Post by Okwes on Feb 8, 2006 11:00:16 GMT -5
10,000-year-old site puts recognition in perspective
Monday, February 6, 2006
BY GEORGE KRIMSKY
www.rep-am.com/story.php?id=2554&p=0
WASHINGTON, Conn. -- When the subject of Native Americans is raised
in Connecticut these days, public attention is drawn to gambling
casinos and legal struggles over tribal recognition.
What tends to be forgotten or ignored is a history, which thanks to a
discovery here three decades ago, extends back in time more than
10,000 years.
It was then that the first inhabitants of the area arrived, according
to artifacts unearthed along the Shepaug River in 1977. Called the
Templeton site, it revealed a camping ground where a wide variety of
stone tools were fashioned by what archaeologists call Paleo-Indians.
Radiocarbon tests pinpointed the site as being 10,190 years old.
"Human habitation probably goes back even earlier, because
Connecticut was free of glaciers as of 15,000 years ago," said
Lucianne Lavin, director of research at the Institute for American
Indian Studies here. "But we don't yet have hard evidence of that."
Although the archaeological evidence leaves no question that Indians
got here way before the Europeans, science has been little help in
proving the modern legal case for tribes like the Schaghticoke of
Kent, who have been trying to gain federal recognition since the
early 1980s.
That is because the U.S. government requires for official
recognition, among other evidence, proof that a specific tribe
maintained a continuous cultural, political and bloodline identity
from the "first sustained contact" with white settlers during
Colonial rule up to the present. For that, genealogical records,
correspondence and official documents are more relevant than science.
Even DNA identification is not applicable, the experts contend,
because there are no available tissue samples from the early period.
The whole question of tribal identity is a fairly recent one in the
timeline of human habitation of this continent.
"We are only able to trace back tribes to the late Woodland period,
about 500 A.D.," Lavin said.
The earliest Paleo-Indians banded together in "small, extended family
units" and tended to be migratory, moving from one place to another
with the season and availability of food, she said.
"The European psychology was to stake out a piece of land," said
Roger Moeller, an archaeologist from Bethlehem who was one of the
discoverers of the Templeton site. "For the early Indians, it was
different. Once your firewood is more than a half day's walk away,
you just move."
Washington's role in piecing together Connecticut's prehistoric past
began in the early 1960s, when teachers from The Gunnery, an
independent secondary school here, ventured out with their students,
armed with spades and toothbrushes, to see what they could find
beyond the occasional arrowhead.
The first meaningful discovery came in 1970 when biology teacher
Edmund Swigart and his students uncovered evidence of circular
dwellings, like wigwams, dating back to 1,500 B.C. near the bank of
the Shepaug.
"That's what blew the lid off everything," remembered Swigart, who
still lives here in retirement. "Suddenly, we had an army of
volunteers who wanted to help."
Continued discoveries prompted the establishment of the Indian
studies institute in 1975. Two years later, Swigart and Moeller
uncovered the Templeton site, drawing interest from around the world
and prompting a revision of New England's early history.
Until that discovery, the oldest human habitation in New England was
believed to be 5,500 years ago. Templeton -- named whimsically from a
local gravel excavation company -- moved human history in the area
back 4,500 years.
It was a great leap -- and a great gap in current knowledge --
between the Paleo-Indians and their modern counterparts. The
Algonquin-speaking peoples, from which the Schaghticoke come, are
believed to have arrived in the area about 1000 B.C. from the Great
Lakes area.
Whether they encountered any descendants from the earliest settlers
is not known.
Monday, February 6, 2006
BY GEORGE KRIMSKY
www.rep-am.com/story.php?id=2554&p=0
WASHINGTON, Conn. -- When the subject of Native Americans is raised
in Connecticut these days, public attention is drawn to gambling
casinos and legal struggles over tribal recognition.
What tends to be forgotten or ignored is a history, which thanks to a
discovery here three decades ago, extends back in time more than
10,000 years.
It was then that the first inhabitants of the area arrived, according
to artifacts unearthed along the Shepaug River in 1977. Called the
Templeton site, it revealed a camping ground where a wide variety of
stone tools were fashioned by what archaeologists call Paleo-Indians.
Radiocarbon tests pinpointed the site as being 10,190 years old.
"Human habitation probably goes back even earlier, because
Connecticut was free of glaciers as of 15,000 years ago," said
Lucianne Lavin, director of research at the Institute for American
Indian Studies here. "But we don't yet have hard evidence of that."
Although the archaeological evidence leaves no question that Indians
got here way before the Europeans, science has been little help in
proving the modern legal case for tribes like the Schaghticoke of
Kent, who have been trying to gain federal recognition since the
early 1980s.
That is because the U.S. government requires for official
recognition, among other evidence, proof that a specific tribe
maintained a continuous cultural, political and bloodline identity
from the "first sustained contact" with white settlers during
Colonial rule up to the present. For that, genealogical records,
correspondence and official documents are more relevant than science.
Even DNA identification is not applicable, the experts contend,
because there are no available tissue samples from the early period.
The whole question of tribal identity is a fairly recent one in the
timeline of human habitation of this continent.
"We are only able to trace back tribes to the late Woodland period,
about 500 A.D.," Lavin said.
The earliest Paleo-Indians banded together in "small, extended family
units" and tended to be migratory, moving from one place to another
with the season and availability of food, she said.
"The European psychology was to stake out a piece of land," said
Roger Moeller, an archaeologist from Bethlehem who was one of the
discoverers of the Templeton site. "For the early Indians, it was
different. Once your firewood is more than a half day's walk away,
you just move."
Washington's role in piecing together Connecticut's prehistoric past
began in the early 1960s, when teachers from The Gunnery, an
independent secondary school here, ventured out with their students,
armed with spades and toothbrushes, to see what they could find
beyond the occasional arrowhead.
The first meaningful discovery came in 1970 when biology teacher
Edmund Swigart and his students uncovered evidence of circular
dwellings, like wigwams, dating back to 1,500 B.C. near the bank of
the Shepaug.
"That's what blew the lid off everything," remembered Swigart, who
still lives here in retirement. "Suddenly, we had an army of
volunteers who wanted to help."
Continued discoveries prompted the establishment of the Indian
studies institute in 1975. Two years later, Swigart and Moeller
uncovered the Templeton site, drawing interest from around the world
and prompting a revision of New England's early history.
Until that discovery, the oldest human habitation in New England was
believed to be 5,500 years ago. Templeton -- named whimsically from a
local gravel excavation company -- moved human history in the area
back 4,500 years.
It was a great leap -- and a great gap in current knowledge --
between the Paleo-Indians and their modern counterparts. The
Algonquin-speaking peoples, from which the Schaghticoke come, are
believed to have arrived in the area about 1000 B.C. from the Great
Lakes area.
Whether they encountered any descendants from the earliest settlers
is not known.