The genome confirmed that the Spirit Cave Man was part of the founding population of the Americas — the same broad founding population that gave rise to all Native American peoples.

It could not confirm that he was a member of any specific historic tribal community, because the specific tribal communities that would eventually develop in the Great Basin did not exist ten thousand years ago in the form they would eventually take.

The Fallon Paiute-Shoshone Tribe’s claim to the Spirit Cave Man as an ancestor was not primarily a genetic claim, even though the genetic evidence supported it.

It was a claim based on geographic continuity — the site is in the Tribe’s traditional territory — on material culture consistency — the burial materials are consistent with the broader regional tradition — on oral tradition — the Tribe has maintained knowledge of its long presence in the landscape — and on the understanding of ancestry that the Tribe applies to its own history.