Paleo-Indians is a term used to refer to peoples who were present in the Americas at the end of the last Ice Age. The term 'paleo' is an abbreviation of the word 'paleolithic' and refers to when these people lived, the Upper Paleolithic period. They are also referred to as Clovis people.

Paleo-Indians were the first people to have inhabited a large number of areas in the Americas, although there is now some doubt as to if they were the first people to have lived there. They are thought to have entered the two continents from Asia via a land bridge connecting eastern Siberia in with present-day Alaska. This theory too though has been challenged with an alternative theory suggesting that Paleo-Indians, or at least some groups of them, may have come from Europe, Asia, or the Pacific Islands by boat.

Paleo-Indians were nomadic hunter-gatherers whose following animal migrations dictated where they camped. As the glaciers that covered much of North America receded in the warming climate, tundra was the main plant-growth. Paleo-Indians primarily hunted mastodons, and mammoths, as well as prehistoric bear, bison, and caribou, large animals who were able to live off of tundra. They hunted with both fluted stone-pointed wooden lancing spears and shorter spears that they would sling using an atlatl. Paleo-Indians also foraged for edible plants.

Paleo-Indians travelled in small groups of approximately 20 or 50 members. These groups consisted of the members of one extended family. Archaeological evidence of where particular kinds of fluted-stone have been uncovered suggests that groups traded with other groups.

Archaic Indians of the Americas are believed to be direct descendants of Paleo-Indians.

See also

• Clovis culture

External links

Smithsonian Institute: Paleoamerican Origins