Paleo People

Folsom Point

NPS Photo

Paleo People-13,500 to 8000 B.C.
By the end of the last Ice Age, hunter-gatherers roamed the Southwest. During this time, the region was cooler with a grassland environment. People gathered wild plants for food and hunted extinct forms of bison and other large herd animals. The nomads used a device called an atlatl to throw their spears and darts. With their distinctive elegant fluting, the projectile points of these ancient people help define the Clovis and Folsom Cultures. Folsom and Clovis camps have been found within Petrified Forest National Park as well as fluted projectile points made of petrified wood.

 

Archaic Point

NPS/ZION

Archaic Culture-8000 to 500 B.C.
By 4000 B.C., the climate had become similar to that of the present. The area became warmer and the monsoon pattern of precipitation evolved. The megafauna of the past were extinct. People had to broaden their source of food, including many different species of plants and animals. Farming and sedentism began during this period, particularly as corn was brought into the region from the south in the Late Archaic Period. Indicative of this period were one-handed manos, basin metates, flaked tools, and no pottery.