Newly Discovered Footprints Dramatically Re-date When Humans First Came to Americas
A new study published in the journal Science Advances confirms that the peopling of the Americas began much earlier than originally thought.
Back in 2021, a series of footprints were discovered within the mud of a paleolake bed which had long ago dried up. A 2021 study hypothesized that the prints meant the arrival of settlers to North America occurred somewhere between 23,000 and 21,000 years earlier than previously believed. Now, the new study has confirmed that the footprints were made between 20,700 and 22,400 years ago.
"It's a remarkably consistent record," explained lead author Vance Holliday, who was also a co-author on the initial study. "You get to the point where it's really hard to explain all this away. As I say in the paper, it would be serendipity in the extreme to have all these dates giving you a consistent picture that's in error.”
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Halliday undertook the study for a second time because there was some controversy over the use of ancient pollen and seeds to determine the footprints’ age. For this new study, he and his researchers analyzed the mud itself. “Mud never lies,” Halliday said, explaining that it always holds up to radiocarbon analysis. This most recent study makes the third paper and third laboratory to confirm the timeframe of the footprints’ creation.
“It would be serendipity in the extreme to have all these dates giving you a consistent picture that's in error,” Halliday said.
R. Scott Byram, Kent G. Lightfoot, Jun Ueno Sunseri/CC BY 4.0
The discovery is particularly notable for its lack of artifacts, leading Halliday to posit that the footprints were left by nomadic hunter-gatherers trudging through the lake bed. “These people live by their artifacts, and they were a long way from where they can acquire replacement material,” he explained. “They're not just randomly losing artifacts. It’s logical…If you’re passing through, carrying your gear, you’re not leaving it by chance.”
The footprints predate the Clovis people, which have long been believed to be the oldest North American humans on record. “When you stand there and see the prints, you understand they undermine everything you've learned. They're not gesture steps—they're a revolution in human arrival history,” Holliday said.