Abstract
ABSTRACTFour recently identified sites from eastern Santa Rosa Island contain flaked-stone artifacts diagnostic of Paleocoastal occupations between ∼13,000 and 8000 calendar years ago. The largest site (CA-SRI-997/H) contains two discrete loci that have been the subject of recent testing and data recovery excavations reported elsewhere. Three smaller, nearby sites are lithic scatters that produced Paleocoastal stemmed points and/or crescents. When occupied, the sites were located adjacent to a perennial stream ∼3–5 km from the shore of a large embayment named Crescent Bay, which persisted until ∼9000 ± 500 calendar years ago. The Crescent Bay area contained freshwater, estuarine, and marine habitats – as well as terrestrial plant communities rich in geophytes and other edible plant foods. Understanding Paleocoastal settlement patterns and the paleogeography of the area enriches our understanding of early human lifeways on the Channel Islands and may help predict the location of Paleocoastal sites on the submerged, offshore landscapes.
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