OHIO RIVER FLOODPLAIN DEVELOPMENT IN OHIO AND WEST VIRGINIA NEAR WELLS BOTTOM: GEOARCHAEOLOGICAL LANDSCAPE EVOLUTION MODELING

The development of the alluvial landscapes and landforms of the Ohio River Valley is a primary dictator of where and what temporal period archaeological sites may be found within its floodplains and bottoms. These landforms have been built, shaped, and eroded by the Ohio River since between 18,000 and 20,000 years before present. Research in the Ohio Valley in eastern Ohio and Western West Virginia has aimed to reconstruct the landscape of this alluvial valley that has evolved since the Late Pleistocene through geoarchaeological investigations, in order to better predict the archaeological potential of the landforms and landscapes found therein. For this study, two contiguous floodplains, one each located on the Ohio and West Virginia banks of the Ohio River, near Wells Bottom, were utilized to create this predictive model. The results of this study have identified landforms relating to the Late Pleistocene Elizabethtown Ohio River Terrace, as well as Early and Late Holocene Ohio River Terraces. Mapping of these landforms was done through topographic relation, absolute and relative dating, creating a landscape evolutionary model spanning approximately the last 15,500 years. The landscape evolutionary model presented here can be used as a basis for the better prediction of the location and age of archaeological sites within this region of the Ohio River Valley, while refinement and regional expansion can increase its geoarchaeological utility.