Archaic Late Prehistoric Transition

The Late Prehistoric Period stands out in the San Diego archaeological record from the long Archaic Period that preceded it. Archaeological characteristics that have been claimed as distinctive to the Late Prehistoric Period include ceramics, small projectile points, cremation, mortars and pestles, the use of obsidian from the Obsidian Butte source, a greater density of settlement, and a settlement shift from primarily coastal to inland locations. The appearance of Late Prehistoric characteristics has also commonly been taken to mark the initial appearance of the ethnographically known Kumeyaay, Luiseño, Cupeño, and Cahuilla peoples.

No consensus exists concerning the relationship between the Archaic culture or cultures and the subsequent Late Prehistoric cultures in this region:

  • Malcolm J. Rogers (1945) hypothesized that the bearers of an Archaic culture that had been developed on the Pacific Coast later spread gradually eastward to the Colorado River. There they came into contact with Southwestern cultures and assimilated new traits from them, forming the Yuman Complex. Subsequently, according to Rogers, this hybrid Yuman culture spread back to the Pacific Coast. The return may have been accomplished either by acculturation of the coastal peoples or by actual migration of aggressive desert groups.
  • James R. Moriarty, III (1966) suggested that a Kumeyaay presence in coastal San Diego could be recognized as early as 1000 B.C., on the basis of cremations, small projectile points, the diversity of flaked lithic artifacts, and the use of nonlocal lithic materials. He stressed the stratigraphic continuity within archaeological middens between Archaic and Late Prehistoric components (but for a contrary view, see Hubbs et al. 1962:235-236, 1963:258, 264-265). Moriarty (1966:23) argued that there was no hiatus and that a “process of amalgamation between the two cultures” had occurred. He also noted that “whether [the amalgamation] was a peaceful merging or the more dynamic Yuman peoples came as invaders and assimilated the La Jolla survivors is not known. The archaeological evidence tends to suggest a peaceful merging over a fairly long period” (Moriarty 1966:24).
  • Claude N. Warren (1964, 1968) also stressed the continuity between Archaic (Encinitas Tradition) and Late Prehistoric components in western San Diego County. He raised the question of whether the cultural influences from the east that distinguished the Late Prehistoric Period were sufficient to define a new tradition, or whether they should be considered to represent merely a continuation of the Archaic one.
  • D. L. True (1966, 1970; True et al. 1974) also argued for a continuous development of the Late Prehistoric culture out of the earlier Archaic pattern, at least in southern San Diego County. He cited in particular, as supporting a view of continuity, the continued emphasis on manos and metates, scrapers, scraper planes, and choppers within the ethnohistoric Kumeyaay area. True contrasted these characteristics with the Late Prehistoric assemblages in the Luiseño area, where he perceived a discontinuity between the Archaic and Late Prehistoric cultures.
  • D. Sean Cardenas (1986; Cardenas and Van Wormer 1984:168) argued that the Avocado Highlands sites in El Cajon contain a continuous cultural sequence from Archaic to Late Prehistoric components, with no evidence of site abandonment or reoccupation by a different group, demonstrating in situ cultural evolution between the Archaic and Late Prehistoric Periods.
  • Charles S. Bull (1977, 1983, 1987) argued for a marked discontinuity in southern San Diego prehistory between an earlier coastal culture and the Late Prehistoric Kumeyaay occupation. Bull’s proposal was based, to a substantial degree, on interpretations of linguistic evidence. He identified the earlier culture with the broad Hokan linguistic group but not specifically with the Yuman family. Archaeologically, he identified the Archaic assemblages as proto-Chumash in character. In both northern and southern San Diego County, he argued that a scarcity of stratified sites, little stratigraphic blending of components, little continuity in assemblage traits, and evidence of environmental changes all pointed to the abandonment of the region by its Archaic inhabitants and repopulation by the Late Prehistoric peoples.
  • Patterns of linguistic differentiation and their tentative dating by lexicostatistical methods may be relevant to understanding the character of the Archaic-Late Prehistoric transition. Languages may have undergone fission as groups ancestral to the ethnographically known Takic and Yuman peoples expanded their territories into and inside the San Diego region. Within the Yuman family, estimates suggest that the separation of Delta-California Yuman from the other branches of Core Yuman may have occurred about 1,700-2,000 years ago, and the separation of the Kumeyaay language or group of languages from Cocopa may have taken place about 1,200 years ago. Within Uto-Aztecan, the Takic branch may have separated about 5,000 years ago, and Takic may have begun its fission as early as about 3,000 years ago (Laylander 1985, 2010). Mark Sutton (2011) proposed that there was an intrusion of Takic speakers into northern San Diego County around A.D. 700-1000, replacing the region’s Archaic inhabitants.
  • Collected radiocarbon dates from San Diego County as a whole seem to show a relative scarcity of dates pertaining to the period between about 1300 B.C. and A.D. 200 (Breschini et al. 2005; Gallegos 1987b:25; Warren and Pavesic 1963:435). Many more radiocarbon dates are reported from subsequent periods, and the frequency of dates from earlier periods is also somewhat higher than during this interval. The drop-off of dates during this final Archaic period may indicate a population decline or even a hiatus, or it may reflect merely a bias in the selection of radiocarbon samples.
  • Jerry Schaefer and Don Laylander (2014; Laylander et al. 2015) used a GIS database to analyze the environmental contexts of 140 substantial, multi-activity sites with and without pottery in southeastern San Diego County. The objective was to see whether differences existed between the locations selected for such sites during early and late periods. Significant differences were not found, possibly suggesting continuity in land use patterns across the Archaic-Late Prehistoric divide.

In sum, several contrasting views have been suggested: that the Archaic culture evolved independently and in place into its Late Prehistoric successor; that the Archaic culture evolved under the influence of cultural developments taking place in the deserts to the east, perhaps with some physical immigration of members of the eastern groups; that eastern groups migrated to the coast, bringing with them the new cultural patterns and displacing or eliminating their Archaic predecessors; that northern groups migrated south into northern San Diego County, with similar results; and that a hiatus occurred between the departure or dying-out of the Archaic groups and the arrival of the Late Prehistoric peoples.

PROSPECTS

Future archaeological investigations may be able to clarify several issues: (1) when the various cultural innovations associated with the Late Prehistoric Period occurred, and whether they occurred simultaneously or were spread across an extended period of time; (2) whether an occupational hiatus occurred in any portion of the region; and (3) whether there was a substantial degree of cultural continuity between Archaic cultures and the Late Prehistoric cultures in the Yuman and/or Takic portions of the region.