cover image The Settlement of the Americas: A New Prehistory

The Settlement of the Americas: A New Prehistory

Thomas D. Dillehay, Tom D. Dillehay. Basic Books, $27.5 (371pp) ISBN 978-0-465-07668-0

In a gripping and groundbreaking new study, University of Kentucky anthropologist Dillehay (Monte Verde: A Late Pleistocene Settlement in Chile) pushes back by at least 1,000 years our estimates of when the New World was first settled. He challenges a long-held belief--that the first inhabitants of the Americas were the so-called Clovis people, a big-game-hunting culture who came through North America starting 11,200 years ago and reached South America even later. Drawing on his 20-plus years of research at Monte Verde, in Chile, he argues that South America was inhabited by 12,500 years ago. Indeed, he suggests, there were multiple pre-Clovis migrations to the Americas from several different points in Asia and possibly other parts of the world. Thus, the continent was a land of great cultural diversity at least 11,000 years ago. Dillehay also offers some evidence that these populations were physically as well as culturally diverse; he postulates that late Pleistocene America was the world's first real ethnic melting pot. The first Americans, he argues, do not fit into any of our contemporary categories of race or ethnicity. Writing in accessible but still scientifically rigorous prose, the anthropologist does a good job of supporting his controversial claims with solid radiocarbon dating and other evidence; his passion for and mastery of the topic make for an impressive narrative. Whether or not future scholarship confirms Dillehay's theories, this is a valuable book for anyone interested in archeology, early American settlements or the history of science. (June)