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Archaeological Investigation in Central Alaska

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2017

Froelich Rainey
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Extract

The area referred to in the following summary of investigations includes the valley of the Tanana River, sections of the Central Yukon Valley above the mouth of the Tanana, and the upper Copper River Valley. This sub-arctic region, inhabited by bands of semi-nomadic Athapascan Indians, by white traders, trappers, miners, and only recently by a few farmers, presents unusual difficulties to an attempt to discover archaeological sites. This is due not only to the sparse population and limited cultivation but to the characteristic mantle of moss, brush and forest that obscures all evidence of ancient dwelling sites. No habitable caves or rock shelters have been found. Under these circumstances, investigations must depend primarily upon information obtained from the present natives and upon accidental discoveries made by white settlers in very limited cultivation and in placer mining operations.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 5 , Issue 4 , April 1940 , pp. 299 - 308
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1940

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References

402 The investigations were carried out with funds supplied by the American Museum of Natural History in New York (Voss Fund) through an arrangement with the University of Alaska, College, Alaska, during 1936 and 1937. A more detailed account by the writer, entitled “Archaeology in Central Alaska” appears in the Anthropological Papers of the American Museum, Vol. XXXVI, 1939.

403 These scrapers, called tci-tho in the upper Copper River Valley, are made and used in preference to iron blades at present, both in that region and in the Upper Tanana, for scraping skins. It is the most common implement in all Athapascan sites excavated. An oval or semi-lunar flake is struck from a water worn boulder and then battered against a stone until crudely retouched. The same implement is reported by Hrdlifika from the lower Yukon; also by de Laguna from the lower Yukon and Cook Inlet. The implement also occurs in collections from the Baikal region in Siberia.

404 Potsherds found at the mouth of the Tanana are reported by Frederica de Laguna “An Archaeological Reconnaissance of the middle and lower Yukon Valley, Alaska.” American Antiquity, Vol. II, pp. 6–12.

405 Nelson, N. C. “Early Migration of Man to America” Natural History, Vol. 35, p. 356, N. Y. 1935 Google Scholar) “Notes on Cultural Relations between Asia and America“—American Antiquity, Vol. II, pp. 267–272.

406 Debets, G., “An Experiment in Isolating Culture Complexes of the Baikal Neolithic” (in Russian) Izvestia of the Association of Institutes for Scientific Research. Vol. III No. 2, U.S.S.R. 1930.Google Scholar

407 Similar material is found under the same circumstances in the Gobi and in the Lake Baikal region.

408 Chaney, R. W. and Mason, H. L. “A Pleistocene Flora, from Fairbanks, Alaska.” American Museum Novitate No. 887, New York, 1937.Google Scholar

409 Mertie, J. B. Jr. The Yukon Tanana Region, U.S.G.S. Bulletin No. 872, Washington, D. C. 1937.Google Scholar

410 Giddings, J. L. Jr. “Buried wood from Fairbanks, Alaska,” Tree Ring Bulletin, Vol. 4. No. 4. Tucson, Arizona, April 1938Google Scholar.

411 What appear to be the same long, polished bone points, were found by Dr. Edgar B. Howard in direct association with mammoth bones, in New Mexico. Science News Letter, March 20, 1937.

412 One of these is an Eskimo “woman's knife” with a walrus ivory handle. The other resembles an Eskimo “man's knife.” They are the only typical Eskimo implements found in central Alaska.