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America before Columbus

See also Native Americans and Archaeology/Anthropology.

Selected Books
Websites

Selected Books

For more library resources browse the subject headings Indians -- Origin.

The First Americans Adovasio, James
The First Americans: In Pursuit of Archaeology's Greatest Mystery
James M. Adovasio, director of the Mercyhurst Archaeological Institute, achieved world acclaim as an archaeologist in the 1970s with his excavation of Meadowcroft Rockshelter, 30 miles southwest of Pittsburgh. Meadowcroft has been recognized as the earliest well-dated archaeological site in the Western Hemisphere, with evidence of human habitation dating to 16,000 years ago.
Bones: Discovering the First Americans Dewar, Elaine
Bones: Discovering the First Americans (2002)
Dewar, a Canadian investigative journalist, interviews the scientists involved in the battle over who were the first Americans.
Riddle of the Bones Downey, Roger
Riddle of the Bones: Politics, Science, Race, and the Story of the Kennewick Man (2000)
From its discovery in the Columbia River shallows in 1996, reporter Roger Downey chronicles the epic adventures of the skeleton called "Kennewick Man" and the controversies over how the Americas first came to be settled & by whom.
The Great Journey: The Peopling of Ancient America Fagan, Brian M.
The Great Journey: The Peopling of Ancient America (2004)
First published in 1987, The Great Journey tells the story of the search for the first Americans--one of archaeology's great controversies. The 2004 edition is an enhanced edition beginning with an update on the debates and discoveries that have taken place since the late 1980s. Fagan presents the latest archaeological findings on both sides of the Bering Strait, new genetic and linguistic research that amplifies earlier theories, and he assesses the importance of global warming to first settlement.
1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus Mann, Charles C.
1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus
A groundbreaking study that uses information from research using novel scientific techniques to alter our understanding of the Americas before the arrival of the Europeans in 1492. The Americas were not a vast unpopulated wilderness but may have had a larger population than Europe.

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Websites

Pittsburgh Region

Pennsylvania

For a selection of books about Pennsylvania's prehistory, browse Indians of North America -- Pennsylvania -- Antiquities.
For Pennsylvania Native Americans browse Indians of North America -- Pennsylvania.

Nearby States

  • Searching for the Great Hopewell Road
    This is a website for a one-hour documentary that explores new research into the monumental earthworks of the Ohio Hopewell people - Native Americans whose culture flourished in the central Ohio Valley about 2000 years ago. The website includes information on cultural resources but without links to websites.

  • Hopewell Culture National Historical Park
    http://www.nps.gov/hocu/
    From about 200 BC to AD 500, the Ohio River Valley was a focal point of the prehistoric Hopewell culture. The term Hopewell describes a broad network of beliefs and practices among different Native American groups over a large portion of eastern North America. The culture is characterized by the construction of enclosures made of earthen walls, often built in geometric patterns, and mounds of various shapes. Visible remnants of Hopewell culture are concentrated in the Scioto River valley near present-day Chillicothe, Ohio.

  • Ohio History Central: Prehistory
    http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/
    A fairly extensive overview of palaeolithic culture in Ohio

  • Serpent Mound
    This is now a National Monument and the largest and finest serpent effigy in the United States.

  • Sunwatch Indian Village, Archaeological Park
    http://www.sunwatch.org/
    Archaeological excavations at a site near the Great Miami River uncovered evidence of an 800-year-old village built by the Fort Ancient Indians. SunWatch Indian Village, a National Historic Landmark, is a reconstruction of that settlement of long ago.

  • West Virginia Archaeology Index
    Includes the archaeological history of West Virginia

United States

Additional resources can be found in Archaeology.
  • Center for the Study of the First Americans
    http://www.centerfirstamericans.com/
    Located at the Department of Anthropology at Texas A&M University., this website offers its quarterly news magazine, the Mammoth Trumpet, to the public, reporting on all aspects of the peopling of the Americas.

  • Chaco Digital Initiative
    http://www.chacoarchive.org/
    Chaco Culture National Historical Park is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and was a major site of Pueblo culture of the American Southwest between 850 BC and AD 1250. The website currently includes an exhaustive bibliography, an image gallery, and links to other online resources.

  • Columbus and the Age of Discovery
    http://muweb.millersville.edu/~columbus/
    over 1100 text articles from magazines, journals, newspapers, speeches, official calendars and other sources relating to various encounter themes. Awarded the status of an "Official Project" by the U.S. Christopher Columbus Quincentenary Jubilee Commission, Spain '92, and the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, CIRS and its databases are freely available to you through your Internet connection.

  • The Columbus Navigation Homepage
    http://www.columbusnavigation.com/
    Examining the History, Navigation, and Landfall of Christopher Columbus by Keith Pickering.

  • Southeast Archaeological Center (National Park Service)
    http://www.cr.nps.gov/seac/
    Outline of Prehistory and History of Southeastern North America and the Caribbean
    Includes an overview of the PaleoIndian, Archaic and Mississipian periods of American prehistory

International

  • Mesoweb
    http://www.mesoweb.com/
    Mesoamerican (Central American and Mexican) archaeology and history.