GREAT DROUGHT

climatic interval of the Holocene Epoch (the Holocene began about 10,000 years ago and continues to the present). The Great Drought, dated by tree-ring studies, affected much of what is now the western United States from present Oregon to southern California to eastern Texas and had a profound influence upon the plants, animals, and American Indian cultures of the time. The period of drought began about 1276 and continued to about 1299. Many urbanized centres of Indian culture in the Southwest were abandoned, never to be reoccupied. Major movements of people out of the drought-stricken areas occurred; much movement of other people in areas not so affected resulted from the intense competition for limited resources. The stability of many areas was upset as various peoples competed with each other for scant resources. The Great Drought was but one of several major periods of drought that affected the same region in the relatively recent past. Other periods of drought that have been identified are the Fairbank Drought of 500 BC and the Whitewater Drought of AD 300. These dates are compatible with the dates of the major upheavals in human populations of the New World, evident all the way to Central America.