The role of mammoths in rapid Clovis dispersal

Both empirical and theoretical evidence indicate that mammoth-hunting by Clovis foragers contributed to extinction at the same time as it encouraged a very rapid dispersal of fluted-point-making people into North America. The empirical evidence comes from fossil site studies and actualistic research on African elephant bonesites; the theoretical evidence comes from generalizations about foraging in Pleistocene environments. Rapid dispersal of hunter-gatherers is not impossible, and it was probably inevitable under certain conditions in the past. Overkill was not impossible, and perhaps also inevitable under terminal Pleistocene conditions.