Geochemical Analysis of Baezaeko River and Baker Creek Dacite

Summary

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 analysis of geological samples representing two heavily utilized FGV tool stone materials collected from the vicinity of the Baezaeko River and Baker Creek drainages located within the northern extent of the Plateau. Utilizing portable X-Ray Florescence (pXRF), Inductively Coupled Plasma-Emission Spectroscopy (ICP-ES), and Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS), we examine the geochemical fingerprint of these two proposed sources of FGV tool stone, and offer a comparison of the trace element analyses from each technique.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 14490