Abstract

Over the past decade, research in the Aucilla River of northwestern Florida, USA, has focused upon understanding the geoarchaeological context of numerous formerly-terrestrial, now-inundated sinkhole spring sites and the landscapes surrounding them. Dozens of terminal Pleistocene and early Holocene-aged diagnostic artifacts have been recovered from this river, some in association with drowned terrestrial soils and intact dateable stratigraphy. Currently-terrestrial sites have thus far proven nearly undateable and are often conflated and deflated, but they provide evidence of extensive and resilient lifeways along the Aucilla River basin over thousands of years. The wealth of paleoenvironmental proxy data recovered from the drowned landscapes can help to explicate where, why, and how some sites have preserved while others have not. These data further suggest how people were adjusting to their changing environments over the more than 14,000 years they have been occupying the Aucilla River basin. This paper details the methods utilized to work on both sides of the waterline to reach a more holistic understanding of geoarchaeological context and human societies in the Aucilla River basin.

摘要

在过去的十年中，在美国西北佛罗里达的奥柯拉河进行的研究集中在理解许多以前是陆地的，现在被淹没的下沉泉水站点及其周围景观的地质考古背景。从这条河中已经发现了数十个更新世末期和全新世早期的诊断文物，其中一些与淹没的陆地土壤和完整的可追溯的地层有关。迄今为止，目前的陆地站点已被证明几乎是不合时宜的，并且常常被混合和缩小，但是它们提供了数千年来沿奥柯拉河流域广泛而富有弹性的生命周期的证据。从淹没的地形中恢复的大量古环境代理数据可以帮助阐明某些地点的保存位置，原因和方式，而另一些则没有。这些数据进一步表明，人们在居住于Aucilla流域的14,000多年中是如何适应不断变化的环境的。本文详细介绍了在水线两侧工作的方法，以便对奥柯拉河流域的地质考古背景和人类社会有更全面的了解。