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| The period of time in which the Red Paint culture flourished along the coast of Maine northward to Labrador has been defined as the Late Archaic, the Maritime Archaic, as well as the Moorehead Phase. The terms "Late Archaic" and "Maritime Archaic" describe where the people are believed to have lived. The term Late Archaic refers to coastal regions as well as inland. Whereas the term Maritime Archaic describes the Red Paint people primarily as a coastal, sea faring culture. In addition the Moorehead Phase is named after Warren K. Moorehead. All of these terms can and are used to refer to the time period in which the culture known as the Red Paint people existed. Although the deposits were generally considered to be graves, they were apparently so old that no bones were preserved and even some of the artifacts were badly decayed. The condition in which the artifacts were recovered led Moorehead to declare the sites older and unrelated to Algonquin tribes that inhabited the area at a later time. The proposal of a "new" ancient culture could not go unchallenged and the challenge came in 1914 from David T. Bushnell of the Smithsonian Institution, who suggested that the Red Paint People are more recent (Robinson 1997). This controversy occurred long before the radiocarbon dating (carbon 14) techniques had been invented (Robinson 1997). With the advent of new technology the controversy of the Red Paint People faded away. Moorehead was correct that the graves were quite old. They date between 2,000 and 6,000 years old. The closest age estimated for the graves at Nevin was 2660 B.P. give or take 85 years (Byers 1979). This would complement the dating range proposed for the Red Paint people given that they lived during the Late Archaic. |