PreColumbian Archaeology of North America

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Pre-Columbian Archaeology of North America

• Week 7
• The Northwest Coast and California

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Regional CharacteristicsThe Northwest Coast

• Narrow coastal band, including offshore islands,
  that stretches from southeastern Alaska to
  southern Oregon/northern California
• Interior limit set by Canadian Rockies and
  Cascade Mountains
• Marked by deep valleys running east-to-west
  creating in effect islands

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Climate

• Mild temperatures and high rainfall
• At lower elevations rainfall in excess of 1000 mm
  p.a.
• At higher elevations, snowfall amounts average
  4.1 m
• At lower elevations average temperatures remain
  above zero
• Latitude/Longitude 49.1 N 123.06 W
• Avg. Annual Temperature (C) 9.8
• Annual Temp. Range (C) 16
• Total Annual Precip. (mm) 1048
• Summer Precip. (mm) 277
• Winter Precip. (mm) 771

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Flora

• Temperate rainforest
• Coniferous trees
• Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii)
• Redwood (Sequoia sempevirins)
• Giant Sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum)
• Spruce
• Yellow cedar (Chamaecyparis nootkatensis)
• Not a cedar but members of the False-cypress
  family
• Red cedar (Juniperus virginiana)
• Hemlock (Tsuga sp.)
• A member of the pine family

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Vegetational Zones of North America
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Northwest Coast fauna (1)

• Herbivores
• Moose (Alces alces) los
• Elk (wapiti) (Cervus elaphus) jelen
• White-tail (Virginia) deer (Odocoileus
  virginianus)
• Mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus)
• Rabbits/hares
• Beaver (Castor canidensis) bobr kanadský

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Northwest Coast Fauna (2)

• Carnivores
• Bears
• Grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis)
• Brown bear (Ursus arctos)
• American black bear (Ursus americanus) baribal
• Canines
• Wolf
• Coyote (Canis latrans)
• Red fox (Vulpes vulpes)
• Felines
• Mountain lion (Puma concolor)
• Lynx (Lynx canadensis)
• Mustelids
• Wolverine (Gulo gulo) rosomák
• Otter, marten, mink, weasel
• Sea otter
• Raccoon (Procyon lotor)
• Virginia opossum (Didelphis virginiana)

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Northwest Coast Fauna (3)

• Whales
• Killer whale (Orcinus orca)
• Gray whale
• Sea otters
• Salmon
• Chum, pink, coho, chinook, sockeye

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Northwest Coast (1)

• Research limited by impact of changing sea levels
  in the Holocene
• Sites prior to 5000 BP are mostly under water
  today
• What is known is from upland locations on the
  Queen Charlotte Islands
• Northwestern Coastal culture technology is
  dominated by microblades and, on occasion,
  macroblades that are differentiated from
  microblades by widths of 10 mm or more.
• These narrow flakes with prismatic and triangular
  crossections were struck from specially prepared
  cores. Sections of the resulting microblades
  would have been used as inserts to arm wooden or
  bone lances, knives, and other composite tools.
• Microblade technology represents the most
  economic use of stone ever developed by stone age
  people. Ubiquitous cobble core and spall tools
  are also well represented.

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Northwest Coast (2)

• By the time sea levels (5000 BP) stabilize a
  recognized cultural complex emerges that
  continues through to the modern period.
• A seasonal pattern of coastal winter settlement
  in the deltas of major rivers with summer
  interior extensions up the rivers to key salmon
  capturing and processing locations was evolving
  throughout the period up to 3000 BP and would
  eventually lead to permanent interior
  settlements.

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Northwest Coast (3)

• Social stratification with hereditary slavery and
  the importance of wealth have been identified as
  the most distinctive features of the culture area
• The Northwest Coast cultural pattern included
  hereditary social inequality, semi-sedentary
  settlement with permanent winter villages, and
  intensive production and storage of resources,
  especially salmon.
• Craft specialization, masks and ceremonialism,
  different labret types indicating social ranking,
  wood working, three-dimensional art

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A Reconstruction of Microblade Production Using
Specialized Cores

• The drawing illustrates a possible method of
  locking the microblade core between two pieces of
  wood preparatory to striking off the microblades.
• Methods of fitting the microblades into wooden
  handles to produce sharp edged knives are shown
  below.

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Northwest Coast Village

• Although idealized, the artist's rendition of a
  village scene illustrates many of the major
  characteristics of Late West Coast culture. Large
  multi-family plank houses form a row facing the
  sea with shell middens being present behind and
  between houses. A successful raiding party has
  returned with prisoners as slaves, the heads of
  slain enemy retained as war trophies, and loot in
  the form of material goods. The leader of the war
  party is greeted by the village leaders who are
  in ceremonial garb. In the middle background an
  old woman dressed in a woven cedar bark tunic,
  cape, and hat watches the proceedings while in
  the far background two dugout canoes have bark
  mats thrown over them to prevent the canoes from
  drying out in the sun and cracking. The man in
  the left hand corner wears a woven spruce root
  potlatch hat with three rings on top indicating
  that the individual has validated his rights and
  privileges in three potlatch ceremonies.

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California

• California
• Roughly equivalent to modern state of California
• Eastern limit is the Sierra Nevada
  Mountains/Colorado River
• Mediterranean climate
• Cool wet winters and warm dry summers
• Broadleaf evergreen flora
• Live oak chaparral (mosaic of oak groves and
  grasslands) Sclerophyllous Woodland
• Eight species of oak (Quercus sp.)
• Four deciduous and four evergreen
• High acorn production (200-400 kg/year)

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• Mild, moist winters, hot dry summers inland
• Cool, often foggy coasts
• High percentage of sunshine
• High summer diurnal temperature range
• Frost danger during winter

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California Fauna

• Virtually all terrestrial species found in North
  America (except for species restricted to the
  arctic/sub-arctic)
• Importance of marine species
• Shellfish
• Oysters (Ostreiddae)
• Clams
• Mussels
• Abalone (Haliotis)
• Sea urchin (Echinoidea)
• Marine mammals
• Whales, porpoises, dolphins, sea otters, sea
  lions, seals

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Shellfish
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California

• History of archaeology in California is quite
  long and complex with a number of different
  paradigms having evolved over the past century
• Central California Taxonomic System
• Very influential but now considered inaccurate
• Three major periods now recognized
• The Millingstone Horizon 7000 - 4000 BP
• The Middle Horizon 4000 - 1500 BP
• The Protohistoric Period 1500 - 400 BP

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Millingstone Horizon

• Abundance of milling stones (basin metate and
  mano) that appeared during this time.
• These were used to grind the small, hard seeds of
  grasses and sage, which formed a major part of
  the diet.
• Shellfish-gathering continued to supply most
  protein, and hunting and fishing were relatively
  unimportant.
• Pine forests were still extensive, reflecting
  cooler, wetter climate than today.
• Considerably more evidence exists for occupation
  during this period than the previous one.
• Some variation between northern and southern
  California

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Middle Horizon (1)

• The Middle Horizon is a time of considerable
  culture-change in both the north and south, but
  the nature of this change is difficult to
  generalize about.
• The establishment of many new villages in new
  portions of the state suggests population
  dispersal, but the size and apparent organization
  of some Middle Horizon villages suggests
  nucleation.
• An expansion of trade is indicated by the
  widespread dispersal of obsidian from the various
  eastern and northern California sources, and of
  shell beads from the coast into the interior, but
  there is also evidence of considerable
  specificity in the adaptation of local
  populations to local environments.
• Mortuary populations show evidence of both
  widespread violence and complex political
  organization.

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Middle Horizon (2)

• To place these apparent changes in an
  interpretive framework, we can propose that the
  Middle Horizon represents a period when
  maritime/littoral adaptation along the California
  coast permitted and impelled a large-scale
  population increase in sedentary coastal
  villages, culminating in periodic population
  pushes into the interior.
• Populations moving into the new environments
  would have been under pressure to experiment with
  methods of readaptation, to interact with other
  groups, and to maintain trade and other ties with
  the coastal villages. This process, described in
  detail in the model of increasing cultural
  complexity, above may be responsible for the
  Middle Horizon as we know it.
• Mortar and pestle replace millingstones
• Diverse stone tool typologies, emphasis on larger
  points, probably dart points

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The Protohistoric Period

• During the protohistoric period in northern and
  southern California, there is evidence for rapid
  socio-economic change.
• High levels of linguistic diversity
• Micro-political units (triblet)
• The clam disc bead economy appears, and clam
  discs are adopted as currency across broad parts
  of the north, while in the south a proliferation
  of Olivella money beads occurs.
• There are suggestions of shifts in coast-interior
  trade patterns for example, the use of obsidian
  from the east of the Sierra Nevada drops sharply
  in the Chumash area after the Middle Horizon.
• Shift toward smaller points, reflecting use of
  fore-shaft technology
• Full emergence of basketry
• Twined and coiled basketry
• Rise of coiled basketry is associated with a
  predominance of bone awls

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Millingstone

• Large, shallow basin metates and handstones
  (manos) were the common form of millingstone
  common in the Chumash area until
• They were used to grind small wild seeds for food.

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Mortars Cooking vessels

• Mortar and pestle made from sandstone were used
  for grinding and processing acorns or seeds.
• The Indians on Santa Catalina Island carved these
  stone pots from steatite, a soft, easily worked
  soapstone which they quarried on the island.
  These heat resistant cooking vessels were traded
  to the Chumash of the Northern Channel Islands
  and to people on the mainland coast, in exchange
  for local resouces.

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Middle Horizon Projectile Points (Large)

• Large Projectile Points from CA-FRE-115.
  Specimen A-D concave base, deep E-F concave
  base, shallow (entire) G-H concave base,
  shallow (partial) I-L concave base,
  side-notched M concave base, corner-notched
  N-P straight or convex base, corner-notched
  Q-S convex base, side notched T convex base,
  unnotched.

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Protohistoric Projectile Points (Small)

• Small Projectile Points from CA-FRE-115.
  Specimen A-E concave base, side-notched F-J
  concave base K-O straight base P-T straight
  or concave base, corner notched U-Y concave
  base, corner-notched.

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Shell beads (Olivella sp.)
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Basketry

• Coiled basketry technique
• trays, bowls of all sizes, treasure baskets and
  hats
• Twined basketry technqiue
• leaching basins, sieves, fish traps, cradles, and
  water bottles

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Bone awls

• Usually made from the cannon bone of Mule deer
  (Odocoileus hemionus)
• a, Pomo
• b, Maidu
• c,d,e, Yokuts
• f, Yuki
• g,h, Miwok."

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Major sources of obsidian