A Geography of Foodways in the Salish Sea, Pacific Northwest Coast

Summary

This paper examines past foodways within the southern Strait of Georgia, Pacific Northwest Coast at a number of geographic scales. It also addresses the extent and nature of temporal shifts in the social landscape of the region. Seasonal use of the landscape is revealed through an understanding of place in the Salish Sea. Zooarchaeological analysis of a regional sample of thirty sites suggests that while extensive variation was characteristic of southern Strait of Georgia settlement from 3200 BC to the arrival of Europeans, late winter and early spring site use was prominent on southeastern Vancouver Island. The southern Gulf and San Juan Islands appear more generally to have been a focus of spring and summer inhabitation. This pattern is most evident during an important period of village aggregation in the southern Strait of Georgia between 650 BC and AD 650, although it is expressed to a lesser extent both before and after this interval. People may have established a larger number of villages after 650 BC in order to not only increase their use of food resources available in seasonal concentrations, such as herring and salmon, but also to engage in more elaborate ritual activity.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)   •
• Consuming Landscapes

Keywords

Spatial Coverage