Native history
Early
c. 11,250-8000 BCE
DeKalb County
General area only

Ice Age hunters (Paleoindian period)

People were living in Georgia by about 13,250 years ago, at the end of the last Ice Age. They moved in small bands over large territories, hunting and gathering.

See it on the map All Early records

The record

The New Georgia Encyclopedia says people had to have been present in Georgia 13,250 years ago and divides the period into Early (c. 11,000-9000 BC), Middle (c. 9000-8500 BC) and Late (c. 8500-8000 BC) phases. Bands of 25 to 50 people moved on foot or by water and relocated often. The period's best-known tool is the Clovis point, a large lance-shaped spear point; mammoths, horses, camels and other megafauna died out during these millennia. The encyclopedia names no Paleoindian site in the Atlanta area, and this map shows the period only at regional scale.