The Wizards Beach Men: A Study in Contrasts From Pyramid Lake, Nevada

Abstract

This thesis compares and contrasts two sets of human skeletal remains of different chronometric ages found on Nevada's Pyramid Lake shoreline in 1968. The remains were found when drought lowered the shoreline of the lake, resulting in exposure by erosive wave action. No artifacts were found associated with the remains, so there are no direct indications of the two men's subsistence and lifeways in the Early and Middle Holocene. This thesis describes how the lives of these two individuals and their possible manner of death differed under disparate climatic conditions. Differences are seen in their skeletal morphology, pathologies, and degree of dental wear during periods of changing climate in the Great Basin.