North America-Canada (Geographic Keyword)
51-75 (136 Records)
Housepit 54 at the Bridge River site, British Columbia provides a unique look at the evolution of interpersonal dynamics within a single household over time. The sequence of 17 floors evinces a wide-range of activity patterns and spatial configurations reflecting performed labor. Current theories of intra-household dynamics posit that cooperative, complimentary work should underlie individual social interactions within a single household. However from late Bridge River 2 (ca. 1300-1500 cal BP)...
Geoarchaeology at the Little John Site (KdVo-6), Yukon Territory, Canada. (2015)
The Little John Site (KdVo-6), Yukon Territory, Canada, contains the presence of Chindadn complex (East Beringian Tradition), Denali complex (Paleoarctic Tradition), Northern Archaic Tradition, and Late Prehistoric artifacts in unique stratified contexts. The site contains loess/paleosol stratigraphic sequences dating to the Wisconsin Interstadial c. 44,000 years ago, and cultural deposits from the Late Pleistocene to the recent past. Optically Stimulated Luminescence and Accelerator Mass...
Geochemical Analysis of Baezaeko River and Baker Creek Dacite (2017)
Lithic artifacts produced from fine-grained volcanic (FGV) tool stone material, such as dacite, dominate archaeological assemblages from the Interior Plateau of British Columbia. While this heavy reliance on locally or regionally available FGV has been previously well documented, subsequent geochemical analysis has predominately focused on material from well-known procurement sites or sources located within the central and southern portions of the Interior Plateau. In this paper, we present the...
Geochemical Characterization of Anthropogenic Sediments through EA-IRMS from Slocan Narrows Pithouse Village (2015)
Elemental Analysis-Isotope Ratio Mass Spectroscopy (EA-IRMS) has been used to analyze the elemental compositions of materials from archaeological settings, but work done specifically on culturally modified sediments is limited. In this study, we explored EA-IRMS as a technique for characterizing anthropogenic sediments to establish spatial organizations of past living spaces as well as possible changes in environmental conditions over the past 2,700 years. Using EA-IRMS techniques, we examined...
A Geochemical Investigation and Spatial Analysis of the Earliest Living Floors of Housepit 54, Bridge River British Columbia (2017)
A geochemical investigation of the early floors of Housepit 54 provides insight into the daily activities of household occupants. Excavations of Housepit 54 revealed 17 superimposed floors and roofs. The earliest dating floors were excavated in 2016 with sediment samples systematically collected across each floor level. In this study we use both EDXRF and WDXRF techniques to provide reliable compositional data on the floor sediments. With the use of XRF data and geospatial tools we are able to...
Green Lake Burial Grounds: An Unprecedented Collaboration in Shuswap Territory (2017)
Located atop the shores of Green Lake, and on Shuswap First Nation traditional territory, a First Nations burial site was slumping into the water. Long bones began emerging 40 years ago, when the local landowner was just nine years old. In 1997, archaeologists relocated one burial; but up to 15 individuals remained in this sliding cemetery. Since 1997, provincial government Archaeology Branch has worked toward moving those individuals. In July of 2013, Crossroads Cultural Resource Management...
The Groundstone Artifacts of Housepit 54, Bridge River Site, British Columbia (2015)
The people of the Middle Fraser Canyon traditionally used groundstone to accomplish a wide range of tasks spanning food processing to weaponry and ornamentation. Excavations of Housepit (HP) 54 at the Bridge River Site, British Columbia, in 2014 revealed an unexpectedly large sample of groundstone tools. Many items were apparently used, broken, and recycled as cooking rocks on select floors. This study draws from multiple data sources to define variability in the nature of groundstone tools...
Historic Cultural Perspectives Through Cemetery Landscape (2017)
The Jewish cemetery in Victoria, BC is home to approximately 300 interments and is one of the oldest Jewish cemeteries in Canada and the second largest in western Canada. This study explores the Jewish community of Victoria during its earlier period of use from 1914 – 1918 using four individuals from a variety of economic, social, political, and gender specific backgrounds. The goal of this research was to investigate the biographies of four people buried at Emanu-El cemetery who died during the...
The Historical Ecology of Laxgalts'ap – a Cultural Keystone Place of the Gitga’ata of Northern British Columbia (2017)
For many Indigenous Peoples, their traditional lands are archives of their histories, from the deepest of time to recent memories and actions. These histories are written in the landscapes’ geological features, the plant and animal communities, and associated archaeological and paleoecological records. Some of these landscapes, recently termed "Cultural Keystone Places" (CKPs), are iconic for these groups and have become symbols of the connections between the past and the future, and between...
Household Hearth-Centered Activity Areas and Cache Pit Patterning at the Bridge River Site (2017)
Archaeological investigations at Housepit 54 within the Bridge River site have, to date, exposed seventeen discreet floors primarily dating to ca. 1500-1000 cal. B.P. In this poster we draw data from three of the site’s floors, IIk, IIl, and IIm, where the most recent investigations have yielded an interesting pattern of hearth and cache pit features. Questions will be addressed specifically towards formation processes as well as the potential relationships between the patterning of...
Household Hearth-Centered Activity Areas at the Bridge River Site, British Columbia: Formation Processes and Site Structure (2015)
Archaeological investigations at Housepit 54 within the Bridge River site have identified approximately 15 discrete floors dating between 1500 and 100 years ago. In this poster we draw data from a Bridge River 3 (ca. 1300-1000 cal. B.P.) period floor to examine the formation of activity areas with a larger goal of reconstructing "site structure" in a constrained space. We address questions specifically directed at formation processes as well as potential relationships between at least two...
Housepit 54 through an Indigenous Framework: A Holistic Interpretation of an Ancient Traditional Home (2015)
Data collection and analysis at Housepit (HP) 54 Bridge River Site, British Columbia, has provided an opportunity for a range of studies emphasizing (but not limited to) questions of subsistence, inheritance, lithic technological adaptations and spatial organization of the ancient occupations of this household during the BR3 period (ca. 1300-1000 cal. B.P.). This poster draws upon data acquired through the systematic analysis of artifacts and ecofacts and is further enhanced through the use of...
Housepit 54: Dogs and their Changing Roles (2017)
Excavations at the Bridge River site, British Colombia have been on going since 2003. The careful study of these housepits have significantly increased our understanding of the communities that inhabited the Middle Fraser Canyon over 1,000 years ago. The completion of the Housepit 54 excavation has provided further evidence of the many facets of indigenous life at Bridge River; among these is the role of dogs. The possession and many uses of dogs in the Middle Fraser Canyon is well documented...
Humans and carnivores at the Bluefish Cave II (northern Yukon): interpretation of the faunal remains (2015)
While research is still ongoing, the earliest date for the first modern humans in America is well accepted at 14,000 cal BP. Some archaeological sites propose a date prior to the end of the Last Glacial Maximum, however. This is the case of the Bluefish Caves which proposes a human presence in northern Yukon as early as 25,000 uncal BP. Here, approximately 18,000 bone specimens recovered from Cave II have been determined and examined under stereomicroscope. This zooarchaeological and taphonomic...
The Identification of Archaeological Bone through Non-Destructive ZooMS: The Example of Iroquoian Bone Projectile Points (2016)
The Identification of Archaeological Bone through Non-Destructive ZooMS: The Example of Iroquoian Bone Projectile Points Krista McGrath; Keri Rowsell; Christian Gates St-Pierre; Matthew Collins ZooMS (Zooarchaeology by Mass Spectrometry) is a technique for the identification of archaeological bone. In this study, we apply a refined ZooMS method to worked bone points. The traditional ZooMS technique requires destructive analysis of a specimen, which is obviously problematic when dealing with...
The Inglewood Mammoth (Maryland) and Others Like It (2015)
The Inglewood mammoth site near Largo, Maryland, radiocarbon dated in 1982 to 20,000 rcybp, shares some features with other mammoths in North America and Mexico. It had no lithics associated with the bones, and some of the elements had been fragmented. Over 25 years ago I interpreted the bone-breakage as recently done by heavy equipment, but another researcher now interprets it as done by humans in antiquity. I provide a first look at the site’s bone maps, sediment profiles, and other essential...
Isotopic Perspectives on Spatial and Temporal Variability in British Columbia Paleodiet (2017)
This study aggregates and re-evaluates all available stable isotope data from archaeological human remains in British Columbia. Isotope signatures for coastal individuals correspond well with the heavy marine specialization attested to by archaeological and ethnographic studies of traditional Northwest Coast diets. Within this marine specialization, the data for coastal BC demonstrate a high degree of regional dietary variability, although high trophic level marine prey species are of ubiquitous...
Kaskisebook Tett L’nuk - People on the Edge of the Riverbank: New Perspectives of the Transitional Archaic from the Annapolis River, Nova Scotia (2016)
Recent excavations at the Boswell Site (BfDf-08) in southwestern Nova Scotia have yielded a unique assemblage of Transitional Archaic artifacts. Dating to 3,630 ± 30 BP, the Boswell Site provides important insights into population movements during this period in Maine and the Maritime Peninsula. Previous archaeological investigations have led to debate concerning the relative importance of cultural diffusion and migration in the southern origins of broadpoint technology. By comparing artifacts...
Large changes environmental changes following commercial whaling in the Eastern Canadian Arctic (2016)
Stable isotope records from dovekie (Alle alle), ringed seal (Pusa hispida) and bowhead whale (Balaena mysticetus) bones recovered from archaeological sites in eastern North American High Arctic (northwestern Greenland and eastern Canadian Arctic) reveal little auks declined an entire trophic level in the 20th century, following stability between the 12th and early 20th centuries. Conversely, bowhead whale trophic level remained stable and ringed seal trophic level slightly increased across the...
Learning Landscapes within an Ancestral Wendat Village (2015)
This paper concerns my proposed doctoral research that focuses on learning environments within Ancestral Wendat potting communities, more specifically, the 15th Century AD Keffer village. My theoretical perspective is grounded in a framework of apprenticeship, and experiential philosophy that emphasizes the experience and interaction of an individual within the material world, interwoven with both social and body memory. My methodological approach consists of micro-variation analysis to identify...
Least Cost Analysis of Maritime Movement in Prince Rupert Harbour during the Holocene and Late Pleistocene (2017)
Spatial modeling of prehistoric maritime movement on the Pacific Northwest Coast is important in contemporary archaeology because it can help reveal previously unseen patterns and trends in movement through a landscape that has radically changed over time. GIS analysis has the potential to reveal new sites that have been hidden by changing sea levels. Here we present models of maritime movement using least cost path analysis (LCA) to determine the area’s most likely to have been traveled through...
Linguistic relationships between the Apachean sub-group and Northern Athapaskan (2017)
Linguistic evidence has long played an important role in determining the relationship of Apachean peoples to Northern Athapaskans (Sapir 1936). While Apachean membership within the larger Athapaskan family is firmly established, the more precise determination of their linguistic affiliation to Northern Athapaskan linguistic groups has proved more difficult (Rice 2012). The reasons for this difficulty arose chiefly from the lack of available data and the limitations in the power of analytic...
Linking Geochemistry and Geology in Interpreting Anthropogenic Sediments at Bridge River, British Columbia (2015)
Previous research utilizing energy dispersive x-ray fluorescence (EDXRF) spectroscopy and isotope ratio mass spectroscopy (IRMS) identified geochemical patterns in Housepit 54 sediments that might be attributable to human occupation. In this study we conduct additional geological analysis of Housepit 54 sediments in order to more fully understand the observed geochemical variation. In addition to grain size analysis, detailed mineralogical analysis of fourteen sediment samples from a single...
Little Pots, Big Implications: Analysis of Devils Lake Sourisford Ritual Pottery Vessels (2016)
With an estimated temporal range spanning from 900 to 1400 AD, the Devils Lake Sourisford (DLS) pottery tradition has been viewed as a northern expression of Mississippian cultural influence within the Northernmost Great Plains. Owing to the recovery of these vessels in direct association with human remains and the paucity of available vessels for analyses, understanding this phenomenon has posed a complicated challenge for archaeologists. However, advancements in pottery analyses have provided...
Living Landscapes and Moving Cultures (2017)
Culturally Modified Trees (CMTs) in the Central Interior of British Columbia are well known and extensively documented. While there are several types of CMTs, the most common in the interior, by far, are barked stripped Lodgepole Pine for the purpose of cambium collection as a food resource. The majority of the discussion and analysis of CMTs is field-based and primarily focuses on scar identification to determine cultural origin, dating methods, mapping and describing locales where large...