At https://phys.org/news/2026-03-monte-verde-fieldwork-resets-age.html … Monte Verde is a site in southern Chile that has been associated with early human activity, prior to Clovis in North America. In fact, the date assigned to the site in the 1970s to 1990s was 14,500 years ago. It caused a lot of angst amongst Clovis First archaeologists who doubted the date from the word go. Clovis First was entrenched amongst American archaeologists. It was assumed that all the northern hemisphere was under ice during the Late Glacial Maximum. Hence the tag given to that brief geological period. In other words, humans were blocked from entering the Americas which led to the Clovis First consensus view, an idea that resisted opposition for decades. However, we now know that there was a land bridge in which humans could cross from Siberia to Alaska, vestiges of which lie in the Aleutian Islands. It is now known, especially via genetic evidence, that humans from Siberia migrated westwards towards Europe and eastwards into North America, at some point prior to Clovis First. How far north in Siberia these people were living is unknown as the region is glaciated, or tundra that is seasonally frozen, and actual digging is out is not an option. People could have, for example, crossed the Arctic Ocean – which was much narrower at the time – [another sunken continental shelf system]. They could have crossed the Bering land bridge, a large lowland zone now also submerged. Or they could have boated around the edge of the theoretical ice sheets. We do not know how Clovis First arrived in North America but it is assumed they came from Siberia during the warm period prior to the Younger Dryas event. That event seems to have led to their demise – although a mass die off does not necessarily involve 100 per cent.
From that you can see why Monte Verde’s 14,500 date perplexed archaeologists attached at the hip to the Clovis First paradigm.