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"The End of the Folsom Culture: A Transition in Ancient North America (c. 4000 BCE)"
Content:
Around 4000 BCE, the Folsom culture—a Paleo-Indian hunter-gatherer society known for its distinctive fluted projectile points—faded from prominence in North America. This marked the end of an era defined by specialized big-game hunting, particularly of now-extinct megafauna like the giant bison (Bison antiquus).
The Folsom people (flourishing c. 9000-4000 BCE) were successors to the earlier Clovis culture and were highly skilled in crafting finely fluted spear points, which were used to hunt large mammals. Archaeological sites, such as Folsom, New Mexico (where the culture was first identified in 1927), reveal evidence of communal hunts and butchery sites.
Several factors likely contributed to the culture's disappearance:
1. Climate Change: The end of the Pleistocene and the warming Holocene epoch altered ecosystems, reducing the grasslands that sustained large herds of bison.
2. Overhunting: Some scholars suggest that human predation, combined with environmental shifts, may have accelerated the decline of megafauna.
3. Cultural Adaptation: As large game became scarcer, Folsom descendants may have shifted toward broader-spectrum foraging, leading to new technological and social developments.
The end of the Folsom tradition gave way to later Archaic-period cultures, which diversified their subsistence strategies, incorporating smaller game, plant gathering, and eventually early agriculture.
Limitations of Knowledge:
Precise details about the Folsom culture's decline remain speculative due to limited archaeological evidence. The transition was likely gradual rather than a single "event," and regional variations in adaptation complicate the narrative.
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