Clovis

A Paleo-Indian culture located on the plateau of Arizona, New Mexico, and western Texas and beginning sometime prior to 10,000 BC. It is so named from its first important site near Clovis, NM. The culture is generally considered to be ancestral to the later Folsom complex and it, like Folsom, was part of the big-game hunting tradition. It is characterized by distinctive, fluted, lanceolate stone projectile points, believed to be the oldest of their type. In Arizona, Clovis projectile points have been found in association with mammoth bones. The most problematical Clovis find comes from a site in Texas where a Clovis point was found in hearths with a radiocarbon date of 37,000+ years. The type site for this complex is Blackwater Draw and its artifacts are of the Llano complex.

A complex of cultural traits from the Paleo-Indian period which characterize the Llano culture of North America. A distinctive, fluted, lanceolate projectile point, especially when found in association with mammoth bones, is particularly diagnostic. The type site for this complex is Blackwater Draw. Numerous sites throughout North America have a Clovis component that usually falls within the date range 10,000 to 9000 be.