ABSTRACT In Late Pleistocene North America colonizing hunter-gatherers knapped and used Clovis fluted projectile points. During their expansion the size and shape of Clovis points changed significantly. Archaeologists know that cultural drift contributed to this variation, but is it possible that this single source could alone generate so much variation so quickly? We present the first of several experimental studies exploring whether Clovis size and shape variation results in performance differences, focusing here on how deeply different Clovis point forms penetrate a target. Our ballistics experiment demonstrates that seven different Clovis point forms penetrated the same target with different effectiveness. Even after tip cross-sectional perimeter is accounted for, there are significant differences in penetration depths between two of the point types. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that Clovis people in different times and places may have chosen specific attributes to provide them with a selective functional advantage.

中文翻译：

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北美克洛维斯角形式和性能：穿透深度的实验评估

摘要在北美洲晚更新世，殖民猎人和采捕者被打劫并使用克洛维斯（Clovis）带凹槽的射弹点。在扩展过程中，Clovis点的大小和形状发生了显着变化。考古学家知道文化的漂移是造成这种变异的原因，但这种单一来源是否有可能如此迅速地单独产生这么多的变异呢？我们介绍了几项实验研究中的第一项，探讨了克洛维斯（Clovis）尺寸和形状变化是否会导致性能差异，这里重点介绍不同克洛维斯（Clovis）点形式穿透目标的深度。我们的弹道实验表明，七种不同的克洛维斯点形法以不同的效果穿透了同一目标。即使考虑到尖端的横截面周长，两种点类型之间的穿透深度存在显着差异。这些结果与这样的假设是一致的，即克洛维斯人在不同的时间和地点可能选择了特定的属性来为他们提供选择性的功能优势。