Geoarchaeology of the Mockingbird Gap (Clovis) site, Jornada del Muerto, New Mexico

Abstract

The Mockingbird Gap site is one of the largest Clovis sites in the western United States, yet it remains poorly known after it was tested in 1966-1968. Surface collecting and mapping of the site revealed a dense accumulation of Clovis lithic debris stretching along Chupadera Draw, which drains into the Jornada del Muerto basin. We conducted archaeological testing and geoarchaeological coring to assess the stratigraphic integrity of the site and gain clues to the paleoenvironmental conditions during the Clovis occupation. The 1966-1968 excavations were in stratified Holocene eolian sand and thus that assemblage was from a disturbed content. An intact Clovis occupation was found elsewhere in the site, embedded in the upper few centimeters of a well-developed buried Bt horizon formed in eolian sand, representing the regional Clovis landscape. Coring in Chupadera Draw revealed ϳ11 m of fill spanning the past ϳ11,000 14 C years. The stratified deposits provide evidence of flowing and standing water on the floor of the draw during Clovis times, a likely inducement to settlement.

Clovis Paleoecology and Lithic Technology in the Central Rio Grande Rift Region, New Mexico

“…Here we describe and analyze two relatively unknown Clovis projectile point assemblages from the central Rio Grande rift region of New Mexico (Figure 2). The first assemblage includes 222 projectile points from the Mockingbird Gap site (Holliday et al 2009;Huckell et al 2006;Huckell et al 2008;Judge 1973;Weber and Agogino 1997), located southeast of Socorro, New Mexico, and the second assemblage includes 70 surface-collected projectile points from a survey of the greater central Rio Grande rift region (Figure 3). Both assemblages were collected, catalogued, and curated over a period of about 60 years by Robert H. Weber, 1 a geologist for the New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources and an avocational archaeologist.…”

“…The site was first discovered in the late 1950s by Robert H. Weber. The Mockingbird Gap site covers an area of about 800 m by 150 m along a low-lying gravel ridge adjacent to Chupadera Wash (Holliday et al 2009). The surface-collected artifacts come from two primary concentrations, a northern cluster and a southern cluster, both of which seem to have an internal substructure of artifacts suggesting spatially and/or temporally discrete occupation events (Hamilton 2008).…”

“…The first project focused on a locality in the southern cluster and took place between 1966 and 1967 under the direction of George Agogino of Eastern New Mexico University (ENMU) (Weber and Agogino 1997). The second project was initiated in 2005 in the area of the ENMU excavations, but in 2007 was focused in the northern cluster at a locality referred to as Locus 1214 under the direction of Bruce Huckell and Vance Holliday (Holliday et al 2009;Huckell et al 2006;Huckell et al 2008). In this paper, we include projectile points recovered from these excavations.…”

“…Geoarchaeological coring of Chupadera Wash, currently a dry, shallow drainage with localized arroyo development located immediately to the west of the site, revealed that the wash was deeply incised (~10m below the site and the present floor) during the Clovis period and occupied by a stream or wetland or both, and possibly spring fed Huckell et al 2008). This wetland environment likely would have attracted game along (Holliday 1997;Holliday et al 2009). In effect, the central Rio Grande Valley would have offered the benefits of a Plains-like foraging environment with the additional benefit of local access to high quality lithic raw materials and a wide diversity of ecosystems.…”

Geoarchaeology of the Water Canyon Paleoindian site, west‐central New Mexico

“…The Terminal Pleistocene stratigraphic record at Water Canyon contrasts with that from other localities in the Southwest. The Mockingbird Gap site to the east‐southeast (Holliday et al, ) and the Scholle site to the northeast (Hall, Penner, Palacios‐Fest, Metcalf, & Smith, ) as well as Murray Springs and other Clovis sites in the upper San Pedro Valley of southeast Arizona (Haynes, ; Haynes & Huckell, ) all exhibit conformable stratigraphic sequences for the period ~13,500 to ~10,000 cal years. In particular, the Stratum 6 wetland mud is broadly similar lithologically and chronologically to that proposed for the “black mats” of the San Pedro Valley, the “wet meadow” zone at the Scholle site, and the palustrine muds (stratum 2) at the Mockingbird Gap site.…”