Archaic Archaeology Stony Brook Long Island New York VN

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THE STONY BROOK SITE AND ITS RELATION TO ARCHAIC AND TRANSITIONAL CULTURES ON LONG ISLAND

by William A. Ritchie

New York State Museum and Science Services

Bulletin 372

169 pages with 7 figures and 53 plates

1965

Softbound in new condition.

Coastal New York, of which Long Island Forms the principal segment, appears on current evidence to have been visited or inhabited by man since about 5000 B.C.  Two recorded examples of the Clovis style of fluted point, one of the earliest known New World projectile forms, found near Greenport and Bridgehampton, respectively, apparently attest to the brief presence of the paleo-Indian on eastern Long Island.  More numberous examples of this widely distributed pre-Folsom point, dated before 10,000 years ago in the southern plains and desert basin area of New Mexico and Arizona, occur in the Hudson Valley and north of Long Island Sound in Lower New England.

Unlike most archaeological sites on Long Island, the Stony Brook site appears to have been relatively undisturbed when reported in 1955 by William H. Sears.  Because of the site's intact condition it was possible to plan and execute a systematic excavation and to discern vital stratigraphic relations.  The Stony Brook site artifacts range from a lower preceramic remains from Archaic age to a more Transitional (pre-woodland) upper midden deposit.

Includes extensive site maps and illustrations of pits, hearths, burials, orient fishtail type points, stemmed and side-notched points, lozenge-shaped and lobate-stemmed points, triangular points, ovate and trianguloid knives, drills, scrsper, hammer and anvilstones, celt, paintstones, stone potsherds, bone artifcats, shell ornaments, pottery and more.