"Who were the first humans to inhabit North America? According to the now familiar story, mammal hunters entered the continent some 12,000 years ago via a land bridge that spanned the Bering Sea and introduced the distinctive stone tools of the Clovis culture. Drawing from original archaeological analysis, paleoclimatic research, and genetic studies, noted archaeologists Dennis J. Stanford and Bruce A. Bradley challenge that narrative. Their hypothesis places the technological antecedents of Clovis technology in Europe, with the culture of Solutrean people in France and Spain more than 20,000 years ago, and posits that the first Americans crossed the Atlantic by boat and arrived earlier than previously thought."--Back cover.

This volume presents a detailed description and analysis of the technology of tool production in the Clovis, Paleoindian period of North American prehistory. Lithic technology is most exhaustively covered, but ivory, bone, antler, and tooth tool production is considered as well. In addition, microscopic analysis of a number of lithic tools provides indications of some of the uses to which these tools were put.

Co-authored by Bruce Bradley. Includes bibliography and glossary.

A comprehensive revision of the classic prehistory of the North American high plains.