NYSAA Bulletin No. 52 — Archaic Sites: Croton Point & Dogan Point — Passage 3 (part 15)

[Various (1971)] ± 120 years (Y-2346), about 500 years later than the Lamoka Lake site situated approximately 60 miles to the southeast (Hayes and Bergs 1969). The persistence of a regional variation of the Lamoka culture in the lower Genesee Valley to around 2000 B.C., and of the Brewerton phase in central New York to the same date, as shown at the O'Neil site, gives clarity and support to the approximately 2000 B.C. age for the Frontenac phase, a hybrid culture resulting from the interaction of both these cultures, at the Frontenac Island site in Cayuga Lake. The Lamoka culture, which I have described in detail elsewhere (Ritchie 1965a: 36-79) is not traceable over most of New York State, but in eastern and southern New York points of the Lamoka type do occur in association with other narrow point varieties, e.g., Bare Island, Wading River, etc.

It is important to note that, while these and other point forms of the narrow point tradition definitely overlie the Laurentian in eastern New York (Funk 1965) and in southern New England (Ritchie 1965b; 1969b), radiocarbon dates which unequivocally relate to assemblages with such points fall around 2200 B.C. At the unique central base camp of the Lamoka culture at Lamoka Lake seven hearth charcoal samples processed by three different laboratories securely date this site about 2500 B.C. An older figure of 3433 B.C. ± 250 years (C-367), obtained by the solid charcoal method, is rejected as non-compatible and too early (Ritchie 1965a: 45).