As a Native American culture, the Chickasaw people broadly trace their ancestry back to the migratory peoples of the Paleo-Indian period, which spanned from roughly 10,000 BC - 8500 BC. Legend has it that the Chickasaws migrated for generations from “the place in the West” to settle in what is now the Southeast. The climate was drier and colder than today in the centuries after humans first migrated to the Americas and glaciers covered the northern lands. Paleo-Indian era people roamed the country in small extended family bands and hunted herds of mammoth, mastodon, giant bison, horse, ground sloth and other Pleistocene megafauna. Storm Spirits and the Undead: Native American Tornado Myths and Legends Native American Creation Stories: Creator Animals, Gods and Goddesses  Crafting for Survival: Ground Stone Tools and Early Agriculture The people of this era used Clovis point spears to hunt, which have been discovered all over North America, as well as in what is now Mississippi. Clovis points were often made of exotic high-quality flint, or chert, and sometimes traced to modern day northern Alabama and middle Tennessee, the Chickasaw’s historic homeland. Read moreSection: NewsScience & SpaceAncient PlacesAmericasRead Later