FORAGERS AND COLLECTORS IN THE ARCHAIC AND WOODLAND PERIODS: LITHIC EVIDENCE FROM LAKE HUDSON, MAYES COUNTY

Abstract

The archaeological record in northeastern Oklahoma has been infrequently plumbed for evidence regarding the timing and pace of the hunter-gatherer change from mostly “Forager” strategies to mostly “Collector” behavior. The best current evidence suggests that by 1,000 C.E. the populations of the region had adopted sedentary farming as a major subsistence regime. However intriguing indirect evidence of changes in hunting practices, complex subsistence strategies, and increasing sedentism has been noted for populations in the vicinity of Lake Hudson, in Mayes County. Analysis of stone projectile points has the potential to increase the resolution of our understanding of incipient residential sedentism in the region. Contemporaneous Archaic and Woodland components from four sites in the vicinity of Lake Hudson contain a projectile point assemblage ranging from the Early Archaic to the Terminal Late Woodland. In this thesis research I evaluate the extent to which these projectile points exhibit criteria associated with a shift from highly residentially mobile forager hunting and gathering subsistence to a more sedentary collector logistical strategy. A research sample of Archaic and Woodland Period projectile points from these four sites was analyzed using morphological metrics analyses. The results of these analyses were statistically examined in search of correlations indicating of a shift in technological organization matching the increasing adoption of more sedentary Collector subsistence activity during the period in question. This research concluded that the lithic analysis produced inconclusive results that did not match the manufacturing and curation expectations set forth in the Forager-Collector subsistence and land-use model.