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Changing Holocene Environments at the Koster Site: A Geo-Archaeological Perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Karl W. Butzer
Karl W. Butzer*
Affiliation:
Departments of Anthropology and Geography, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637
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Abstract

Geomorphologic and sediment-stratigraphic study of the Koster site has been carried out in the broader context of the lower Illinois Valley. Accumulation of reworked loess in an overdeepened tributary valley began at Koster shortly after 10,000 B.P., and continued through Holocene times with major sedimentary breaks. The Illinois floodplain began to stabilize ca. 5000 B.P. after rapid aggradation, but remained a dynamic environment that developed its present patterns after 2500 B.P. Valley-margin hillside vegetation was considerably more xeric during the periods 1200-950 B.P., 2100–1900 B.P., and ca. 9700–5000 B.P., with hillside woodland reduced to hill prairie or parkland ca. 8500–7700 B.P. These dramatic Holocene environmental changes suggest that interpretative archaeological models for cultural adaptations through time must consider the environment as a critical variable, rather than as a constant.

Type
Reports
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 43 , Issue 3 , July 1978 , pp. 408 - 413
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1978

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References

Reference Cited

Butzer, K. W. 1977 Geomorphology of the lower Illinois Valley as a spatial-temporal context for the Koster Archaicsite. Illinois State Museum, Reports on Investigations 34:1–60.Google Scholar