Through the Shadow: The Archaeology of Western Appalachian Caves and Rockshelters.

[@AncientAmericas]

I'm loving these videos about cave archaeology. Super interesting stuff!

[@NathanDudani]

Love your channel

[@AncientAmericas]

@@NathanDudani why thank you!

[@daviddawson1718]

Great work, both of you

[@FacesintheStone]

Woot woot for knowledge!

[@tedtimmis8135]

For a Viking, you deliver a pretty damn good lecture. Well done, Ivar!

[@cabbyabby8490]

AA turned me onto this channel. Thanks AA I'm loving it. This is a knowledge I am very grateful for it thank you

[@CrazyBear65]

What does Alcoholics Anonymous have to do with archeaology?

[@rodneycaupp5962]

35 students in one uncharted western Appalachian Cave... getting lost, finding the main cave the river flows through... Exit at top of slope at the Lake on top of Spruce Knob WV.... PRICELESS

[@ght.s1732]

i'm a chemist but, i admit it, i am falling in love with archeology

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

It's an addiction more than it is anything else.

[@justinrobinson2359]

Thank you so much for taking time to make these awesome videos man. I can literally put your videos on and just listen and pickup some great info.

[@jfu5222]

I appreciate the way you present information without dumbing it down too much. There's enough content on KZbin that's basically entertainment for folks with a grade school education and a short attention span.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

I'm glad you're enjoying it! I aim to be clear and to the point.

[@jfu5222]

@@NathanaelFosaaen Any chance you could go more in depth on the balanoculture (I believe that specifically refers to acorn mast use) in the Eastern Woodlands? I have read about West coast tribes of a much later time placing great importance on this resource. Most of what I know comes from William Bryant Logan's book, Oak: The Frame of Civilization. A great read by the way.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

@@jfu5222 there's a whole-ass fight about this between Ken Sassaman and James Truncer concerning the function of soapstone vessels. I've thought about reviewing that debate at some point. I'll put it on the to-do list.

[@jfu5222]

@@NathanaelFosaaen thank you

[@lezardvaleth2304]

12:27 I do like how you try to avoid assigning a specific biased sort of meaning to what the specially mined chert was for. Most other archaelogists I've seen would started saying the word 'ritual' ten seconds into the explanation.

[@thequestforartifacts]

Thank you for the information, I enjoy your videos also Congratulations on your new subscribers, when I subscribed you had only 200....

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

Thanks! The recent uptick is mostly from the Ancient Americas channel giving me a shout-out last week. Go follow his channel if you haven't already.

[@RobVollat]

@@NathanaelFosaaen I found a video of yours via the KZbin algorithm of suggested videos while watching Charles Mann present “Living in the Homogenocene: The First 500 Years” on the ‘Long Now Foundations’ KZbin channel. The Long Now is a truly great organization and I’m very glad that it brought me to your channel

[@gnostic268]

This is really interesting. I'm wondering how closely these earlier people are related to the more recent Cherokee/Tsalagi people who were originally living around that area up to 200 years ago. They're more matrilineal and traditionally in the past had a designated Beloved Woman so they would have buried certain women with honors. The women were usually in charge of their gardens/agriculture and the men hunted, etc. In my own tribe (Lakota) women practiced living apart during menstruation times (isnati) and are still not allowed around any ceremonies today during their moon times which was originally probably for sanitation but also because the ability to give birth was seen as a powerful spiritual time. A woman who died in childbirth was given a warrior's burial so apparently these are widespread very ancient traditions. Thank you for the video.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

I'm always curious about that too. It's SO hard to say what the relationship of Archaic peoples was to modern ethnic affiliations like the Cherokee. I think about what my ancestors were up to 8000 years ago in Eurasia when the Early-Middle Archaic transition happened here. It's such an absurdly distant time in the past! I talked a little about this in my Archaeology and Language video way back when, but we have some sense that the Cherokee diverged from their northern Iroquoian relatives sometime around the Late Archaic period, so ballpark of 4000 years ago, but exactly what that means in terms of who was living exactly where is so speculative at this point. Glad you found the channel!

[@oltch.]

@@NathanaelFosaaen Hows about down in the caves theres no bad guys are bad animals to get you? Its safe down there? Have you ever looked into the cenote discoverys with humans habitants. My uncle waz part of the scuba team who explored them in the 90s and found human habitation down there. Their findings are only now getting out in textbooks...

[@marschlosser4540]

@@NathanaelFosaaen I was told the Iroquois horde came east perhaps 5,000 years ago. cherokee split off after a civil war and fled south with the sacred men leading them. You have to be cautious about using caves. They were considered haunts of evil.

[@zeideerskine3462]

Good point. Too many authors on the subject forget tat women died in childbirth a lot. There were also some who had many babies without dying in childbirth and that maintained a population. However, in contrast to modern times were women live longer than men, adult populations prior to the age of antibiotics were heavily skewed towards men. That does not mean there were no older women. They were just much rarer than old men.

[@marschlosser4540]

@@zeideerskine3462 I may be wrong, but on average, American Indian women birth very small babies. I was 4 pounds at birth and a younger sister 4.7. Same with all our kids, sibs and cousins. We're about 6 feet tall for men and 5.6 for women. In addition to, there are herbs in the Americas which help, even force a baby from the womb. Tradition is, 4-5 years between babies. Again, there are herbs which stop ovulation and others taken as a morning after tea. Abortion was and is still considered the murder of a child. For that, the mother and abortionist are punished by death. Tobacco is very antibiotic and was widely used. A burial was found in NW Alaska with a small pouch of seeds. the burial is over 5,000 years old. Well over a century ago, when the Materica medica of herbalism was published by the US government most herbal formulas were of American Indian origins.

[@nozrep]

i don’t know the first thing about Norse mythology beyond Hollywood stuff so when he said that Odin thing as an example I paused and went looking for an example of Norse cave art with like, proto Odin or something. Couldn’t find it didn’t look hard enough and the search got drowned out by a bunch of pretty badass looking “fanarts” of Odin depictions from all around the internet. There really are some talented artists out there!

[@joesharp5602]

Lots hard work preparing your informative videos. It must be a labor of love, and I appreciate your sharing your knowledge and experience with us. Keep the great content coming.... Joe

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

Thanks! Most of it is cannibalized from research I did for technical reports at work or term papers in school, but organizing the ideas and keeping as much jargon out as I can does take a bit of thought.

[@zenolachance1181]

Maybe they were mining the Flint in the cave during adverse weather. When the outside is covered in snow and ice , and you know where the Flint is on the inside , it may be easier to acquire the Flint in the cave than outside. I think we put too much emphasis on religion many things are construed assumed to be religious in origin and it may just be looking at it through modern eyes and assuming they were overly zealous. IMO just a thought...... keep up the good work, I'm finding your videos quite fascinating and I have learned a lot in the few weeks I have been watching thank you

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

It's Tennessee. It doesn't get THAT cold there, and even if it did, at no point is it ever easier to go a few miles underground to get chert than it is to find it in a creek bed.

[@mollydickens1280]

Fascinated with Caves !

[@weissblitz88]

Very interesting videos!!! Thanks for sharing!

[@FacesintheStone]

Would love to see Archaeologist Nathaniel talk about Effigies and face stone art found in North America. My profile picture is a photo realistic image of a person on a 9 to 10 inch arrowhead found in North Carolina alongside a mound and piles of huge granite statues that are currently being exploded by our state…

[@postictal7846]

Enjoyed your presentation. I like the imagery of ordinary life you share. It's a bit out of your geographic area, but would these patterns of life apply to Fate Bell Shelter and Panther Cave in Texas.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

I'd have to read the site reports.

[@headlessspaceman5681]

"I'm going to start in the light and later move into the dark." Yeah that was also my path to metal. \m/

[@bobconnor1210]

As a young caver, I casually explored parts of Russell Cave beyond the vestibule, which I appreciated as a fine deep rock shelter.. An excellent place to be when the weather goes to hell.

[@ellenbruckermarshall4179]

Thanks for your Good Work! I’m developing a folk drama about early guides at Mammoth Cave in the 1850s. Any info or experience with early, early cave guides? Caving with Patty Jo Watson I know they went way into Salts Cave Kentucky. Another curiosity, any evidence of music in the caves? If so where should I look for more information?

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

That sounds AWESOME! of course everyone talks about Stephen Bishop and his family, but I'm not familiar with much else on the subject. Maybe shoot Jan Simek an email. He's not great about responding but this might pique his interest.

[@headlessspaceman5681]

I've been looking at human habitation of rock shelters in the Southwest/Four Corners for years and years and yet I know nothing about rock shelter habitation back East. This is crammed with great information for someone like myself coming into the subject with total ignorance and walk away feeling like I just took a field tour. The things that are interesting to yourself are the things that make it interesting and keeps it from getting too dry, ie talking about rock art iconography, gender in archaeological sites, I've just started reading Engendering Archaeology ed. Gero/Conkey. The serrated, triangular Dalton points you showed earlier looked to me like reworked Clovis points...? Maybe it was just trendy at the time, everyone had to rework a Clovis point or they weren't cool.

[@NocturnalIntellect]

Ok. Many tools I’ve found in N Illinois resemble that Mississippian gods head, and beak. Great video, and information. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

[@terrywallace5181]

Very informative.

[@bjornbenson3989]

hey brother im a viking living in africa. good stuff, thank u, b

[@janices6370]

Thank you!

[@mikemoriarty6061]

Hi Nathanael! Thank you for posting these videos and for taking people's questions. Is there any effort that you're aware of for use of LiDAR in surrounding West Virginia/Virginia Appalachia area?

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

Not specifically. I'm sure it's out there but that's mostly useful for detecting landscape modifications, which isn't what I do so I'm not really plugged into that scope of work.

[@rocksandoil2241]

Always curious about the "Bluff Dwellers" in the NW AR/SW MO corner and around, who seems to have lived near caves as well as under rock bluffs. The other curious site in my mind is the Afton Springs (Oklahoma) which apparently dried up when they started mining lead and zinc, and when excavated 110± years ago they found Mammoth or Mastodon teeth, stone tools, and other apparent offerings to the spring. Apparently there has not been any investigation of that site since that one early excavation.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

vimeo.com/426320014 you'll be into this.

[@texanfilms]

Have you read The First Signs by Genevieve Von Petzinger? Would love to hear your thoughts on it. Has a similar catalogue been assembled for cave art in the Americas?

[@CrazyBear65]

Meadowcroft rockshelter. My maternal ancestors had a written language 22,000 years ago.

[@JosephKeenanisme]

I'm seriously planning a visit to the site in NY. The climate around the NE and Great Lakes isn't good for preservation of wood & skin artifacts :(. I heard something about a air burst (small comet or meteor) that scorched a good deal of the continental US, about the time of the Clovis People in Virginia. Unfortunate that that is about all I can remember about the article.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

That's Chris Moore's work. He thinks the event happened up in Canada, but the soil depositions from it are found all over the place.

[@brucegordon9615]

Are there any megalithic rock structures located in the area you indicate on your map (eastern woodlands) similar to those found in Mexico and South America? The burial mounds are the largest man made structures that I am aware of but to me they seem much less labor intensive than the rock structures found further South. If there are no megalithic rock structures in the Eastern portion of the USA, do you have any thoughts on why they only happened further South?

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

Northeast of mesoamerica people really don't seem to do much architecture with stone. The temple mounds are much bigger than the burial mounds, and they're still labor intensive as all hell. Long-term they might be even more labor intensive because earthen structures require constant maintenance. And those temple mounds are HUGE. Monk's Mound is bigger than the pyramids at Giza. As to why not, I'd ask why would they? What would be the point of switching from earthwork complexes to stonework? Especially if your engineers already have the soil mechanics worked out for building stable structures. If nobody else is doing it, what's the point?

[@brucegordon9615]

As always your video’s and reply are well thought out and complete while still being easy to understand by us laymen. Thanks for the reply.

[@heightsofsagarmatha]

A mystery to me as well.

[@cheapvodka9942]

ty smart people

[@danc3367]

Do you have knowledge of caves in North Central Arkansas. I used to live within a few hundred feet of one*. The archaeologists that worked in that cave said Indians had lived there for at least 10,000 years. I moved away while they were still digging. I'm curious if they found anything interesting? *On Clear Creek near Pyatt Arkansas

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

I'm actually working on a faunal assemblage from an Arkansas bluffshelter as we speak. My former adviser gave this presentation on the work being done there at the Fayetteville library. m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10157767541408902&id=23492578901

[@danc3367]

@@NathanaelFosaaen Thanks, very interesting. "10,000 years" That brief conversation was 20 years ago, or so. He may have said "up to" or some such. The number 10,000 just stuck with me. If you're interested, and have a bit of spare time. Ancient Ozarks Natural History Museum - Top of the Rock The Ralph Foster Museum - At the College of the Ozarks. Thanks again for sharing the video.

[@boburwell9921]

I’d love to hear your take on the mummified dogs found with the Inca royals

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

I don't really know enough about the Inca to comment. Totally different continent

[@boburwell9921]

@@NathanaelFosaaen I learned of them from a yter Robert zepher

[@Scp716creativecommons]

You ever upload any of your music?

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

Nah not really.

[@nozrep]

i like it when he accidentallynotaccidentally burped on camera and it don’t even matter hahaha nice.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

I burp at some point in every video. Sometimes I can edit around it, other times I can't.

[@eriknelson2559]

Any connection to the middle archaic cultural transition in the SE? kzbin.info/www/bejne/j4emdYmdjKaiqbM

[@CaucAsianSasquatch]

I'm curious about tree burials, or maybe under root burials. I've always wondered, is the tree related to burial, incidental or intentionally planted? Why do they all seem to be female?

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

Great question! I've never seen one, and haven't really read about them either.

[@CaucAsianSasquatch]

@@NathanaelFosaaen I have seen 3 "root burials" all in central Georgia near Milledgeville. The trees were toppled by storm damage dislodging the rootball leaving the "grave goods" exposed, Beads, shells, strange braided leather and maybe feather bits. My assessment of "women" is derived from the apparent lack of hunting tools or weapons, and the broken pottery things idk what they were maybe platters and bowls? Maybe it's coincidence or a was local custom. 🤨 I didn't realize it was rare. Thank you.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

@@CaucAsianSasquatch let the Tribal Historic Preservation Office for GA know. They'll want to set their ancestors to rest. We don't generally mess with human remains unless they tell us to.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

@@CaucAsianSasquatch or contact Okmulgee National Park. They should be able to direct you to the appropriate persons.

[@CaucAsianSasquatch]

@@NathanaelFosaaen I touch nothing it's bad luck. With the first I was a child maybe 8, noone believed me. I reported the second one but was not able to relocate it. The third was flooded by the river in the few hours it took to hike out, I reported it's location for what it was worth.

[@lesjones5684]

🍺 in the cave 😂😂

[@christianbuczko1481]

I saw a bushtucker episode earlier, he points out some foods, and finds one root which needs to be processed before eating. He told a story about an aboriginal eldar once turning his nose up at the idea of him doing that. He just said its womans work and walked off. In aborigal society men hunt, women do not, and same with womens work, the men would not do it. It sounds like native americans may have similar attitudes towards work division.

[@NathanaelFosaaen]

In most hunter-gatherer societies it seems like labor is gendered. Not always in ways that we might expect, but it does seem to pattern out that way.

[@jasonbuckman7298]

Also found stone red stained cougar head and horned bird effigies. And found a pinkish quartsite worked stone with what appears a bird with wings stretched open. A lot of weird similarities to hopewell but stone art looks so much cruder then what was found in ohio hopewell culture. This stuff keeps me up late at night endlessly researching who and what these people where who occupied this site. Also located in a funnel of death hunt zone.

[@justdoingitjim7095]

In shelters that were not predominantly occupied by women, the higher percentage of female remains at the shelter could be attributed to the fact that most women died in or close to the shelter. Whereas men tended to die away from the shelter due to accidents and encounter deaths associated with tribal warfare or lethal prey.

[@82dorrin]

That thumbnail looks like you've seen some sh^t. 🤣

[@bsure4]

👍👍

[@lesjones5684]

You are not drinking yet 😢

[@lesjones5684]

You can get a bed 🛌 for your alcoholic self 😂😂

[@Maaaatttttt]

The melted bricks

[@cadebritt8001]

Great seeing and listening to a egg head with long hair and a beard. You know by that this is his labor of love.

[@bannedfordays.5101]

So, no feminism back then? Women did domestic work?

[@lesjones5684]

My girlfriend has a cave 😂😂

[@allthingsflowers]

Very interesting 🤔Morning Star. Jesus! In America...

[@lesjones5684]

Hey there drunk man 😂😂

[@lesjones5684]

You look 👀 drunk 😂😂

[@marschlosser4540]

niio

[@lesjones5684]

Please call doves nest 😂😂Florida

[@CrazyBear65]

It's good that you don't perpetuate the myth of the Berring land bridge hypothesis. Ask any Indigenous Peoples where they come from, I bet none of them say their People came across a land bridge from Siberia. Not even Inuit folks. That whole hypothesis was invented by white Europeans to use as an excuse to push Indigenous Peoples off of ancestral lands. It's the same ignorant mindset that facilitated colonialism across the planet. The white race has a lot of bad Karma to attone for. BTW, Mercury was the Roman interpretation of Hermes. Interesting how the Pantheon is the same across many different cultures. Seems like the same gods/aliens/overlords were called by different names in different locations. Oh, and just one more point: How do you know they didn't have another light source other than torches? The ancient Egyptians had batteries and lightbulbs. Mainstream "science" refuses to admit it, just like they refuse to acknowlage the fact that the Pyramids were never tombs. Read Zecharia Sitchin and Erich Von Daniken. The 1% have ruled this world long enough. It's time for the human species to rise and reclaim that which is rightfully ours.

[@Owyourhurtingme]

I love this stuff, especially northeastern US archeology.

[@solexxx8588]

Have you found any early evidence of man who did not create gods/deities to explain the gaps in their understanding of everything?

[@Owyourhurtingme]

Dude, stop making your videos after a big lunch. 😑