8000-year-old brain tissue from the Windover 



site: Anatomical, cellular, and 



molecular analysis 



William W. Hauswirth, Cynthia D. Dickel, Glen H. Doran, Philip J. Laipis, 



and David N. Dickel 



The Windover site (8BR46) consists of a small (5400 m^) 

 peat deposit in a low-lying swale on the western edge of the 

 Florida Atlantic Coastal Ridge, roughly equidistant from the 

 Indian River coastal lagoon system and St. John's River in 

 eastern, central Florida (Figure 1). Information from pre- 

 liminary analysis of flora and fauna indicates the site was a 

 wooded marsh from 8000 b.p. to 6900 b.p. and during this 

 time was regularly used as a burial ground. Most bodies 

 found at the site had been placed in a flexed position and then 

 buried lying on their sides in anaerobic, water-saturated peat 

 at an approximate depth of one meter. 



The Windover site is a significant North American archeo- 

 logical site for several reasons: it is one of the oldest Ameri- 

 can sites with a large, representative human skeletal sample; 

 it contains all age morphs; it has a large sample of prehistoric 

 flexible fabrics; it has 91 crania containing preserved matter 

 identifiable as brain tissue; and intracranial tissue was dem- 

 onstrated to be human by cellular and biochemical tech- 

 niques and by isolation of human DNA (Doran et al. 1986). 



Results 



RADIOCARBON DATES 



During excavation four distinct types of peat strata were 

 identified (Figure 2). The upper stratum (1.2 m thick) was 

 composed of black sawgrass-peat (W. Spackman, Jr., andS. 

 Stout, pcrs. comm. 1986). The lower levels of this black peat 

 were dated at 4790± 100 b.p. (Beta- 10763). Underlying the 

 black peat was a 1 .2-m-thick stratum of red-brown peat con- 

 taining a high concentration of naturally deposited wood. 

 The upper zone of this red-brown peat has been radiocarbon 

 dated at 5800±80 b.p. (Beta- 10764). The red-brown peat 



stratum had a striking preservation of intact leaves, sawgrass 

 strands, twigs, branches, turtle bones, fish remains, nonhu- 

 man fecal material and other faunal material. The highest 

 concentration of skeletal material was within the lowest lev- 

 els of the red-brown peat stratum. Underlying the red-brown 

 peat was an approximately 0.5-m-thick layer of "rubber" 

 peat. The top of the rubber peat stratum has been radiocarbon 

 dated at 7950 ± 140 b.p. (Beta- 10855). Human and nonhu- 

 man skeletal material and preserved wood decreased with 

 increasing depth of the rubber peat. The incidence of fresh- 

 water moUusks was high in the rubber peat and may have 

 influenced the water chemistry of the pond. Beneath the 

 rubber peat was a I.8-m-thick stratum of tan-brown peat 



2S0KII1. 



Scale 



(Excluding intel) 



Figure I . Geographic location of the Windover site, 

 8BR246 



60 



Zagreb Paleopathology Symp 1988 



