Environmental Change and Human Ecology in Central Alaska during the Early Holocene: Hollembaek’s Hill

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Dramatic environmental changes occurred in central Alaska during the Early Holocene as mixed woodlands and grasslands transitioned to boreal forest ecosystems. Despite 80 years of research in this region, we are just beginning to understand how interior Alaskan populations coped with the extinction of the large grazers (bison and elk) that constituted their favored resources, and how caribou became the preferred large mammal resource in the Northern Archaic. Hollembaek’s Hill site contains an archaeological occupation dated to 8,000 cal B.P. that provides rare insights into this period of central Alaska’s history. The occupation contains numerous faunal remains dominated by elk, which are likely associated with microblades as part of a late Denali component. A large pit was excavated by the site’s occupants and may have functioned as a storage pit before being re-used for trash management. This evidence for investment in modification of domestic space suggests the adoption of novel forms of mobility that may have been designed to cope with changes in resource availability, and provides information on economic choices and how they influenced the evolution of material culture.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 23445