Martinez Lectures (III), "Clovis First" Archaeology's Achilles Heel?

 Mr Martinez, the apodictic Spanish teacher from the US, thinks we should all know some local lore.  

Mark Martinez @xprofe1 7h.

Tom Dillehay and Graham Hancock

(@Tdillehay50 , @Graham__Hancock)
In the early 1980s Tom Dillehay first published his initial findings regarding his opposition to Clovis First. It wasn't until 1997, when a team of 12 archaeologists visited Monte Verde, that his work began to receive increased acceptance and finally it was recognized as accurate and correct. Clovis First was dead.

For nearly 20 years Dillehay's work was peer reviewed. However, the criticism that Dillehay endured was absolutely crushing and brutal. Dillehay suffered endless personal attacks to his integrity and person.

During this ordeal, mainstream archaeologists claimed their methodology was correct, and Dillehay's was incorrect. However, when it was all said and done, Dillehay was correct, and mainstream archaeologists were incorrect.

Though Graham Hancock is no Tom Dillehay [no one is], I can not help but see the correlation in their treatment by mainstream archaeologists. Dillehay in the end prevailed and was proven right. How much longer before Hancock may also be proven right?

It is one thing to critique a man's work, it is quite another to viciously attack him personally. After witnessing how vicious the attacks have been against Graham Hancock, we can clearly see that nothing has changed with mainstream archaeologists. For the most part, they are still the same cruel and vicious gatekeepers that tormented Tom Dillehay for 20 years. Ironically though, when you return fire, they scatter, play victim, and cry.

Tom Dillehay and Graham Hancock are examples of brave men who defy all the odds and refuse to surrender before immense pressure-campaigns by those who attack them personally.

Thank you Tom and Graham for setting such great examples for future researchers, historians, and archaeologists.
3:47 AM · May 4, 2025

       Спасибо        

That last bit sounds so familiar to somebody living in central eastern Europe ("Thank you Comrade Stalin for the opportunity to have a peaceful and happy childhood in this our beloved Soviet Federation of Socialist Republics, under your leadership....."). Creepy. But this Cult of the Personality crap is now spreading to Trumpland, so perhaps we should not be surprised. Yuk.

Let us start with noting that Monte Verde is an archaeological site [41°30′17″S 73°12′16″W] in southern Chile, near Puerto Montt, discovered in 1975 and excavated by Tom Dillehay starting in 1977. It is primarily known for Monte Verde II (MV-II), dated to approximately 14,550–14,500 calibrated years Before Present (cal BP), making it one of the earliest confirmed human settlements in the Americas. The site’s location in an anaerobic peat bog near Chinchihuapi Creek preserved organic materials exceptionally well, unlike most archaeological sites, which typically yield only stone tools and bones. The site also includes a more controversial layer, Monte Verde I (MV-I), with potential dates as early as 18,500 cal BP or older, though this is less widely accepted (including by the excavator).

Martinez ignores the fact that the acceptance of Monte Verde and other pre-Clovis sites (e.g., Meadowcroft, Cactus Hill) has fundamentally altered the Clovis First paradigm. The field has become more open to earlier human presence in the Americas, suggesting that archaeology is capable of evolving when presented with compelling data.

Again with this twit, we see a confusion in the use of the m-word:

"During this ordeal, mainstream archaeologists claimed their methodology was correct, and Dillehay's was incorrect".

What on earth is he on about? the methodology is one. Tom Dillehay carried out the investigation at Monte Verde and interpretation of the results according to the state-of-the-art methodology, and it was in the bounds of the very same methodological constraints, and in the framework of peer-review, that questions were raised about that interpretation.  


In any case, Martinez seems not to realise the situation here, and I would urge him to read up on it. What he's doing is simply parrotting one of the fixed mantras of the pseudoarchaeological community. "Clovis first" is the big bogeyman. They all "know" about it, none of them have read about it, beyond what they saw in a hancock book or a disparaging mention or two on the internet - all saying the sdame thing. NONE of them have checked it out, or thought it through. They just repeat it mindlessly like some holy mantra of their own as if it changes something or justifies anything.

The truth is the evidence (esp. the artefacts) from Monte Verde I and II was poor. Dillehay said that the artefacts were tools, but he was (for various reasons) unable to disseminate information about them in a way that was able to convince everyone. I wonder if the Hancockians blithely citing this as an alleged example of the archaeologists-blinded-by-dogma model they promote have ever actually reached for those first publications to look at those artefacts. They should, it might help them understand the nuances of their cardboard cutout model (IF they actaully know how to recognise lithic artefacts in the first place.

I would also recommend they strive to find out more about J. Reid Moir (and in the process my favourite early archaeologist Samuel Hazzledine Warren) and the matter of the 'eoliths' (here too). I have had the privilege of having a number of the original Moir ones in my hands and though I know they are natural, some are nevertheless very convincing. Which is why a certain circumspection is required classifying the more dodgy lithic artefact like theses. Reid Moir met a lot of scepticism, but as far as I can see from the publications of the time (as one would expect!), rather civil and healthy scepticism from the English antiquaries. In the end, reason won and East Anglian eoliths are no longer a 'thing' (?).

This is why the description of the alleged treatment of Dillahay is so puzzling for me. I've spend more than two thirds a lifetime going to and presenting papers in various forms of academic gatherings (in the UK, Poland, Austria, Ukraine, Egypt, USA once). I've sat through some really excruciatingly badly prepared and delivered papers. I've heard some of the most sawdust-for-brains-stupid presentations under the sun. I have sat through a presentation  with slides where a very senior and influential colleague presented his discoveries of his latest excavation project of a waterlogged site with structures and worked wood, only to have a little grey man at the back in the corner stand up and explain in a quiet steady voice that everything the professor had shown for the last hour was explicable as the work of (Upper Palaeolithic) beavers. And when you looked again... everyone (speaker included) agreed he was right. But it was all very amicable. In all those years, I have never (never) witnessed the sort of treatment of a conference participant as described by the Hancockians. I wonder what was wrong in the US archaeological community that something like that could happen? (The ringleaders seem to have been prominent archaeologists like Ales Hrdlicka (1869–1943) [physical anthropologist at the Smithsonian Institution], Paul S. Martin (1928–2010) [paleoecologist at the University of Arizona], C. Vance Haynes Jr. (1928– ) [geochronologist and archaeologist at the University of Arizona], Thomas Lynch (1938–) [archaeologist at Cornell University], Stuart Fiedel ( ?-?) [archaeologist and consultant]). I am sure there must be literature covering this aspect of teh development of US archaeology.

It is worth noting that, despite the bleak picture presented by Martinez, there was a small group of archaeologists in the US, including figures like George Carter and Louis Leakey, argued for pre-Clovis occupation as early as the 1950s and 1960s, citing sites like Tule Springs (Nevada) or Calico Hills (California). These claims were largely dismissed due to questionable evidence, but they indicate that the debate was not entirely one-sided. By the 1970s and 1980s, as sites like Monte Verde and Meadowcroft gained attention, a growing number of archaeologists began questioning Clovis First, though they faced significant resistance.

Contrary to the bleak picture painted by Martinez, Dillehay has had a highly successful career. He is a Distinguished Professor at Vanderbilt University, has published over 19 books and 200 journal articles, and has received numerous awards, including membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has held prestigious positions at universities worldwide and led major interdisciplinary projects. Martinez slyly omits this context, which undercuts his narrative of Dillehay as a perpetually persecuted figure.

Martinez's account lacks nuance and fails to acknowledge that scientific skepticism is a necessary part of validating extraordinary claims. Dillehay’s eventual acceptance shows that the system, while slow and sometimes contentious, can embrace paradigm-shifting evidence when it meets rigorous standards. Hancock’s ideas in contrast have not gained similar traction because they often lack such evidence, not because of a conspiracy among archaeologists.

Finally, I am at a bit of a loss trying to understand why it is somehow 'brave' to excavate a site and find evidence, study it and draw reasonable conclusions from it and then go ahewaad and publish and publicise it. That's what we do. If some Hrdlicka says it is "not an artefact - and here is why...." then obviuously it behoves the excavtor to listen attentively to the experienced older guy's reasoning, but if he finds it wanting... well what else can he do, but go ahead and tell what he is pretty sure IS the truth about those finds? Where would that lead US archaeology? (The whole system of US academic integrity in the study and presentation of the past is now faced with a challenge from the Trump-enabled "anti-woke" mob: here and here)