The footprints of family members gathered around a hearth fire thousands of years ago on the central coast of B.C. may be the oldest ever found in North America.
Radiocarbon dating shows footprints are 13,200 years old
CBC News
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The footprints of family members gathered around a hearth fire thousands of years ago on the central coast of B.C. may be the oldest ever found in North America.
The impressions left by the feet of two adults and a child in the soft clay of Calvert Islandappear to be 13,200 years old, which would make them older than any others ever found on the continent, announcedthe Hakai Institute, a research organization that helped supportthe research.
"It was really quite exciting because with every brush of the trowel, you'd see toes appearing, or a heel or the arch of a foot,"recalledUniversity of Victoria archeologist Duncan McLaren, as he described the discovery to CBC's All Points West."Thehair on the back of our necks was standing up."
- Can't see the image? View raw and enhanced images of one of thefootprints here.
If the prints are as old as they appear, they are also theoldest evidence ever found of humans living along the coast of B.C.,added McLaren. He and University of Victoria colleague Daryl Fedjeled the archeologicalteam that made the discovery.
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Thefirst footprint, pressed in grey clay that was covered with other sediments, was found late last yearjust as work was wrapping up for the autumn season.
"We weren't actually too certain what we found, but we took some photographs, also took some samples of the sediment from within the footprint," he said.
Radiocarbondating of two samples of material from the footprint showed it was 13,100 to13,200 years old —older than any other evidence of humans in coastal B.C.
"We were very excited," McLaren recalled in another interview with CBC News. "To tell you the truth, we were a little bit surprisedthat we got such early dates."
12 more prints
The resultsprompted the team to return to Calvert Island to do a larger dig this past May.
This time, they found 12 distinct footprints belonging to a larger adult, a smaller adultand a child, and the remains of a hearth fire that the group —probably a family —had been gathered around.The hearth itself wasfull of charcoal and ash and ringed by rocks, including a stone tool that would have been used for chopping or cutting, McLaren said.
It was a challenging project, he added, because thedig sitewas located in the intertidal zone.Thesamples were very oldand fragile, requiring great care during the excavation.
"But at the same time the tide is coming in and will create havoc for us so it's always a little bit of rush against time."
Because the dig took placeless than twomonths ago, the team hasn't yet had the chance to get radiocarbon dates for the other footprints or publish the results in a peer-reviewed journal. But McLaren said the team decided to go public with the results because it's an exciting find and journalists had been asking about it.
He cautioned that more work is needed toconfirm the results, as material found a few metres away was just 2,000 years old. But he says he's fairlyconfident thefootprints are closer to 13,200 years oldbecause thosedates came from the footprint material itself.
The oldest human archeological remains ever found in B.C. are from a cave inHaida Gwaii, dating to about 12,500 years ago.
"This is pushing it back 700 years," he said. "It's quite a long period of time."
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Migration by boat
McLaren says the find could provide key evidence about how the continent's first inhabitants migrated south. Older archeologicalremains havebeen found in both north of B.C., in Alaska, and south of B.C. in Oregon. It wasn't clear whether people moved from Alaska to Oregon bytravellinginland on footnear the Rockies or along the coast by boat. But the new discovery favours the water route.
"There's no way to get toCalvert Island other than watercraft, and that applies to 13,000 years ago as it does today," McLaren said.
The team plans to do carbon dating on the new footprints to ensure they can duplicate their results. They are also dating the ash from the hearth and examining it under the microscope.
The research was supported by the Hakai Institute, a research organization fundedby the private, non-profitTula Foundation. Members ofthe local Heiltsuk and WuikinuxvFirst Nations also participated.
To hear the full interview withDuncanMcLaren, listen to the audio labelled 13,000-year-old footprints.
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