Reconsidering the role of bison in the terminal Late Prehistoric (Toyah) period in Texas

Toyah Phase of Central Texas: Late Prehistoric Economic

Volumn 9781603447553, Issue , 2012, Pages 90-110

  Mauldin, Raymond ^a   Thompson, Jennifer ^a   Kemp, Leonard ^b,c  

^a UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT SAN ANTONIO   (United States)

^b Geo Marine Inc   (United States)

^c APPLIED RESEARCH ASSOCIATES   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84957769626     PISSN: None     EISSN: None     Source Type: Book    
DOI: None     Document Type: Chapter

References (2)

1. The question here, as well as at several otherpoints in this analysis, is one of both temporal and spatial scale. The spatial scale of bison migration has been widely debated (e.g., Barsness 1985; Epp 1988; Morgan 1980:157). Cahalane (1954:77) notes that herds may remain in a region for several weeks if forage is adequate, then move rapidly to new grazing areas. Bison certainly may have been absent from much of Texas on a seasonal or yearly basis for brief periods during the long period considered here. Such absences would, however, be invisible at an archaeological time scale. In his original characterization of the "presence/absence" argument, Dillehay (1974) appears to have used those terms in a similar sense. He subsequently has suggested that "frequent" and "infrequent" may be terms that are closer to his original meaning, given the immense size of the region considered and the temporal resolution available (Dillehay, personal communication, 2008).
2. 4 proxies all decline late in the sequence.