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BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULEEETIN 192° PEATE 1
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Sites in the Yakutat Bay area.
(For explanation, see p. 218.)
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY
BULLETIN 192
ARCHEOLOGY OF THE
YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA
By FREDERICA DE LAGUNA, FRANCIS A. RIDDELL,
DONALD F. McGEEIN, KENNETH S. LANE, and J. ARTHUR FREED,
with a chapter by CAROLYN OSBORNE
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
WASHINGTON : 1964
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office
Washington, D.C., 20402 - Price $3.25 (Cloth)
LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL
SMITHSONIAN InsTITUTION,
Bureau or AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY,
Washington, D.C., June 28, 1963.
Str: I have the honor to submit the accompanying manuscript,
entitled “Archeology of the Yakutat Bay Area, Alaska,” by Frederica
de Laguna, Francis A. Riddell, Donald F. McGeein, Kenneth S. Lane,
and J. Arthur Freed, with a chapter by Carolyn Osborne, and to
recommend that it be published as a bulletin of the Bureau of American
Ethnology.
Very respectfully yours,
Frank H. H. Rossrrs, Jr.,
Director.
Dr. LronArp CARMICHAEL,
Secretary, Smithsonian Institution.
gL
f) N l4p> ;
17 198
_ LIBRARY_2
. aT
CONTENTS
PAGE
TRIS FR VLAN ER Te a see ee aan Ix
InrRopuctTIoN, by Frederica de Laguna-_----------------------------- 1
fine probleme. 23-50. S225. 5 soso Je ee ee =A 1
Traditional history of the Yakutat area__._..-.-.--------=------- 3
Srninay with bilrOpeuis 2. ssesoo 226 ooo sso ees aes See eee 10
Tue Yaxurtat ArRzEA, by Frederica de Laguna-_---_-------------------- 13
Geurrap hye ses 525 o05 55S So SSS 8 UL ie seas ee Se eels 13
(Goolgricaehanves 60 S20 cls 2. ste 5 4S Lae REE es 15
Seihement On WY aKUtAl DaYosaso52-.sSss~s— 3 Ss See Seale = 20
Sethioments in the Anka area... .> 2-25 2-- = See ees es = 23
Settlements, Lost River to Italio River. o2v- --2 22225-5226 252SL25 24
Battlements im the Dry bay area. 2525 23-2. >=. -Steeeas ee = 28
Oup Town, Knieut IsLanp, by Francis A. Riddelland Frederica de Laguna_ 31
Native: tradiions. 02) 222 2.3 Se ee ee bass pee seks ae 31
RNRIRN LOM fps 0 ain bao soe a ee 33
Shaman’s grave, Koicht Islandas 3 seu 2c ee. gel2ee 5-25} eee ees 35
Excavation and mapping techniques - -...—.---------+-5-=-------- 36
Stratigraphy of the trash mounds___.._...----------------------- 36
Hovusrs AND Cacuss, by Francis A. Riddell and Frederica de Laguna---- 43
MAIR BSG ae eae oe hg rs Si SS aaa Sa sees Se eee 43
Smaller surface and subsurface. pits... =.-L0 22/2825 vet so lsslSee 45
Sic Sten ne es BOUSG Sos oo 2 Ss Sa Ss a SE SLOSS 2 48
irieiyen = OCIS BS 2 oo 45 so baw ee ae sees oj ES SSL PS 51
GUNek Biro 2 SS on ee re eee eee a= 2 SOS 52
ROO fee oe TS BER os EA a BS SBSH SEE BAe eS. = 54
igloos a ae ee a Eee 54
She t bath r OGRE Sh see ee ot aa Sa SO SS 54
Are | Sees epee te Oi LS by Rt ee Fn Fs de eer a Oe BOE 23 55
PEM GRU ey thd te So en Bo ea tan tals SR Se BS 2 58
ELOUINE:. ONS PU OS sg oo FS ee Ole Dee OOO BOE E 61
\ CCL LE Se ee Seo ereme me Lie ies ese tell. ae 61
PRR gh he en al Pa Bae Say hs se A ES 63
BOG lS Pe, BS. Se eee HUGS ENS 63
Bear ihe ease bo nee esa pe oeee see See cece 63
Imirusive featuresic 2.220. A ele eo MUI AS eles 63
Rest. Pits ee soe te eo le BO Se 2. OPE Oe oe 64
Mcgee Et irag Se ee eee eee 82, BA ae oe eh Save Ch be BONING Ee 65
BP BTIGEONCH el oho semi fe ee ee st Ie RA 66
Gorninarisonae cs: 22.8. UPL bP Sure. oo ee 2 re SIO A AeRea FE . - 73
ANALYsIS OF FAUNAL REMAINS FRoM Otp Town, Knicut Istanp, by J.
Arthur treed. and Kenneth §..Lane.-.2-.22 2-224 =. 22220 Foe esse. 77
Artrracts, by Frederica de Laguna, Francis A. Riddell, and Donald F. McGeein- 85
IntroGuction. 2. sel. 2) Jo eee 2 SUSE TS Be DARL 85
@byects or copper-ue = 2) toot ae 2b aOR? BNO ie Lek 87
Objecte aharOnew ows e sey soos a SR LON BAe = 88
Adzes, axes, and small woodworking tools-_----------------------- 90
Splitting adzes=. 2-52 fe 2 PE TO e NAS Sele ele oes 90
TV: CONTENTS
Artiracts, by Frederica de Laguna and Francis A. Riddell—Continued
Adzes, axes, and small woodworking tools—Continued PAGE
MA ice 2 Te sere am ea a a ne, ope 92
Planing adzes <2 2-2 eee ee eee ere es 8 Se eee 93
Adz irarments 2255.2 oo ees eee ete ees Se ek ee 95
Small svoodworkingtoolss 2234 23-2 es eee 95
Rubbing; tools2... 2222 = 4. 2 A ees ei Marae 99
Bone; burins;andchisels:...2.5-25-555 aesee e 99
Knives,scerapers, and, choppers- 23.2 See oie ee ee ores 99
Wl0se.o2os6n See a a ee ta a 99
Ulo-with. lateral handles #2222. 22a. Salus Oe eee eee 103
Ulo-shaped bark. scraper or knife=2 73255. 5 103
Crooked knives. (?)i2... 22255255 Sees Se ee ee 104
Stone iscrapérs.. 2.22 252 ee ee ee ee ave 105
Bone scrapers. 22-225. 0 8 Se eee ee ee Se ee 108
Hammerstoneés,,anvils,,(?),, and maulse sae 2s eee ee eee 108
Hammerstones. 222-2 442 283s oe ee ee ei a tee 108
Anvil (Biol tied. (RG, Aoi ge eh Hela ae Sine ae 110
Unhaftedvhandimanisiorspestles seas ee 111
Hafted maulthesds: S27 26 Cee ee ee ee ee eee ee 112
Stone saws (?), grinding slabs, whetstones, and paint_____________-_- 113
Stone/sawsn(?):.< 22-23-2552) See ee ee le eee 113
Grinding slabs_....2.2.+.42...5) eee eee 114
WhetstoniesS..2uiyeco2fb eo {onli 2 ee eee See ee eee 115
Paing 2 oe le Be Ss ee Sr 116
Stone Jamps:and fire making... <- 4 hye ee Se eee lal
Stone lamps <2-.--2...<---2c. 5 eee eee ee ee 117
Wire sMmakine 62 = uj ook 2 See ee eee 122
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SON OO Pp WH
VII
ILLUSTRATIONS
PLATES
(All plates except frontispiece follow p. 226)
. Sites in the Yakutat Bay area. (Frontispiece.)
. Knight Island, Yakutat Bay.
. Lamp and petroglyph.
. Objects of iron.
. Splitting adzes, axes, and war club.
. Planing adzes.
. Small woodworking tools like miniature adz blades.
. Small woodworking tools like chisels and burins.
. Stone scrapers and choppers.
. Rubbing tools, whetstones, and hammers.
. Stone lamps.
. Stone lamps.
. Barbed bone harpoon heads.
. Copper arrowheads, knife blades, and pins.
. Bone arrowheads and small weapon points.
. Bone chisels, awls, and small tools.
. Ornaments.
. Twined weaving.
. Fragments of Chilkat blanket from shaman’s grave, Knight Island,
Yakutat Bay.
TEXT FIGURES
PAGE
Penchematice profile of Mound By Old) Towns 2422.52.22) se2.2-c2hece 37
SeeLorace House. and Subsurface Pit: $8..-...22.....-2---&~-.-2-4--- 49
BEGERGIIBE DUCGIS ues hep Mert sc a5. ns a cee ae 52
TBLECONNULIC HON, OF VOUS Gu. o2Gs co. toe t ooo Kae cae ead eeee oe 53
5. Cross section of Trench 51, through House 8 and House Pit 1_____- facing 54
6. Cross section of Trench 53, through House Pit 1 and House 9______ facing 58
epi ECOR louse 0. 22 lek Fee Bee he et gh Be 60
BELL OCOMSTEUCHIOINGL ELOURG 9) foo ete ee ee oe 62
9. Cross section of Trench 33, through Mound C and House Pit 7___-__- 65
SOMES SCT AGN ee eect ce oe eb cee aes gee a an Wee RE ee 102
Inn V CH ARG BUEADETS.. <2 sae ee 2 Se Dk es oo SAA ey ee 106
Pere nuod OF StonG lampas: - 22. Seta) oe ee oR ee bee ee 119
13. Blades and points for large weapons____.._..._--_-..------.--------- 126
14. Ground slate blades for weapons or knives____.____..-___-_----__-- 128
Heat ped Nesan ANd, WOOMEM DIN. 2-2. 2 fe ee es oe 132
EEN NSIT OM IEC hd nee we et at ote ee en ek 140
ie Garbed points and ‘arrowheads... ==. 2 222 So) Se A ba ee BO 144
iS.) Devices. used. in fishing and trapping....22.2.5 2.22.22 2. 24222522 152
Why | 2 Sherr Se ee eae ye ee Pe oe oe eee eee 156
BRMIEHOPAUCCLODICUISES seer a ee ee EE eS ee the a 166
geearved and mcised stone objects: _.._2 2 2-228 170
22. Wooden figurine, floor of Storage House, Old Town II (194)_________ 173
2a box irapments Ana baud Of prass. 2-2 So) 2 ee ee 176
eee COTE Oe tet enero 2a oI As Re ie 182
25. Diagrams of weave of Chilkat blanket from shaman’s grave, Knight
LIVES OM EESTI o 1, 13h ee ge ne a a ae Se 190
VIII ILLUSTRATIONS
MAPS
PAGE
Le he: Gulf Coastiof Alaska. >. 2 Set @eee 3 oe eer eee See facing 2
2. The Coastal and Inland Tlingit and their neighbors_____-_-_------- 5
Sh, Srey mel arey Meany IBID pba alten = oe ee eee 14
A. Sites in southeastern Yakutat-Bay ot 25> _ S238 22s Sete eee facing 22
5. Map of Knight Island, Yakutat Bay, with detail indicating the site
of Old Towne 2.2252 5. en ose eee ee eee ae 32
6. Map of Old Town, Knight Island, Yakutat Bay____-__-_.---------- 34
i. Map of Mound B, Old Town, Knight Island==22222_223) === facing 36
FOREWORD
This report deals with archeological investigations in the Yakutat
Bay area, Alaska, which were undertaken as part of a larger program
of coordinated archeological and ethnological studies of the northern
Tlingit. The ultimate objective of the program, as originally formu-
lated, was to gather materials on the history of northern Tlingit
culture and to analyze as far as possible the factors and forces respon-
sible for the development and decline of Tlingit cultural patterns.
These studies were begun in 1949, when Frederica de Laguna,
senior author of the report, made an archeological and ethnological
reconnaissance to select some area or areas for the proposed research.
On this trip she was assisted by Edward Malin and William Irving,
then students at the University of Washington and the University of
Alaska, respectively. As a result, the Yakutat region on the Gulf
of Alaska and the territory of the Angoon Tlingit in southeastern
Alaska were chosen. A report on the fieldwork at Angoon in 1949 and
1950 has been published by the Bureau of American Ethnology as
Bulletin 172.
In the summer of 1952 combined archeological and ethnological
fieldwork was carried out at Yakutat. The archeological investiga-
tions were continued in the summer of 1953, and the ethnological
work in the winter and spring of 1954. While Frederica de Laguna
was in overall charge of this research, the archeological parties were
led by Francis A. Riddell (now State archeologist for the California
Department of Parks and Recreation). He was assisted in 1952 by
J. Arthur Freed, Kenneth S. Lane, and Donald F. McGeein, and in
1953 by Lane, McGeein, Albert H. Olson, Jr., and Robert T. Anderson
(now assistant professor of sociology and anthropology at Mills
College), then all students at the University of California or recent
graduates from that institution. Dr. Catharine McClellan (now
associate professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin)
collaborated in the ethnological work at Yakutat in 1952, and Mary
Jane Downes (now Mrs. Benjamin Lenz, then fellow in anthropology
at Bryn Mawr College) served as ethnographic assistant in 1954. In
connection with this program, a study of Eyak linguistics was made
Ix
x FOREWORD
at Yakutat in 1952 by Dr. Fang-Kuei Li, Department of Far Eastern
Studies, University of Washington. When it became apparent that
the ethnographic investigations should be extended to the neighbors
of the Yakutat Indians, Frederica de Laguna and Catharine McClellan
collaborated in studying the Atna of the Copper River during the
summers of 1954, 1958, and 1960.
The field researches at Yakutat were supported by the Arctic
Institute of North America, with funds from the Office of Naval
Research, in 1949 and 1953; by the Wenner-Gren Foundation for
Anthropological Research in 1949 and 1952; by the Social Science
Research Council and the American Philosophical Society in 1954;
and by the Department of Anthropology, University of California at
Berkeley, in 1952 and 1953. ‘The University of Pennsylvania Museum
and Bryn Mawr College were also sponsors. A faculty research
fellowship from the Social Science Research Council and the hospitality
of the Berkeley campus during the senior author’s sabbatical leave have
permitted her to finish this report.
We wish to express our gratitude to the above-named organizations
and also to acknowledge the assistance generously given by the U.S.
Geological Survey, the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service, the Alaska Native Service, and the U.S. Coast
Guard. We are also grateful for the valuable information furnished
by Dr. J. Louis Giddings, director of the Haffenreffer Museum,
Brown University; by Elizabeth Ralph, Radiocarbon Laboratory,
University of Pennsylvania; by Dr. Charles E. Borden, University of
British Columbia; by Dr. William O. Field, of the American Geo-
graphical Society; by Dr. Calvin J. Heusser of the Osborn Botanical
Laboratory at Yale University; and by George Plafker and the late
Don J. Miller, of the U.S. Geological Survey.
In preparing this report, Francis A. Riddell was responsible for the
original descriptions of the artifacts and of the archeological features
at the Old Town site, although his preliminary draft was later revised.
Donald McGeein collaborated with Riddell and also drew all the
maps, diagrams, and text figures, except a few prepared by HE. F.
Chapman, Mrs. Arlie Ostlie, Irene Brion, Richard A. Gould, and
Frederica de Laguna. The photographs of specimens were taken by
the late Reuben Goldberg, of the University of Pennsylvania Museum,
with the exception of a few by Kenneth Lane and the Campus Studios
of the University of Washington. Arthur Freed and Kenneth Lane
prepared the analysis of faunal remains. We are indebted to Carolyn
Osborne for the description and interpretation of the Yakutat blanket.
While the senior author has been responsible for the organization and
FOREWORD XI
editing of the report in general, her specific contributions have been
the ethnological and comparative sections, and the historical and
theoretical speculations.
For assistance in the final editorial preparation of the report for
publication, we wish to thank Mr. Edward G. Schumacher, illustrator
for the Bureau of American Ethnology, and Mrs. Eloise B. Edelen,
editor for the Bureau, and her assistants.
FREDERICA DE LAGUNA,
Bryn Mawr College;
Francis A. RIDDELL,
California Department of
Parks and Recreation;
Donawp F. McGere1n;
Kennetu S. LANs;
J. ARTHUR FREED.
* * * * * * *
NOTE
The system used herein for transliterating native words is essen-
tially that employed by Boas (1917) for Tlingit, except that digraphs
are used for affricatives, and A, 5, 1, and U are substituted for Greek
letters.
The archeological specimens are deposited in the University of
, Pennsylvania Museum in Philadelphie, although for the most part
they are designated by their field catalog numbers (in parentheses).
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de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 3
Cordova on the eastern edge of Prince William Sound to the Italio River,
alittle over 30 miles east of Yakutat. Still farther east, the inhabitants
of the Akwe River and Dry Bay area are reported to have spoken
Athabaskan (Tutchone?). Already in the 18th century was being
felt that movement of Tlingit from southeastern Alaska which intro-
duced Tlingit speech and culture to Yakutat Bay, and some Tlingit
were apparently even then living at Lituya and Dry Bays. The
Russians in 1788 and Malaspina in 1791 met Tlingit in Yakutat Bay;
Colnett (MS., 1788) noted that the natives there spoke different languages.
We do not know when Eyak was completely abandoned in favor of
Tlingit. Some items of material culture, notably the hunting canoe
with forked prow, link the Yakutat with the Eyak of the Copper
River Delta.
According to Birket-Smith (Birket-Smith and de Laguna, 1938,
pp. 530 f.), Eyak culture represents a very ancient phase of northern
Northwest Coast culture, somewhat modified by more recent influences
from the Eskimo and the Tlingit. Although it may be impossible to
trace Eyak speech southeast of the Italio River, it seems likely that
all the northern Tlingit area was occupied until relatively recently
by small scattered populations with a simple form of Northwest
Coast culture, quite possibly one similar to that of the Eyak (de
Laguna, 1953). Nowhere in northern Tlingit territory are there
large or numerous archeological sites comparable to those of the
Koniag or Chugach or to those on the southern British Columbia
coast (Drucker, 1943). Tlingit sib traditions would indicate a very
recent expansion of population, owing in part to immigration from
the south, perhaps under pressure from the Tsimshian and Haida,
in part to immigration of Athabaskans from the interior, and in part
to local population growth. This expansion probably accompanied
the development of classic Tlingit cultural patterns. An important
factor may have been contact with the European traders in the 18th
century which made possible a richer life on the coast. The same
processes by which the coastal Tlingit of southeastern Alaska absorbed
and acculturated originally non-Tlingit elements presumably operated
in the Yakutat area, where some of the events and changes are
remembered in oral traditions.
It was expected, therefore, that archeological research at Yakutat
would reveal a rather simple type of culture, resembling the culture
reported ethnologically from the Copper River Eyak, and that the
more recent sites might document the growth of Tlingit influence.
TRADITIONAL HISTORY OF THE YAKUTAT AREA
According to informants at Yakutat, their ancestors once occupied
all of the Gulf of Alaska from Cape Martin, east of the Copper River, to
4 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
Cape Fairweather between Dry Bay and Lituya Bay. The Eyak of
the Copper River Delta farther west were not a distinct people; indeed,
the inhabitants of Cape Martin were grouped with them in Yakutat
thought, although the Cape Martin people are said to have been
originally an offshoot of those living in Controller Bay. Vague
traditions suggest that the area between Cape Fairweather and Cross
Sound may have been occupied by the same groups that lived at Dry
Bay, though mixed with Tlingit of southeastern Alaskan derivation.
In any case, this Lituya Bay region is now deserted, though claimed
as hunting territory by a Tlingit sib of Hoonah, in southeastern
Alaska. (Map 2.)
All of the Gulf of Alaska Indians are said to have been divided into
exogamous matrilineal moieties (Raven and Eagle), like those of the
Tlingit, and the legendary history of the area is told in the form of
sib traditions. The interior Athabaskans—the Atna of the Copper
River and the Southern Tutchone of the upper Yukon and Alsek
Rivers—also have a similar social organization, and the Yakutat
people felt that they were related to them through migration and
intermarriage.
Excluding the Copper River Delta on the west and the Lituya Bay-
Cape Spencer area on the southeast, the Gulf of Alaska may be
divided into the following four districts, according to native thought:
(1) Controller Bay and the shore almost to the Icy Bay area is claimed
by the Galyrx-Kagwantan, an originally Eyak-speaking Eagle sib
who settled at the Kaliakh River (from which the first part of
their name is derived), after “the Flood.” There is, however, strong
evidence that a branch of Chugach Eskimo may have occupied, and
certainly frequented, Controller Bay during the 18th century, until
they were driven from it by the Tlingit or Tlingitized Eyak from the
east. This is attested by Chugach and Copper River Eyak traditions,
by Eskimo place names in Controller Bay, and by the observations of
Steller and other 18th-century explorers (Birket-Smith and de Laguna,
1938, pp. 341-354; Birket-Smith, 1953, pp. 19, 20). Before their
expansion westward, the Galy1x-Kagwantan were presumably living
between Cape Suckling and Cape Yakataga. The distribution of the
Eyak language suggests, of course, that at a still earlier period the
Indians lived in Controller Bay. The division into Copper River and
Yakutat dialects may have been caused by the subsequent intrusion
of the Eskimo. Indian tradition tells of Chugach raids on the village
at the Kaliakh River, and even as far east as Yakutat Bay. The
versions of some informants that Yakutat Bay was originally occupied
by Eskimo may reflect Chugach occupation of Controller Bay and
their warlike excursions into Yakutat territory, as well as the fact that
skin boats, like those of the Chugach, were once used on Yakutat Bay.
ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA
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(2) Icy Bay, Yakutat Bay, and the coastal plain as far east as the
site of the Yakutat airfield, but excluding Russell Fiord at the head
of Yakutat Bay, compose the territory of the K”ackqwan, a Raven sib
who trace their origin to the middle Copper River near Chitina.
(3) The district from Lost River near the Yakutat airfield to just
east of Italio River, including the head of Russell Fiord, belongs to the
Teqwedi, a Tlingit Eagle sib from southeastern Alaska. The Bear
House lineage owns the western area of Lost and Situk Rivers; the
Drum House lineage claims the eastern lands on Ahrnklin, Dangerous,
and Italio Rivers.
(4) Akwe River and Dry Bay area belongs to the Tluk’axadi, a
formerly Athabaskan-speaking Raven sib, and to the TY uknaxadi, a
Raven sib from southeastern Alaska, with whom the remnants of the
original inhabitants have merged. Also resident in the area, although
they have never established full territorial claims, were the Kagle
Tcukanedi, associated chiefly with Lituya Bay, and two other Kagle
sibs from southeastern Alaska: the Kagwantan (proper) and the
Cankugqedi. The latter came via an interior route from Lynn Canal,
up the Chilkat and down the Alsek, and are said to have inter-
married with the Southern Tutchone Athabaskans.
Although there were once many settlements in these regions, they
are now deserted, and the population of about 250 to 300 natives is
now concentrated in the modern town of Yakutat. Only a handful
of Eyak are reported to be at Cordova, and the little tribe is almost
culturally and linguistically extinct. Some of the Dry Bay and
Lituya Bay people emigrated to Hoonah and Sitka. In 1880, there
were 170 ‘‘Thlinket” in Controller Bay, 150 near Cape Yakataga,
and 500 at Yakutat and on the mainland as far south as Cape Spencer
(Petroff, 1884, pp. 29, 32), making a total of 820, if Petroff’s figures
are to be trusted. Although this count was taken after the disastrous
smallpox epidemics, there is no reason to suppose that the Indian
population on the Gulf Coast was ever very large.
The legendary history of Yakutat begins some ‘“‘ten generations”
ago, when the ancestors of the K”ackqwan emigrated from Chitina
on the Copper River because of an intrasib quarrel. At that time
they spoke Atna Athabaskan, and are referred to as the Ginexqwan
or “people of Ginex’’ (Bremner River, an eastern tributary of the
Copper River). The emigrants are said to have ascended this river
and crossed the glaciers. Part of the group that became separated
from the rest eventually became the Ganaxtedi Raven sib of the
Kyak at the mouth of the Copper River. The main party traveled
across the ice, past Mount Saint Elias, which they now claim as a
crest, and reached the coast somewhere west of Icy Bay, which was
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 7
then filled with ice. Here the Gmexqwan met and intermarried with
some Galyrx-Kagwantan who were moving eastward by canoe.
The extensive icefields of Bagley and Bering (or Guyot?) Glaciers
which the emigrants had to cross, as well as mountain ridges up to
5,000 feet high, might seem to present an insuperable barrier and so
cast doubt not only upon this tradition, but also upon the report that
copper from the interior was carried to the coast via a “shortcut” to
the mouth of the Duktoth River at Cape Yakataga. Don J. Miller,
of the U.S. Geological Survey, who knew this whole area thoroughly,
assured us, however (letters of October 30 and December 6, 1957),
that not only was the route possible, but that it had actually been
followed by prospectors in the early 1900’s on the basis of the Indian
legend. The natives would have come up the Tana River (a southern
tributary of the Chitina), up Granite Creek or Tana Glacier, and then
over Bagley and Bering Glaciers, and down the Duktoth River to the
coast. Miller furnished some details of the prospectors’ journeys, the
first of which were made in 1905 and 1906. Crossing the glaciers took
from 3 days to almost 3 weeks. One of the men found a piece of split
wood, 2 feet long, on a moraine (of Bering Glacier?), apparently left
there by the Indians (cf. also Moffit, 1918, p. 77). Miller reports
the ice along most of the route as “relatively smooth and little cre-
vassed—treally good traveling, as glaciers go.”’
Native accounts vary as to how long the G@mexqwan and their
spouses stayed near Icy Bay, but eventually they came to Yakutat
‘Bay, which was then largely covered by a glacier. They crossed the
bay, walking over the ice according to some informants or using skin
boats according to others. The islands in the bay and the eastern
shore were already owned by a group or groups, variously identified
as Chugach or as Indian. Our most knowledgeable informant called
them the Hinyedi, a Raven sib (presumably Eyak-speaking), although
there may have been other small tribes in the area. From them, the
Copper River immigrants acquired by purchase the territory along
the shores of Yakutat Bay, including the stream, K”ack (‘Humpback
Salmon” in Eyak), from which the sib takes its present name.
Payment was made in copper which they had brought from the
Copper River. After selling their lands, the Hmyedi are said to
have emigrated to southeastern Alaska, although we suspect that
some of them merged with the K’ackqwan.
One group with hunting camps on Yakutat Bay and settlements
along Lost and Situk Rivers to the east were called the Tlaxayik-
(“Yakutat Bay’’)-Teqwedi. They were an Eyak-speaking group
closely related to, or possibly a branch of, the Galyrx-Kagwantan,
and were responsible for the destruction of the Russian post at
Yakutat in 1805. Slightly prior to this, the first of the Tlingit
8 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLu. 192
Teqwedi from southeastern Alaska were marrying into the Yakutat
Ravens. Shortly after 1805, the Tlaxayik-Teqwedi were nearly
exterminated by Tlingit parties from Akwe River, and the survivors
were apparently absorbed by the true Teqwedi. Another group, now
extinct, were the Duxedi, also an Eagle sib, possibly a branch of the
Tlaxayik-Teqwedi. Their name refers to the muddy water of the
Situk River, which at that time drained the ice-dammed lake at
what is now the head of Russell Fiord.
Meanwhile the Tlingit had been moving up from southeastern
Alaska and were established in the Dry Bay area. This is reflected in
the story of the man from the Hoonah district who taught Tlingit
arts to the Dry Bay Athabaskans and who became rich by trading
with them (see Swanton, 1909, Tales 32 and 104). Thesibs that moved
in at this time seem to have been the Kagwantan, T?uknaxadi, and
Teqwedi, although some of the Bear House lineage of the last sib
were already living near Yakutat. The Cankugedi were presumably
established by that time at Dry Bay through intermarriage with the
local inhabitants. The Drum House branch of the Teqwedi pur-
chased the Ahrnklin-Italio district from the Staxadi, a branch of the
Hmyedi, and the Bear House lineage of the Teqwedi acquired the
Situk-Lost River area by preemption. The latter were probably not
secure in their holdings until the T?uknaxadi from Dry Bay, eager to
get the Russian loot held by the Tlaxayik-Teqwedi, made war on the
latter and nearly exterminated them.
The Ti’ uknaxadi apparently did not enjoy their wealth for very
long because they became embroiled in a war with one of the Chilkat
Raven sibs. One of their war parties was lost when a number of
their canoes capsized in Lituya Bay under mysterious circumstances.
This occurred about 1850, and the disheartened relatives at Akwe
River abandoned their town. Some moved to Hoonah and Sitka,
and others came eventually to Yakutat.
More important than the many wars and intrasib quarrels as
causes for the abandonment of settlements were the various epidemics,
of which the smallpox epidemic of 1836-39 was the most disastrous.
The establishment of a trading post, of the mission, and of the cannery
concentrated the scattered population at the modern town of Yakutat
early in the present century.
One of the most important legendary figures in the native history
of Yakutat was Xatgawet, a Tlingit Teqwedi of the Bear House
lineage. He is said to have been born on the Akwe River and to have
traveled all over, even as far west as Katalla, marrying the daughters
of local chiefs and acquiring great wealth from the gifts customarily
bestowed upon brothers- and sons-in-law. This is, of course, a device
used by the Tlingit to establish profitable “trade” with the Atha-
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 9
baskans (Olson, 1936, p. 214). He is said to have ‘organized’ the
coastal groups and to have given them the names of Tlingit sibs, such
as Ganaxtedi, Kagwantan, and so on. He also gave the maximum
number of eight potlatches, a feat not afterward equaled at Yakutat.
All of these stories suggest that while the earlier inhabitants of the
Gulf of Alaska may have had matrilineal sibs and moieties (perhaps
rather loosely organized, like those of the Copper River Atna), it was
the Tlingit immigrants to Yakutat who introduced the fully devel-
oped patterns of Tlingit social and ceremonial life. According to
some informants, Xatgawet was also a shaman and acquired one of
his familiar spirits from a Tsimshian colleague, a story which suggests
the northward diffusion of shamanistic practices.
Some informants say that Xatgawet bought Knight Island for his
Gmexqwan wives and children, and that he assisted his brother-in-
law in founding the village on that island and named it T’ukwan, or
TPak*’an “Old Town,” after the famous Chilkat village (Klukwan).
Our best informant maintains, however, that Xatgawet lived much
later, after the Russians had been expelled. He is said to have been
the grandfather of a woman who died shortly after 1900 and the
ereat-grandfather of a woman who was born in 1874. Furthermore,
it is denied that he had anything to do with Knight Island, but lived
on Lost River. Giving him a post-Russian date would place him in
the period in which Tlingit had replaced Eyak speech at Yakutat.
It is possible that the traditions are confused because there were
‘several persons with the same name. In any case, the first Tlingit
trade with Yakutat antedated the visits of the first Kuropean ex-
plorers in the last quarter of the 18th century, for it was already
well established at the time of the explorations of Ismailov and
Bocharov to Yakutat in 1788, witness the arrogant behavior of the
Tlingit chief, Yelxak (‘Iichak’’), from Chilkat (Shelikhov, 1793,
pp. 228-229, 233-237; and in Coxe, 1808, pp. 324-325, 329-332).
There is no doubt that the fur trade in the late 18th and early 19th
centuries stimulated the northward expansion of the Tlingit. Asso-
ciated with the diffusion of Tlingit trading patterns and the Tlingit
language, many other aspects of Tlingit culture must have been
spread, probably including the style of potlatches, of peace ceremonies,
and of shamanism and witchcraft. All of these would have been
reflected in such items of material culture as the large multifamily
lineage house with totemic crests on carved house posts and painted
screens, and ceremonial regalia of all kinds. The Tlingit also intro-
duced the Haida-derived style in secular songs, and shamans’ spirit
songs in Tsimshian. Tlingit trade also brought to the Yakutat
people large canoes of southern manufacture (Haida and Nootka),
Tsimshian-made dance headdresses, dentalia, abalone, and flat-headed
10 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLu. 192
slaves, in return for which the Yakutat traded their magnificent
baskets, copper from the Copper River, and furs obtained locally or
from their relatives in the interior or farther west along the Gulf
Coast.
CONTACT WITH EUROPEANS
According to the natives, their first contact with Europeans occurred
some time before the Russians established themselves at Yakutat. A
ship was wrecked on the shore near Malaspina Glacier. Two men
and a woman survived, but the men fell down a crevasse and only
the woman was alive when the Indians found the wreck. The latter,
through ignorance, spoiled most of the treasures they took from the
ship. Thus, they put the guns into a fire and pounded up the barrels
with stones to make spears. They could work iron because they
already knew how to shape copper. At that time an iron spear point
was worth a slave, and so the men became rich. One of them married
the White woman, who lived to old age.
From written sources we may infer that the first direct contact
between the Gulf of Alaska Indians and the Russians was in 1783 when
Potap Zaikov led an exploring party into Prince William Sound and
Controller Bay. Other hunting parties, consisting of several hundred
Aleuts and four or five Russians, apparently went down the coast,
perhaps as far as Lituya Bay, but of these we have no details. Lituya
Bay was visited by LaPérouse in 1786, where he met natives who
may be taken as typical of the expanding northern Tlingit. The
Indians there had iron tools and beads. One of our informants told
about the coming of the first ship to Lituya Bay, and a fuller version
was obtained by Emmons (1911) from a chief at Douglas or Juneau.
Dixon visited Yakutat in 1787, and the following year Ismailov
and Bocharov explored Controller, Yakutat, and Lituya Bays, as
reported by Shelikhov, and Colnett also traded with the natives in
Controller and Yakutat Bays and in inlets farther southeast. In
1788, Douglass anchored off the Ahrnklin and Dangerous Rivers,
or off Dry Bay, where he traded with the natives, but he failed to
discover an anchorage in Yakutat Bay. Malaspina’s more thorough
exploration of Yakutat Bay was made in 1791. Brown traded in this
area in 1792, 1793, and 1794. In 1793 a war party from Yakutat went
to attack the Chugach in Prince William Sound, but, to their mis-
fortune, fell in with Baranov and were defeated. That same year the
Russians sent a party of Aleuts to Yakutat under the leadership of
Shields, and in 1794 a large flotilla of bidarkas under Purtov and
Kulikalov. This party met Lieutenant Puget with one of Van-
couver’s ships (the Chatham) at Yakutat, and also the English trader,
Brown, in the Jackall.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 11
The Russian post at Yakutat (actually on a lagoon inside the
southeast point of the bay) was begun in 1795 and fortified the
following year. In 1800 a second post, or blockhouse, was built on
Monti Bay, near the present mission or near the entrance to the
Ankau lagoons where the first post was located. In 1802 the In-
dians attacked an Aleut hunting party at Dry Bay and accused the
Russians of robbing graves, a charge which is still remembered. Our
informants also listed other grievances: the failure of the Russians
to pay for the land they occupied; closing the stream (with a fish
weir?) between the Ankau lagoons and Summit Lake to the east, which
seriously interfered with the natives’ supply of fish; taking children
with promises to educate them but actually using them as slaves;
and, lastly, appropriating native women at their pleasure. As a
result, the Russian post was finally destroyed in 1805, and all but a
few of the occupants were killed. The same year the Yakutat again
invaded Prince William Sound, but this war party was annihilated by
the Chugach. (For the Chugach version, see Birket-Smith, 1953, pp.
141 f.)
In 1806 Campbell rescued an Aleut man and his wife whom the
Yakutat had captured, and took two Indians to Kodiak as hostages.
Our informants also told how the Tlaxayik-Teqwedi leader of the
attack on the Russian fort was taken to Kodiak. It was not until
the following year, however, that the widow and children of the
Russian commander were liberated, together with a few other
‘survivors.
After this a period followed in which there were few close contacts
with Europeans, except when trading parties went from Yakutat to
Nuchek in Prince William Sound, or to Sitka, or even to Prince
Rupert and other distant, southern trading posts. We have few
records of European visitors to Yakutat until about 1880, except for
the Russian cartographers, Boolingin in 1807 and Khromchenko in
1823, the British navigator, Belcher, in 1837, and the U.S. Coast
Survey in 1874. Although the ocean off the coast was a famous
whaling ground, vessels seldom put in to shore.
The first American traders began to appear at Yakutat shortly
before 1880. At that time, a White man was killed and his Indian
slayer taken to Portland on a gunboat. Later, the U.S.S. Adams
landed a party of prospectors at Yakutat, and between 1883 and 1886
there were goldminers working the black sands of Khantaak Island
and the ocean beach. Trading schooners began to call regularly,
and parties attempting to climb Mount Saint Elias stopped at Yakutat
to recruit porters with almost equal regularity. A Dr. Ballou ran a
12 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buin 192
trading post where the mission is now located. During this same
period, parties of Tsimshian and Tlingit from southeastern Alaska
came to hunt seals in Yakutat Bay and sea otters in Icy Bay. The
mission was established in 1888, the ‘Old Village” at Yakutat was
founded shortly afterward, and the cannery was built in 1904.
THE YAKUTAT AREA
By FREDERICA DE LAGUNA
GEOGRAPHY
The region in which our archeological investigations were pursued
includes Yakutat Bay and the coastal plain to the southeast as far as
Dry Bay. Yakutat Bay has its entrance between Point Manby
(59° 41’ N., 140° 19’ W.) and Ocean Cape (59° 32’ N., 139° 51’ W.),
where it is 16 miles wide. It extends northeastward about 33 miles,
narrowing to a width of 3 miles or less, then turns southeastward
toward the ocean for a distance of 28 miles. The coastal plain
between Yakutat and Dry Bays is about 50 miles long, and from 5 to
14 miles wide between the open Gulf of Alaska and the snow-covered
peaks of the Saint Elias Range.
The southern shores of Yakutat Bay, including the chain of islands
(Khantaak to Knight Islands) along its eastern edge, and the fore-
shores northwest and southeast of the bay, are all low-lying terrain,
less than 250 feet above sea level. Most of this land is composed of
alluvial gravels, sands, and silts, and is studded with lakes and swamps.
The western shore of the bay is covered by the terminal moraine of
Malaspina Glacier, and similar outwash deposits are found along the
opposite shore. All of the permanent native settlements are in these
lowland areas. (See numbered sites on map 3.)
Steep rocky shores are encountered at Eleanor Cove, on the eastern
side of Yakutat Bay near Knight Island, about 15 miles above the
mouth of the bay, and on Bancas Point to the northwest. Here the
land rises sharply to altitudes of over 4,000 feet, leaving only small
areas at the mouths of streams where the natives camp in the spring
when fishing for halibut or hunting bears and seals.
Disenchantment Bay, the “heart” of Yakutat Bay, north of Point
Latouche and Bancas Point, is filled with floating ice discharged from
the glaciers that descend to tidewater from the high mountains of
the Saint Elias Range, here over 14,000 and 15,000 feet in elevation.
These icy waters are the principal seal-hunting areas of the region,
and the natives also gather sea gull eggs from the rocky cliffs of
Haenke (‘Egg’’) Island in Disenchantment Bay.
From Disenchantment Bay, Russell Fiord continues southeast for
about 10 miles, where it sends out to the west a 7-mile-long arm,
Nunatak Fiord, at the head of which is another glacier. The bare
13
14 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLu. 192
slopes above Russell and Nunatak Fiords were formerly hunting
grounds for mountain goats. From Nunatak Fiord, Russell Fiord
turns southward, extending so far that its head, “‘ Mud Bay,” protrudes
into the coastal plain only 14 miles from the ocean.
The Alsek River rises in Yukon Territory close to the headwaters
of the Yukon, Tanana, and Chilkat Rivers, and cuts through the
high barrier of the Saint Elias-Fairweather Range to reach the sea at
Dry Bay. The mudflats at the mouth, about 10 miles wide, are
covered only at high tide. Formerly there were a number of villages
or camps on the lower Alsek and at the mouths of smaller streams and
sloughs that enter Dry Bay. Until fairly recently the Dry Bay
people used to ascend the Alsek to hunt, fish, gather berries, and
trade with their interior neighbors and relatives, while the Southern
Tutchone of the upper Alsek used to visit Dry Bay. Interior trails
connected the settlements of the Southern Tutchone with those of
the Interior Tlingit around Tagish Lake and with the villages of the
Chilkat Tlingit on Lynn Canal.
A chain of sloughs, streams, lakes, and salt-water lagoons until
recently provided an inland waterway for canoes going between
Yakutat and Dry Bay, although some portages were necessary. It
was on these streams and lakes that most of the earlier settlements
were located, and here the natives obtained their supplies of salmon.
Until 1875 or 1880 there were few permanent houses on Yakutat Bay
itself; the most important village site was Old Town on the southern
point of Knight Island.
The eastern shore of Yakutat Bay as far north as Point Latouche,
a distance of about 23 miles, is heavily timbered with spruce and
hemlock. The former provided the natives with most of the wood
used for houses, boats, and implements, while the sweet inner bark of
the hemlock was used for food. In addition, cedar drift logs were
sometimes found on the ocean beach and utilized. Dense stands of
trees extend in narrow belts parallel to the ocean, but most of the
plain between Yakutat Bay and Dry Bay is open country. The
natives complain that the trees have recently been encroaching on
areas where they used to gather strawberries, salmonberries, blue-
berries, highbush cranberries, elderberries, Kamchatka lilies (‘wild-
rice’’), wildcelery, wild ‘‘rhubarb,” and “‘Indian-potatoes,” as well as
a variety of medicinal plants. Also there is a tradition that originally
there were no trees on the islands in Yakutat Bay, and that even as
late as 1850 or 1860 Krutoi Island was not wooded.
The Ya utat area enjoys a fairly equable climate, since the
thermometer rarely drops below zero or rises to 80; but there is very
heavy precipitation, averaging about 130 inches a year. Over 4 feet
of snow may accumulate at one time on level ground, and mountainous
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drifts form in the forest in winter. Most of the offshore winds blow
from the south and east, but on land there are often storm winds
from the mountains to the north. The tidal range at Yakutat is
about 10 feet.
The most important animals of the area that were utilized for food
or skins were: fur seal, harbor seal, sea otter, porpoise, sea lion,
whale (eaten when found stranded), black bear, brown grizzly, land
otter (until recently avoided as supernaturally dangerous), mountain
goat, wolf, fox, wolverine, beaver, muskrat, and marmot. Moose,
rabbit, and deer have come or been introduced into the area during
the present century. The most valuable fish are the salmon—king,
sockeye, humpback, and coho, to list them in the order of their runs;
there are also halibut, eulachon, herring, steelhead, etc. Bird life is
particularly abundant, especially in the Ankau system of streams,
lakes, and lagoons between Ocean Cape and Lost River. The most
significant for the natives were swans, geese, salt- and fresh-water
ducks, terns, gulls, and other aquatic birds. Cockles, clams, mussels,
chitons, crabs, and sea urchins were gathered in the sheltered waters
along the eastern part of the bay or in the salt lagoons of the Ankau
area. Edible seaweed was obtained on rocky points off Ocean Cape
or on the outer shores of the islands.
Icy Bay was an important area for hunting mountain goat, seal,
and sea otter, and the Gaty1x-Kagwantan territory west of Cape
Yakataga was noted for its fur bearers, especially beaver and sea
otter.
GEOLOGICAL CHANGES
There have been a number of geological changes in the Yakutat
Bay region since it was first settled, and recently discovered evidence
of these changes (Plafker and Miller, 1958) have tended to confirm
native traditions (de Laguna, 1958). The whole area was probably
buried under ice during the Pleistocene, and while human occupation
may have been possible during the recession which followed the
Wisconsin glacial period, we have no evidence of it. After this, there
was another advance of the ice, so that Malaspina Glacier and the
two lobes that filled Icey Bay and Yakutat Bay formed a continuous
front of ice along the sea. The coastal plain east of Yakutat Bay
and west of Icy Bay was apparently unglaciated. The eastern edge
of the glacier filling Yakutat Bay ran northeastward from Ocean Cape,
covering the area around Lake Redfield, and a smaller ice lobe extended
south from the head of Russell Fiord, although the land around Lost
and Situk Rivers was not glaciated (Tarr, 1909, map p. 106; Plafker
and Miller, 1958). The culmination of the glacial advance in Icy
Bay was roughly between A.D. 600 and 920 (A.D. 756 + 160 years),
16 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
and in Yakutat Bay was between A.D. 970 and 1290 (A.D. 1127 +
160 years), according to radiocarbon dates obtained from wood in
end moraines near Icy Cape and Ocean Cape (Plafker and Miller,
1958). During the subsequent recession, the ice retreated as far as or
even farther than the present glacial fronts, permitting the growth of
trees well behind the present timberline in Icy Bay, in Russell Fiord,
and in Disenchantment Bay. ‘This retreat began somewhat before
A.D. 1400, to judge from the age of living trees near Yakutat.
These geological changes are further discussed on pages 204-206.
Native traditions seem to imply that this recession was in progress
when the ancestors of the K”ackqwan came from the Copper River;
in fact they are said to have caused it by throwing a dead dog down
a crevasse. Icy Bay was then completely filled with ice, and the
immigrants crossed Yakutat Bay on the glacier that extended from
Point Manby on the west to Eleanor Cove on the east. The native
name for Yakutat Bay, Ttaxayik, is derived from the Eyak ta’
(glacier), xa’ (near), plus the Tlingit suffix -yik (place inside). The
glacier was melting back, exposing the bay, and Yakutat, yak”dat,
is supposed to be an Eyak expression meaning ‘‘a lagoon (or bay) is
already forming.”
It was presumably during this same recession that a village was
founded on Guyot Bay, just inside the northwest point of Icy Bay.
It was eventually overwhelmed by a readvance of the ice, which
culminated during the 18th century. Tarr and Martin (1914, pp. 46
f.) quoted a version of this tradition, recorded by Topham in 1888,
and believed that the glacial advance took place between 1837 when
Belcher sailed into Icy Bay and 1886 when Schwatka saw a solid wall
of icein the bay. Plafker and Miller (1958) have advanced convincing
evidence that the “Icy Bay” of the explorers from Vancouver to
Schwatka was really the former outlet of the Yahtse River, east of
the present Icy Bay, and that the latter was already full of ice by
1790. Malaspina Glacier probably advanced at the same time as the
glaciers in Icy and Yakutat Bays. A radiocarbon date of wood from
its moraine indicates that the climax of the advance was about
A.D. 1750 + 150 years. The advance in the Yakutat area was much
less extreme and affected only the glaciers in Disenchantment Bay
and Russell Fiord. The maximum extent of the ice in Yakutat Bay
may have been to Blizhni Point and to a corresponding locality on the
eastern shore, midway between Knight Island and Point Latouche
(Plafker and Miller, 1958).
Although the glaciers were already in retreat by 1791, Malaspina
was stopped in June of that year by ice that filled Disenchantment
Bay as far south as Haenke Island. Tarr (1909, p. 20) believed that
this was only floating ice; if so, glacial conditions may not have been
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA Ly
very different from those of today. Even now floating ice in early
summer may prevent travel above Haenke Island, and we have seen
bergs drifting down to Knight Island. On the other hand, there has,
in general, been a great retreat of glaciers near Yakutat since the 18th
century, and other geologists (Russell 1892, p. 172; Tarr and Martin,
1914, pp. 108 f.; Plafker and Miller, 1958) believe that Malaspina
encountered a solid wall of glacial ice in the vicinity of Haenke Island.
The natives told us that before they had guns (which they
did not acquire until the end of the 18th century), they were unable to
camp above Point Latouche because of the floating ice. The main
sealing camp was then 38 miles south of the point, at a place called
Tlaxata, an Hyak word referring to the proximity of the glacier.
In the early 19th century, after the destruction of the Russian post in
1805, the natives made a fortified camp at Wuganiysz, about 2% miles
above the point. At the end of the century the sealing camps just
above Point Latouche were great centers (Grinnell, 1901, pp. 158-165).
Remarks made by some informants suggest, however, that there may
have been a period in the middle of the century when these places
were little used because of the ice.
Until the middle of the last century, Russell Fiord was blocked by
glaciers which dammed up a fresh-water lake at the southern end of
the fiord. This barrier, undoubtedly due to the 18th-century ad-
vance, extended from Beasley Creek to Cape Stoss. The name for
the latter was an Eyak word, meaning “‘it has the glacier in its mouth.”
This lake was drained by the Situk River (see Tebenkov, 1852, chart
vit; Davidson, 1904, map v1). At that time it was possible to travel
by canoe from the lake, through a series of lakes and streams, to
Yakutat Bay just below Knight Island. The ice barrier broke some
time between 1850 and 1875, according to our informants, when the
dammed-up lake waters were discharged into Russell Fiord, reducing
the Situk River to a small stream. Tarr and Martin (1914, p. 230)
estimate that the vegetation on the old lake beach at the head of
Russell Fiord was not over 50 years old in 1909-13. This change in
the size of the river must have affected adversely any settlements on
the upper Situk, where a fortified village had been built shortly after
1805. We do not know, however, whether any attempt was made to
reoccupy this site after the original owners, the Tlaxayik-Teqwedi,
were massacred at their camp at Wuganiyz.
Native tradition also refers to a breaking of a glacier bridge across
the Alsek River probably about the same time or toward the end of
the century. Prior to this, the river had flowed out under a tunnel
of ice. The Ttuk”axadi from Dry Bay, when making their annual
trips to the interior, had to carry their canoes overland through a
gorge on the west side of the river in order to bypass the glacier, and
18 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
on their return downstream would paddle fearfully under the ice.
The collapse of the ice is said to have created a great flood that
drowned many people in Dry Bay. There were also ice-dammed
lakes formed at the headwaters of the Alsek River, and a Southern
Tutchone informant reported that his mother had twice seen the ice
break and the water rush out in a flood, the first occurrence being
about 1842, according to his estimate.
Retreat of the Icy Bay glacier did not begin until about 1904
(Plafker and Miller, 1958). Our informants said that this was be-
cause a dead Tsimshian sea otter hunter had been eviscerated (to
preserve his body) and his entrails buried at Guyot Bay (‘“Tsimshian
Bay’’), just inside the northwest point of Icy Bay. This happening
was evidently after 1890 and before the death of Yakutat Chief
George in 1903.
Although we have no Yakutat traditions concerning the topography
at Lituya Bay, Tarr and Martin (1914, p. 10) estimate that the glaciers
advanced about 3 to 3% miles between 1786, the time of LaPérouse’s
visit, and 1906. About 1850 a flotilla of canoes, said to have come
from the Akwe River, were overturned in Lituya Bay and all the oc-
cupants drowned. Possibly this disaster was caused by giant flood
waves, evidence of which could be dated at 1853 or 1854 through a
ring count of trees that had sprung up on the devastated area (Miller,
1960, pp. 67 f.).
Still farther south, the ice in Glacier Bay on the north shore of
Cross Sound has retreated about 55 miles since the latter part of the
18th century. Prior to that, there was a long period of recession when
the glaciers were even smaller than they are now (Field, 1932, p. 371).
The advance of the ice which destroyed a Tlingit town in this area
recorded in one story by Swanton (1909, pp. 337 f.) may be the move-
ment of the ice to its maximum extension in the 18th century.
A very important recent geological event was the Yakutat earth-
quake, which lasted for 3 weeks during September 1899. Although
the center of this disturbance was 15 to 30 miles up the bay, waves
washed away the native graveyard at Point Turner on Khantaak
Island and threatened the mission at Yakutat. Avalanches fell all
along the shore between Knight Island and Point Latouche, and giant
waves in this area destroyed forests over 40 feet above sea level. The
earthquake also produced considerable changes in sea level, although
apparently not at Yakutat itself or on the foreland to the east. At
the extreme western end of Phipps Peninsula there was subsidence of
7 feet, and some stretches of shore north of Knight Island were
similarly depressed. Other areas along the eastern shore were raised
from 1 to 7 feet; Haenke Island rose 17 to 19 feet, and the west side of
Disenchantment Bay reached a maximum elevation of 47 feet. The
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 19
axis of tilting ran directly through the village site of Old Town on
Knight Island, but fortunately the main portion of the site was not
damaged. ‘The effects of the earthquake are described by Tarr and
Martin (1906).
Tarr and Martin (1906, pp. 52 ff.) believe that there had been
previous changes of sea level, and they cite raised beaches now covered
with forests on Krutoi and Otmeloi Islands, and an elevated beach
south of Point Latouche (and Tlaxata) with trees only 75 years old in
1906. We observed similar old beach lines on the south point of
Knight Island. In fact, according to Don J. Miller (letter of October
9, 1957), there is evidence of very recent emergence of land areas,
from beneath both the sea and the ice, all the way from Copper River
to Icy Point beyond Lituya Bay.
The earthquake of 1899 is credited with shaking down so much
snow on the glaciers in the Yakutat area that the latter were stimu-
lated to renewed activity between 1905 and 1910 (Tarr and Martin,
1914, p. 37). Since then most of them have been in retreat, except
that we observed that Turner Glacier in Disenchantment Bay had
recently advanced farther south and east of the position shown on the
U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey chart No. 8455 (1945, 5th ed., chart of
1901). This observation was confirmed by the natives, who said
that they no longer dare to camp on Osier Island nearby because of the
danger of waves from calving bergs.
Other recent changes in the Yakutat Bay area have been the drying
up or shallowing of the sloughs connecting the Ankau lagoons with
Lost and Situk Rivers, and shifts in the sandbars at the mouths of the
Situk and Ahrnklin Rivers that have resulted in some disturbances
of the salmon runs.
On July 9, 1958, Yakutat again felt the effects of a severe earth-
quake, when waves drowned three persons on Khantaak Island. The
southwest end of the island near Point Turner was, according to
reports, “lifted forty to fifty feet in the air[!]” and then submerged
(New York Times, July 10, 1958). My local correspondents do not
make clear whether the old village site on the island was affected. At
the same time, a landslide in Lituya Bay raised giant waves which
denuded the mountain slope near the head of the bay to the prodigious
height of 1,720 feet. All the shores of the bay were lashed by waves
that stripped them of vegetation and that overrode the three habi-
tation sites near the mouth visited by LaPérouse in 1786. Trim lines
in the forest growth indicate that similar giant waves, but of lesser
extent, had previously devastated the shores of the bay: in late 1853
or early 1854 (although no major earthquake was reported), about
1874, in 1899 (probably associated with the Yakutat quake), and in
1936 (caused by a landslide) (Miller, 1960). Native traditions re-
20 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
count the complete obliteration of a village near the mouth of the bay,
from which the only survivors were the men who had been out hunting
sea otters and a lone woman who had been picking berries on the hills
(Williams, 1952, p. 137). Possibly it was thas village, and not that on
the Akwe near Dry Bay, which our informants should have associated
with the Lituya Bay drownings, since the mourning song commemorat-
ing the tragedy is supposed to have been composed by a woman who
actually saw her relatives drown. Probably the Akwe village,
occupied by the same or related sibs, was deserted about the same time,
leading to an association of the two events. Although there had been
no great waves in the bay for some time prior to 1786, in the opinion
of Miller (1960, p. 56), who studied these phenomena, the Tlingit
were well acquainted with the treacherous character of the bay, as
evidenced by the traditions recorded by Emmons (1911). The dangers
they feared were probably something more than ordinary storms or
tide rips at the entrance.
The whole southern part of Alaska is subject to seismic activity,
and there were probably other earth movements which may have
affected former village sites, but of which we have no direct or clear
evidence.
SETTLEMENTS ON YAKUTAT BAY
A number of former villages or camps within the Yakutat Bay area
were reported by our informants, but we were able to investigate only
a few of these sites. The available information about them is sum-
marized below. Unfortunately the early explorers are not very
definite or specific about the location or nature of the native habita-
tions they saw. Probably Colnett (MS., 1788) was correct when he
estimated that the 200 natives he met at ‘“Koggy Harbour,” or Port
Mulgrave, had their homes to the southeast and came to Yakutat
Bay only to hunt, fish, or trade. He believed the huts he saw were
only temporary summer dwellings. It is to be noted also that Beres-
ford with Dixon in 1787 (1789, p. 169) noted ‘‘several huts scattered
here and there in various parts of the sound.” Malaspina in 1791
seems to have found a village on or near Port Mulgrave, that is
Khantaak Island, but does not indicate its location on his chart
(1802; 1885, p. 156), although the latter shows the cemetery inside
Ankau Creek, on the north shore, near the site of the present Alaska
Native Brotherhood Cemetery.
1. On Ankau Creek, in the vicinity of the cemetery mentioned
above, there was evidently a village, according to Dixon’s chart of
1787. The grave monuments which he and Malaspina describe
evidently stood nearby. Vancouver in 1794 (1801, vol. 5, p. 396)
also noted a village about 2 miles ‘‘within cape Phipps.” This site
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA Di
was only half remembered by one of our informants. We searched
for it without success. (For sites 1-6, 14-17, cf. map 4.)
2. The village on Port Mulgrave, Khantaak Island, was called
Suska. The modern village, remembered by our informants from
the 1880’s, was perhaps founded in 1875-80 to take advantage of the
visits of trading schooners, but was located at the same spot indicated
on Dixon’s map of 1787. ‘This village was abandoned by 1893. Exca-
vation is impossible because the whole site is covered by a graveyard.
3. The “Old Village” of Yakutat, about three-fourths of a mile
north of the cannery, was founded about 1889 when the mission was
built nearby. It is still occupied, although most families moved to the
present town of Yakutat in 1919 to build permanent homes near the
cannery that had been established in 1904. Part of the lowland where
the original houses stood at the Old Village has been washed away.
4, Sites were reported on both sides of Canoe Pass, a channel leading
east from Johnstone Passage, but we were able to find only a very
small shell heap on the island forming the north side of the pass. The
deposit consisted of 3 inches of humus, 12 inches of stones, ash, and
shells, and 7 inches of concentrated shells (clam, cockle, mussel, and
sea urchin) at the bottom, forming a total depth of 22 inches. Only
a cut bird bone (C/3), a rectangular slab whetstone of shale (C/2),
and a quartzite hammerstone (C/1) were found, which gave no clue
to the age of the site.
5. Although a former village site was reported on the east side of
Dolgoi Island, we were unable to locate it. However, a site was
discovered near the mouth of a small stream on the south end of the
island, about 100 feet from the beach. The site is perhaps 300 feet
long and 100 feet wide. Where tested, the deposit consisted of sticky
black soil and fire-cracked rocks, only 6 to 10 inches deep, and con-
tained a cobble hammerstone (D/2) and a ground slate tool (D/1).
That the site may be of considerable age is the fact that a huge tree,
fallen in 1952, once grew on the cultural deposit.
6. Various former camping places were reported on the north end
of Khantaak Island, on ‘‘Crab Island” nearby, on Krutoi Island, and at
the mouth of Humpback Salmon Creek opposite Krutoi Island. Some of
these camps were mentioned in stories of Chugach raids, but the site
at the stream was said to have been occupied by the Hmyedi, the orig-
inal owners of the area. An unsuccessful search was made for it.
We also failed to locate the settlement on the north end of Khantaak
Island, although it is marked on Dixon’s chart near the location
of a White man’s home which we visited.
7. The important site TY ak*-’an or ‘Old Town,” on the southern
tip of Knight Island, was reported to have been originally settled
before the Russians came, but informants differed as to whether
693-818—64__3
2? BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Burn. 192
it was first a Hinyedi or a Chugach camp, or a KYackqwan village.
There is also uncertainty as to why or when it was abandoned. In
1791, Malaspina (1885, p. 164) noted grave monuments here or in
the vicinity, similar to those at Ankau Creek. Since Russian days
it has been used as a camping place, and a White man has a cabin
nearby. It was here that our archeological work was concentrated ;
a full discussion and description of the site is given later.
8. Another site was reported at the mouth of a stream about half
a mile east of Old Town on the south shore of Knight Island. A
White man and his native wife now live here. We could find no trace
of the site. (Numbers for sites 7 and 8 are transposed on map 3.)
9. The small rocky island close to the mainland east of Knight
Tsland is called ‘Little Fort” in Thngit (pl. 1, a). It is supposed to
have been fortified “in the days of Xatgawet”’ as a protection against
Chugach raids. In the clearing on top of the island the outlines of
the fort walls are preserved, and they confirm native traditions that
the foundations of fortifications were often of stone. The walls of
rough cobblestones can be traced for a distance of about 70 feet along
the east side, and seem to enclose a rectangular area, 112 by 225 feet,
within which shelters of some kind were presumably built. In a 6-
inch cultural deposit of dark-brown rocky soil, outside the east wall,
a piece of copper, probably a knife (ulo) blade, was found (F/1). The
island would now be hard to defend, but it had more precipitous
sides before it was elevated about 12% feet during the earthquake
of 1899.
10. A former Chugach (?) camp was reported at the mouth of
the stream opposite the north end of Knight Island, but was not
visited. The land here rose about 5% feet during the earthquake.
11. The old sealing camp, Tlaxata, is said to be back in the woods
on the north bank of the large stream about 3% miles below Point
Latouche. We were unable to land there. Malaspina (1885, pp.
162-164) found natives camped here in early July 1791.
12. Three sealing camps used in post-Russian times, and described
by Grinnell (1901, pp. 158-165), were at the mouths of streams
approximately 1%, 24%, and 3% miles above Point Latouche. They
were called, respectively, ‘‘Burned Down” (in Eyak), Wuganiyr
(meaning the same in Tlingit), and “Big Valley” (in Tlingit).
Wuganiyr was said to have been surrounded by a stone wall with
loopholes for guns, but the Tlaxayik-Teqwedi defenders were mas-
sacred by the Tlingit TYuknaxadi from Dry Bay. Although this
place was visited in May 1954, the snow was too deep to permit
exploration. The three camps were visited by the Harriman Alaska
Expedition in the spring of 1899, when they were occupied by 300 to
400 natives from Yakutat, Sitka, and Juneau. During the earth-
693-818 O—64 (Fame p. 22)
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de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 23
quake that fall, the shore was elevated from 7% to 12 feet. Modern
camping places are on the south shore of Haenke Island where a flat
was raised above sea level by the quake, and on the mainland opposite.
13. The Tlaxayik-Teqwedi are said to have had a camp on high
ground near Bancas Point on the west side of the Bay.
SETTLEMENTS IN THE ANKAU AREA
The Ankau lagoon system of Phipps Peninsula is entered from
Monti Bay via Ankau Creek, and consists of several salt-water lagoons
and lakes. These are connected by streams with Rocky Lake, Aka
Lake, and Summit Lake to the southeast. From Summit Lake,
near the U.S. Coast Guard Loran Station, Lost River flows southeast-
ward to enter the ocean about 11 miles from Ocean Cape.
14. The site of the Russian post, Nova Rossiysk, (‘‘New Russia’)
(1796-1805), was on the narrowest part of the barrier beach between
the ocean and the largest of the Ankau lagoons (‘‘Russian Lake’’).
It is supposed to have contained “seven buildings defended by a
stockade, and five others outside” (Dall and Baker, 1883, p. 207;
see also Tebenkov’s map vu, 1852). Although we visited this spot
several times with native guides, we were unable to find any trace
of the fort. An Indian had a fishing camp and smokehouse at this
spot; the ocean has evidently washed away much of the land. The
natives also reported that the Russians fortified a small island in the
lagoon and erected a “‘gate’’ (fish weir?) across the stream, T’awal,
that drains Aka and Rocky Lakes into the lagoon.
In 1948, on or near this stream, a Yakutat native, since dead, found
a limestone rock, carved in typical Northwest Coast style to represent
a bear (pl. 3, 6). We were unable to discover just where it had been
found, and although this is the only known petroglyph in the Yakutat
area, the natives believed that it commemorated the defeat of the
Russians by the Tlaxayik-Teqwedi. The rock was taken to Yakutat,
where we saw it, but it later disappeared.
15. There was a former K*ackqwan village, “On the Lake,” at
the middle of the ocean side of Aka Lake. The occupants died in the
smallpox epidemic of 1836-39. The site was afterward used as a
fish camp until fairly recently. It is now a clearing, but our brief
exploration revealed nothing more than broken crockery and scraps
of iron.
16. The stream connecting Aka and Summit Lakes was said to
have been a canal, “dug by slaves,’’ which probably means that they
deepened or widened it at some point. Moser (1901, p. 383, map on
pl. xtvi1, Yakutat to Dry Bay) reports that: ‘The rocks and boul-
ders have been removed from the bed,and piled along the side, forming
a Shallow channel up which canoes are tracked at low water, but may
24 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
be poled at high water.” He locates this area on the lower stretch
of the creek, just above the lagoon. A village at the junction of the
stream and Aka Lake was occupied by Eyak-speaking Indians who
were killed by the Tlingit Teqwedi. We were not able to visit this
site.
17. Summit Lake drains both into the Ankau system and into
Lost River. On the ocean side of the outlet toward Lost River there
is said to have been a village, called in Tlingit, ‘“Town on the Hill,’’
because of its situation on a sandhill. It was occupied first by Eyak-
speakers and later by the K*ackqwan, who all died in the smallpox
epidemic of 1836-39. We did not explore this locality.
SETTLEMENTS, LOST RIVER TO ITALIO RIVER
The stream which flows southeast from Summit Lake is erroneously
designated as ‘“Tawah Creek” (U.S.C. and G.S. chart No. 8402), or as
“Ankau Creek” (U.S.G.S. topographic sheet, ‘‘Yakutat’”’). The
natives call it “Lost River,” and give the same name to the lower
part of the stream which it joins, referring to the upper part of the
same stream as ‘Little Lost River.’”’ We shall use the term ‘Lost
River” to refer to the lower part of the stream; designate the stream
from Summit Lake as its western branch; and retain the native name
“Tittle Lost River’ for the small northern branch.
18. Before the Russians came, there was a small settlement on the
western branch, approximately opposite the ‘‘“Number Two” runway
of the Yakutat airfield. When the Russians were expelled, this
became the principal village of the K*’ackqwan, with at least four
large lineage houses and other smaller homes. The inhabitants were
virtually wiped out by smallpox. Later the surviving K”ackqwan
moved to Khantaak Island, and the site was used as a fish camp
(only?). It is called Nessudat. Moser in 1901 (p. 384) noted three
houses and some fish racks at this locality.
The site occupies a fairly large clearing on the ocean side of the
stream and is marked by at least three house pits and several cache
pits, although none of the former could be identified as the ruins of
any of the particular houses mentioned by our informants. We made
test excavations along the cut bank of the stream, in the cultural
deposit at the western end of the clearing, and in a house pit at the
eastern end; but found only objects suggesting recent occupation.
The house pit measured about 18 feet square, with postholes and
remains of the corner posts some 5 inches beyond the end walls. The
cultural deposits in the midden and in the house pit consisted of light-
brown or gray sandy soil, containing ashes, flecks of charcoal, and
occasional fire-cracked rocks. Maximum depths were about 24 inches
in the midden, and 38 inches within the house pit, where cache (?)
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 25
pits were encountered below the floor level. The clearing extends
about 300 feet along the stream and is about 160 feet wide. Unfortu-
nately, it was only as we were leaving that we noticed what appeared
to be a much older house pit in the dense wood west of the clearing.
Material from Nessudat included: A cylindrical beach cobble used
as a pestle (pl. 10, k), a hammerstone (N/10), a fragmentary siltstone
whetstone (N/2), a small iron ball, 2.7 cm. in diameter (N/1), an iron
spike and an iron nail (N/5), some small green, small white, and large
white glass beads (N/6), and some fragments of English soft paste
porcelain. These all came from the test hole in the house pit. From
the midden on the riverbank were: a fragment of copper sheeting
(N/14), a broad flat piece of iron, possibly from a can, folded and
shaped into a knife or scraper (N/20), and an iron knife blade (pl. 4, 7).
Other items from the midden were: a clear glass liquor bottle, remains
of a tin can, a large white bead (N/7), a blue glass bead (N/8), and
an iron spike.
On the ocean beach near Nessudat was found an iron spearhead
which we were able to borrow from the finder for sketching (see fig.
13, d).
19. On the ocean side of the west branch, one-fourth of a mile above
its confluence with Little Lost River, is the site of Diyaguna’st, an
Eyak word meaning ‘‘Salt water comes in here” (pl. 1, 6). It origi-
nally belonged to the L’uxedi or Muddy Water People, and after
changing hands several times, was finally acquired by the Bear House
lineage of the Tlingit Teqwedi. It became their principal village
under Xatgawet, although the latter is reported to have lived in his
own house farther upstream at a place called “Strawberry Leaf” in
Kyak. ‘The village was visited by smallpox in 1836-39, but a number
of inhabitants survived. During Teqwedi occupation, the village
is supposed to have consisted of three or more houses, surrounded by
a palisade. We were told the names of seven houses, but since one
lineage house might have several names, we do not know how many
actual buildings were implied. The village was inhabited up to about
100 years ago. One of the houses apparently had a carved bear
figure above the door, or on a post that served as the doorway.
The site is on a sandbank about 100 yards long, 50 yards wide,
and 20 feet high, which is now being undercut by the stream. ‘The
midden deposit of humus, charcoal, and fire-cracked rocks is from
4 to 18 inches deep in most places, but in one spot the bank has caved
away to expose an old house pit containing a cultural deposit about
48 inches deep. In this fill were found a broken barbed slate blade
(see fig. 14, 2) and a fragment of a slate ulo or scraper (49—25-108), at
depths of 24 and 30 inches.
On top of the bank were three house pits, measuring 32 by 32 feet
26 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buny. 192
and 5 feet deep, 30 by 20 feet and 4 feet deep, and 30 by 20 feet and
2 feet deep. Two other rectangular depressions and a circular de-
pression, about 20 feet in diameter, may also be house pits. Two
other circular pits, 12 and 8 feet in diameter and 5 and 8 feet in depth,
respectively, were probably for caches.
None of these surface house remains appears to be very old. A
rotted post was found in the corner of one of the smaller pits, and test
excavations in the largest house pit uncovered one of the rotted roof
beams and a piece of commercial copper sheeting with nail holes.
The slumped bank and the bed of the river are littered with fire-
cracked rocks, pieces of commercial copper, iron nails, fragments
of china, and scraps of burned bone. Some of the china (49—25-114)
has been identified by Arnold R. Pilling, then a graduate student at
the University of California, as probably of English manufacture
between 1830 and 1875. Other pieces are of true Chinese porcelain,
later than Canton ware, but similar to that introduced into California
about 1850.
The following objects of native manufacture were found on the
bank of the river: a planing adz blade (pl. 6, d), a sandstone slab
possibly used as a saw to cut stone (49-25-109), a hammerstone
(-110), a piece of worked greenstone (—111), and half of a round sandstone
lamp like a complete specimen previously found here by one of the
Yakutat natives (pl. 3, a). The same man also found two stone
blades for splitting adzes. There was also a small whetstone (pl. 10, d)
a scraper made of copper (see fig. 11, f), and an iron dagger (see fig.
13, 5).
This material indicates habitation in both prehistoric and modern
times.
20. A small site on the west side of Little Lost River, about one-
half mile above its confluence with the western branch of Lost
River, is called “Shallow Water Town” (in Tlingit?), and is supposed
to have been the oldest village of the Luxedi. It was acquired by the
Tlingit Teqwedi, and finally given by a Teqwedi chief to his K¥ack-
qwan brother-in-law, who planted native tobacco here. The site
is a clearing about 200 feet long, about 75 feet wide, and some 20 feet
above the streambed. There are no cultural deposits in the cut
bank. An indefinite depression, about 20 by 20 feet, may be a house
pit. Our two test holes indicated cultural deposits to depths of 10
and’20 inches, consisting of humus, ash, charcoal, and a few fire-
cracked rocks. Three blue glass beads of the kind seen by Captain
Cook in Prince William Sound in 1778 (S/2), an iron arrowhead (S/1),
and a lump of red ocher were found. These may date from late
protohistoric times, but fail to corroborate the native claim for great
antiquity.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 27
21. Several houses and tent frames mark the modern Indian fish
camp on the west side of the mouth of Lost River. Two native houses
on the east bank of the river, at the end of an abandoned railway spur
from the cannery at Yakutat, opposite the mouth of the west branch,
were built in 1919 but are no longer occupied. One house at the end
of the railway was formerly ornamented by two carved wooden brown
bear paws, from which it derived its name, but these were stolen in
the summer of 1952.
22. Situk Village was on the east bank of Situk River, and extended
between the railway trestle and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
station. It was founded by the Teqwedi about 1875-80, and was
abandoned about 1916 (?). The site is marked by a few graves and
the remains of collapsed framehouses. In the clearing opposite the
Fish and Wildlife station there are some cache pits, about 3 feet in
diameter and 8 inches deep. Those explored contained only ashes,
rocks, and an iron bolt. In the river above the Government weir,
men at the station found a grooved maul head, carved to represent an
animal (see fig. 21, d). We were unable to discover any trace of an
earlier site, although there may have been one.
23. ‘“Hagle Fort,” reported to consist of four houses connected by
tunnels and surrounded by a palisade, was built by the Tlaxayik-
Teqwedi shortly after 1805 because they feared Russian retaliation.
Here they repulsed an attack by the T?uknaxadi from Akwe River,
but were defeated the next spring at Wuganiys (site 12) in Yakutat
Bay. We were unable to visit the site of this fort. The name for
the locality is known by both Eyak and Tlingit werds.
24. A single TY uknaxadi house was built about the middle of the
last century on Johnstone Slough, about 11 miles above the end of
the railway from Yakutat. The fish camp at the mouth of Johnstone
Slough and Situk River is modern.
25. The main village of the Drum House branch of the Tlingit
Teqwedi was reported on the Ahrnklin River, about 2 miles above the
mouth, apparently near the confluence of the two main branches.
The village and also the river were named “Big Town of the Animals’
(Tlingit), referring to the rich hunting in the area. There were said
to have been four houses there, and the river, now undercutting the
site, exposes charcoal to a depth of 4 feet. The village was abandoned
when most of the inhabitants died, either in a feud or from smallpox.
A Teqwedi settlement on the Ahrnklin, called ‘Wolf Cave,” may be
the same place, or possibly a lineage house at this town.
There are said to have been no villages on Dangerous River, but the
Teqwedi are supposed to have lived on Italio River before they pur-
chased the Ahrnklin area from the Staxadi. There were some
28 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buu. 192
fishing cabins on the Italio in 1909 (Robson, 1910, photograph on
j Oem 7a) ye
SETTLEMENTS IN THE DRY BAY AREA
Our information about former settlements in the Dry Bay area is
unsatisfactory, owing in part to the shifting stream channels which
render available maps inaccurate or confusing to our informants and
in part to the great difficulties of travel encountered by Riddell and
Lane in 1953.
Just west of Dry Bay, the Akwe and Ustay (Akse) Rivers have a
common mouth. The Akwe or western stream drains the lake at
the foot of Chamberlain Glacier and also ponds and swamps near the
Italio River. The Ustay (Us-tay of Moser, and Akse of Tebenkov)
is formed of two tributaries, the one draining the lake at the foot of
Rodman Glacier to the west, and the Tanis, draining Tanis Lake to
the east. Near the confluence of these two branches, the Ustay puts
out distributaries draining eastward and southeastward into Dry
Bay: Gines (‘‘William’’) Creek to the north, and farther down the
Ustay, the Kakanhini (‘Muddy’) Creek and the much smaller
Stuhinuk (“Stickleback,” or ‘(Cannery Creek’’), both of which enter
Dry Bay near the mouth of the Alsek.
According to Tebenkov’s map (1852, map vu; cf. also Davidson,
1904, map vi), there were villages on both the Akwe and ‘‘Akse”’ Rivers,
designated, respectively as ‘“‘Nearer’”’ and “Farther Village to the Mili-
tary Post” (at Yakutat). The Coast Pilot of 1869 (Davidson, 1869, p.
136), relying on Russian sources, reports in roughly this locality
(59°14’ N., 138°45’ W.) the common mouth of two streams, each
with a village on it, some 6 to 12 miles (by winding channel?) from
their confluence.
26. The westernmost of these two villages was probably the
principal town of the TY uknaxadi, called Gusex. This was reported
to have been on the Akwe River, apparently at the confluence of the
main or northern with the western branch. Tebenkov’s ‘Nearer
Village” is west of the river and north of a large slough. According
to the Coast Pilot of 1883 (Dall and Baker, 1883, p. 206), about
1870 (or earlier?), one of the several villages between Yakutat and Dry
Bay was visited by the captain of a whaler anchored at Yakutat.
He reported this as ‘‘the largest, finest and most clean Indian village
he had seen in all his experience on the coast. The population was
large, the houses well built, solid, and adorned with paintings and
carvings of wood, and expressly adapted for defense.”” It was per-
manently inhabited, parties leaving to trade or to hunt seals in
Disenchantment Bay. The description would fit what was told fof
Gusex. Unfortunately, the chart (ibid., opp. p. 204) shows a village
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 29
at what would appear to be the confluence of the Ustay and a western
tributary, but it is so inaccurate that no reliance can be placed upon it.
According to our informants, Guésex had originally been an Atha-
baskan Ttuk*axadi settlement before the Tlingit TYuknaxadi built
houses here. ‘The names of five houses were mentioned, and the posts
of one were said to have been visible 40 or 50 years ago. It was from
this town that the TP uknaxadi sent war parties against the Tlaxayik-
Teqwedi on Situk River and Yakutat Bay, and to it they brought the
Russian cannon and other treasures taken from their defeated enemies.
The town was abandoned about the middle of the last century, after
many of the men from it were drowned in Lituya Bay when going
to make war on the Chilkat.
According to one native informant, this site was located about 4
miles (on a direct line) from the coast (see above); another placed it
at the entrance to a former channel some distance down the Akwe and
about 2 miles (on a direct line) from the shore. The latter described
this place as having four or five house pits and one earth-covered house.
The only site which it was possible for Riddell and Lane to reach was
still farther downstream.
27. This was a site in a clearing on the west bank of the Akwe,
opposite its (present) confluence with the Ustay River. There are
several pits which may indicate former houses or caches, but digging
failed to expose any cultural deposits.
Tebenkov’s “Farther Village,” is located farther upstream, on the
west bank near the junction of the Tanis and Gines. Natives re-
ported a site on Gines (‘‘Williams”’) Creek.
28. A modern settlement was near the mouth of Stuhinuk Creek
on the west side of Dry Bay. Here were native houses, some built
as recently as 1909 or 1910, and the remains of a cannery, built and
abandoned between 1901 and 1912. Moser’s map (1901, pl. xn1m)
indicates a village here in 1901.
About half a mile northeast of Kakanhini Creek and 2 miles north-
west of Dry Bay, aerial photographs indicate an almost circular
pattern in the heavy forest growth, according to Don J. Miller (letter,
Oct. 30, 1957). ‘The photographs give the impression that trees
were cut down around the circumference of a circle about 1, 200 feet
in diameter, but were left untouched or only partly thinned out
within the circle.”” Miller did not visit this locality, nor did our
party, so we do not know what this might be, although it is suggestive
of a fortified town.
29. Other sites reported in the Dry Bay area are on the north shore
of the bay on the west bank of the Alsek, and a town farther down-
stream called “It repeatedly shakes” (Tlingit). There were also
settlements on Easting River, or possibly on Dohn River, streams
30 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
that cross the flats of Dry Bay east of the main, western, mouth of the
Alsek. The first two settlements are said to have belonged to the
Tiuk*axadi, but it was impossible to secure any clear information
about their location or the period when they were inhabited.
OLD TOWN, KNIGHT ISLAND
By Francis A. RippEtt and FREDERICA DE LAGUNA
NATIVE TRADITIONS
Knight Island (map 5) is roughly 3 miles in diameter and lies close
to the eastern side of Yakutat Bay, about 13 miles northeast of the
town of Yakutat. The island is low lying, composed of sands, silts,
and boulder clay. It is heavily timbered, and studded with small
lakes, swamps, and creeks, none of which has salmon runs.
The native name for the island, Ganawas, is not Tlingit, and we
suspect it to be an Eyak word, although some informants think it is
Atna or even Chugach. The island was the first piece of territory
acquired by the ancestors of the K*Yackqwan when they came to
Yakutat Bay from Copper River. At that time there were no trees
on the island, and it was covered with strawberries. The owners
caught a KY*ackqwan girl picking berries here and cut the basket
from her back. Her father, a Gaty1x-Kagwantan chief, then bought
the island for her and her people. Shortly afterward, a similar inci-
dent involving the fishing rights at the Humpback Salmon Stream,
‘KYack (see No. 6 on map 3), induced the K*ackqwan chief to
purchase territory on the mainland, thereby acquiring the present
name for the sib and title to all the lands around Yakutat Bay.
Some informants say that the original owners of Yakutat Bay and
Knight Island were Indians (Hmyedi, Yrenyedi, or Qusqedi) ; others
call them ‘‘Aleuts’’ (Chugach Eskimo), but agree that they had no
permanent settlement on the island. The site which we excavated
is usually described as a K¥ackqwan town, founded and abandoned
before the Russians came. Its correct name is said to be “Raven
Falling Down” (yet ada qutciyr), because smoke from the many
houses would asphyxiate any raven attempting to fly across. The
same name has also been applied to the reported site (No. 7) on the
cove about half a mile farther east. A few informants said that the
village was founded by a K*ackqwan chief who built the first lineage
house here, “Fort House,” and that his Tlingit brother-in-law, the
famous Xatgawet, built ““Bear House” and named the village “Old
Town” (TPak*-’an), after the famous town (Klukwan) on the Chilkat
River, to suggest that this also was the home of high-class people.
While it is tempting to associate this tradition with the oldest house
pit at the site, we must remember that our most reliable informant
31
32 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
a
GULF OF ALASKA
4000 5000
NN mag.
,
K\
Decl. 29°E
Oo 100 200 300 400 J00
Goertr iri tiriitiristiriss
(PISN Sa
Map 5.—Map of Knight Island, Yakutat Bay, with detail indicating the site of Old Town.
Drawn by Donald F. McGeein.
insisted that Xatgawet was a post-Russian chief associated with Lost
River, and that the Knight Island site was pre-Russian. Furthermore,
we found no clear evidence of post-contact occupation of the site.
Although no definite tradition explains the abandonment of the site,
some informants suggest that it may have been due to smallpox.
This is not unreasonable, since the epidemic of 1775 is reported by
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 33
some informants to have spread to Yakutat from southeastern Alaska
before the arrival of the first Europeans.
After Old Town was abandoned, the main K*ackqwan village was
at Nessudat on Lost River, and Knight Island was used only as a
camping place for hunting parties.
There are also confused stories of raids on Knight Island by the
Chugach and by the mixed Athabaskan-Tlingit Indians from Dry
Bay. It was impossible to secure details, and while some raids were
apparently prehistoric, others were later, but we do not know whether
Old Town was involved in any of them. In these stories, Teqwedi
are mentioned as living or camping on Knight Island, and as having
fortified the rocky islet, “Little Fort,’ nearby, but it is not clear
whether Tlingit Teqwedi or Eyak-speaking Tlaxayik-Teqwedi are
meant.
THE SITE
The site of Old Town (map 6), on the southernmost point of Knight
Island, consists of four trash mounds, seven house pits, and numerous
smaller pits (for caches, bathhouses, etc.), scattered over an area of
3 or 4 acres. A small stream that presumably supplied drinking
water to the inhabitants flows along the northeastern border of the
site and enters a little cove 500 feet to the east. The major portion of
the site is an open grassy flat, bordered by a spruce-hemlock forest.
In the clearing, besides ryegrass, there is a luxuriant growth of sphag-
num moss, wildcelery, salmonberry and elderberry bushes, short grass,
‘and patches of nettles. In historic times the area is said to have been
covered with wild strawberries, but the forest has encroached within
the memory of the older natives and there are now many young trees
in the clearing. Part of the site (Mounds C and D, and House Pit 7)
lies within a mature forest growth apparently several hundred years old.
The underlying soil is composed of banded beach sands, evidently
elevated above sea level within relatively recent geologic times.
Several low sand ridges that traverse the site from southwest to
northeast, or that lie southeast of it, seem to represent former beach
lines. The most prominent of these, just southeast of the site, was
probably the shoreline at the time of habitation, and seems to have
been raised during the earthquake of 1899. The axis of tilting ran
directly through the site, so that the shore to the east of datum B
(map 6) was elevated, while the land immediately to the west was
depressed. A maximum elevation of 7 feet was noted by Tarr and
Martin (1914, p. 106) at the cove three-fourths of a mile east of the
site, and there was a subsidence of 5 feet on the south shore about an
equal distance to the west. Fortunately the quake and the waves
that accompanied it did no serious damage to the archeological re-
mains, except at the southwestern edge where an indistinct depression
34 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buy. 192
TS;
above MLLW
MOUND "D"
HOUSEFIT “YT
MAGNETIC N.
TRUE N)
0.10 50FT.
SS
(PIT
MOUND Tet
Tree
@ ---- Pit
f —----— Excavated area
(Elevations in feet above
mean lower low water)
Cabin eS
EL TES TP it
(Midden deposit is
18"deep in this area)
Trees
>
Y HOUSE PIT 4
y Ly
ha po)
@ PIT
iT
© DATUM "A" DATUM Da
(16.9' above MLLW)
Map 6.—Map of Old Town, Knight Island, Yakutat Bay. Surveyed by Francis A. Riddell
and Donald F. McGeein; redrawn by Irene Brion.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 35
(House Pit 3) has been partly washed away and filled with beach
gravel. Beyond this is a low, swampy area with a few dead trees,
evidently killed by salt water after the subsidence (pl. 2, 6). The
earthquake may also have affected the course of the little stream, for
just north of the site there is a depression that suggests a former
channel.
In the woods northeast of the site is the cabin owned by a White
resident of Yakutat, Gil Sensmeier.
SHAMAN’S GRAVE, KNIGHT ISLAND
On the north bank of the stream, about 400 yards above its mouth
and a quarter of a mile north of the site, a grave under an overhanging
boulder was found just prior to our first visit in 1949. The following
description is based upon the account given by the discoverer and
members of his family and upon our own observations in 1949 and
1952.
Although the skull had been removed by the finder, and a number
of other bones were missing when we saw the grave, the vertebral
column, the ribs, the bones of the legs and of the upper arms were
still in position. The skeleton, that of an adult male, was lying on
the back, head to the west. The body had evidently been placed in a
coffin, but the latter was not interred. Although almost entirely
disintegrated, fragments of wood indicated that the coffin had been
originally 72 inches long and 30 to 32 inches wide, made of 1-inch
planks put together with square-headed nails. With the skeleton
were the remains of a blanket of mountain goat wool (pls. 18, 5; 19;
see pp.187-192), and also a number of little blue and white glass beads
(49-25-59). The latter are similar to those found with early historic
(late 18th century or early 19th century) burials on Glacier Island in
Prince William Sound (de Laguna, 1956, p. 211). A tiny iron pot, a
painted shell, and disk-shaped shell beads are also said to have been
found in the grave.
Although one informant denied that the grave could have been
that of a shaman because the beads were not the kind worn by shamans,
it seems more probable that it was a medicine man who was buried
here, for all ordinary persons were cremated at Yakutat until after
the mission was founded in 1888. One informant believed that the
grave was that of Daxodzu, sister of the principal K’ackqwan chief,
a female shaman who foretold the arrival of the Russians. Another
said that it was the grave of a Tlaxayik-Teqwedi shaman, uncle of
the man who led the successful attack on the Russian fort. One
reason for this attack was because the Russians accused the natives
of having stolen the nails used to make this coffin. It is perhaps
significant that both of these traditions associate the burial with a
36 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buin. 192
shaman who died during the Russian occupation. There is, however,
no reason to connect this late 18th- or early 19th-century burial with
the occupation of Old Town, for shamans were often taken a long way
from the nearest inhabited village for burial.
EXCAVATION AND MAPPING TECHNIQUES
In 1949 a rough sketch map was made of the site and some of the
house pits were measured. Test excavations in Mounds A and B
and in House Pit 1 indicated that the site would repay intensive
investigation.
Before beginning excavation in 1952, the entire site was laid out
in 5-foot grids or squares from an arbitrary point (datum A) beyond
the southwest corner of the occupied area (map 6). All horizontal
distances were measured north and east of datum A, additional
datum points were established for convenience in mapping, and
compass bearings on prominent landmarks were taken from datum B.
Elevations were determined for the corners of the 5-foot squares,
measuring from mean lower low water, and these were translated
into a contour map of Mound B (map 7).
Most of the intensive excavations were concentrated in Mound
B and the adjacent House Pit 1, because this mound appeared to be
the largest and deepest midden deposit on the site, and because it
was hoped that the house pit would yield information on house con-
struction. In addition, tests were made in Mounds A, C, and D,
with one end of a trench running into House Pit 7. Small test holes
were made at various places in the site to determine the extent and
composition of the deposits.
These excavations explored a number of pits, visible on the surface
or buried beneath it, and also uncovered the remains of a storage
house, and of two additional houses, 8 and 9, the existence of which
had not previously been suspected. With few exceptions, profiles
of the midden deposits were drawn for the walls of each square ex-
cavated (see figs. 5, 6, and 9).
Identifiable animal bones and samples of shell were kept for each
6-inch level of each square excavated. Most of the shells and un-
modified bones were identified and recorded in the field, and then
discarded. Those which could not readily be identified were retained
for further study in the laboratory. A more careful analysis was
made of faunal remains from certain test areas in each of the trash
mounds (pp. 77-84).
STRATIGRAPHY OF THE TRASH MOUNDS
Figure 1 is a schematic profile of a typical portion of Mound B,
in which the following squares are shown from left to right: 48-57
693-818 O—64 (Face p. 36)
6! “462 63 64 65 66 67 68
60
99
T ose eis
58
57
56
55
54
53
/
\
| SURFACE PITH |
\
\ /
\ oe 5|
50
49
48
47
46
45
61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68
d F. McGeein.
693-818 O—64 (Face p. 36)
42 | 43 | 44] 45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49
ALL. Wf Cay
WO
SURFACE PIT 6
(
pele > NN = \ ~ .
oy Pa 53
~@ |, a 2 peas 51
f ¢ -
166 170 i172 1 180 P 4 1e2 1186 164 #160 i768 | 1
~
S 182
Dotum 0 .
5 Oj eter i708" es ‘ si
STORAGE HOUSE = | HOUSE 8 =
4 “ !
4 \ pe
49 7 a ere 8s
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\ ! 180 184 186 182 80
48 \ ' 74 172 170 70 tz 74 «17% «178
\ /
\ Pog
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e \
4
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46 ! \ Scale in teet
| SURFACE PIT 4 | Contour intervol 0.2 9.
‘a \ / MOUND B
41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 5! 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 6| 62 63 64 65 66 67 68
Mar 7.—Map of Mound B, Old Town, Knight Island. Surveyed by Francis A. Riddell and Donald F. McGeein.
de Laguna]
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ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA
(feet)
Drawn by Donald F. McGeein.
Bark
LUMT
Ficure 1.—Schematic profile of Mound B, Old Town.
37
38 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLn. 192
(south and west faces), 47-58 (south and west faces), and 46-58
(south face). Figure 5 is the actual profile along the south faces of
Squares 61-51 to 47-51, as exposed in a trench which passed through
the middle of House 8 and the southern edge of House Pit 1 (see map
7,a-e). Figure 6 shows both faces (ff? and g—g*) of Trench 53, which
ran through House Pit 1 and House 9. Figure 9 gives profiles of
Trench 33 through Mound C and into House Pit 7.
The maximum depth of Mound B was 90 inches. However, in
areas where no pits had been dug into the underlying sterile sand,
the deposits were between 24 and 36 inches thick. The entire trash
mound was covered with a dense layer of moss, turf, and plants,
about 2 inches thick, which has not been recorded on the profiles.
The only stratum generally distributed over the mound is the black
midden layer with fire-cracked rocks (see Blk. RM below), which
occurs unmediately under the turf. A similar black rocky layer was
found in the upper part of Mounds A and D. In the deeper sections
of Mound B, strata of shell midden are predominant. Most of the
layers are of sandy midden, ranging in color from tan or light gray to
brown and black, depending upon the amount of organic materials
contained.
Because of the complex nature of the stratigraphy, owing in part
to the aboriginal digging and subsequent filling of pits, and to vari-
ations in the thickness of the various layers, the depths below the
surface at which artifacts were found do not necessarily indicate
their relative ages. Although horizontal and vertical position within
the square was recorded for each artifact found, a relative chronology
for these specimens had to be based upon their association with upper
(later) or with lower (earlier) strata of Mound B. In general, except
when specimens were found at the bottom of deep pits, there was a
tendency for artifacts to be concentrated in the upper layers.
The following types of deposit were distinguished in excavating
Mound B, and similar materials were found in the other mounds.
Black rocky midden (Blk. RM) composed of many thermal-fractured
rocks, charcoal fragments, and black stained sand. Larger rocks,
8 to 10 inches long, predominate. Mammal bone was scarce and so
poorly preserved that it resembled wet, mushy cardboard.
Black sandy midden (Blk. SM) is medium-fine beach sand, stained
by decomposed organic material and considerable quantities of char-
coal. This usually contains some very fine fragments of shell, and
some fire-cracked rock.
Gray sandy midden (@SM) is found in two distinct shades, light
gray (Lt. GSM) and dark gray (Dk. GSM), but they are identical in
composition. These consist almost exclusively of medium-fine
beach sand, stained by organic material and charcoal, and often
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 39
contain small flakes of mussel shell. Mammal bones and fire-cracked
rocks are relatively scarce.
Brown sandy midden (Brn. SM) consists of beach sand, stained
light brown. A darker phase of the same midden (Dk. Brn. SM) was
also recognized. It contains occasional flecks of shell, small charcoal
fragments, and a few fire-cracked rocks.
Tan sandy midden (TSM) is light tan in color, and contains only
an occasional speck of charcoal or shell.
Shell midden (SM) of almost pure shell: mussel (Mytilus) by far
the most common, with clam (Saridomus), cockle (Protothaca), and
sea urchin (Strongylocentrotus purpuratus) also common. These
layers contain a high percentage of animal bones, mostly well pre-
served, and also a good deal of thermal-fractured rock and charcoal.
Considerable amounts of rotted bark were also found, often at the
bottom of the layer. The shell midden is distinctive in lacking sand.
Orange-brown midden (OBM) is almost exclusively associated with
burned wooden structures such as houses and storehouses. It is
made up of minute fragments of calcined shell, with occasional flecks
of charcoal mixed with ash and sand.
Clean sand (CS) occurs in lenses or layers of unstained beach sand,
ranging from light gray to light tan in color. It is similar to the
sterile sand which underlies the midden deposits.
The maximum depth of Mound A is 40 inches. It is capped by
the same type of black rocky midden that covers Mound B. No
predominantly shelly strata were encountered, and the stratigraphy
is not as complex as that of Mound B. While an upper and a lower
layer could be distinguished, there was no evidence to suggest that
this indicated different periods of cultural importance. All of Mound
A would appear to be of the same age as the upper part of Mound B.
The maximum depth of Mound C is 32 inches. The deposit is not
capped by black rocky midden, and there are no prominent shell
layers, although occasional shell lenses occur. The second layer
from the top is composed of black rocky midden, but this does not
extend into the adjacent House Pit 7 (see fig. 9) except in one part
of the fill. This layer contains a lower percentage of fire-cracked
rocks than that overlying Mound B, and is much less extensive.
Mound D has a maximum depth of 30 inches. There is some black
rocky midden in the top levels, and it also contains shell strata,
so that in most respects it resembles Mound B, although it lacks
the intrusive pits so characteristic of the latter.
Upper and lower levels could be distinguished in both Mounds
C and D, but there appeared to be no cultural differences between
them. ‘Together with the fill in House Pit 7, they probably represent
the oldest part of the site.
40 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BULL. 192
On the whole, the trash mounds at Old Town are not unlike the
Tlingit middens of the Angoon area in southeastern Alaska (de
Laguna, 1960), or the larger middens explored by Drucker (1943)
in British Columbia. They differ, however, from middens in the
Pacific Eskimo-Aleut area in containing far more earth or sand, and
far less shell. The proportion of artifacts in all middens of the
Northwest Coast is also much lower than in sites within Chugach,
Koniag, and Aleut territory. This last may be due in part to the
ereater use of perishable wood for artifacts on the Northwest Coast
and also to the fact that bone rots quickly in the more acid, less
shelly deposits. Other differences may be due to cultural factors,
such as greater reliance on fish and less on shellfish on the Northwest
Coast, less carelessness in losing and discarding possessions (a trait
for which the Eskimo are noted), or greater neatness in disposing of
rubbish at village sites. Such care does not seem to have been taken
at temporary camps or forts of the Tlingit (de Laguna, 1953, p. 55).
Although our informants doubtless exaggerate the neatness of aborig-
inal housekeeping, the custom of frequently replacing the sand or
gravel on the floor around the fireplace, which had to be done in any
case before a shamanistic seance, might account for the high proportion
of sand in the middens.
The concentration of fire-cracked rocks in the upper layers of the
deposits, in contrast to their relative scarcity in the lower layers
and in Mounds C and JD, is paralleled at sites on Prince William
Sound, Cook Inlet, and Kodiak Island. This has been interpreted
(de Laguna, 1934, p. 162; Hrdlitka, 1944, pp. 30, 133, 394; Heizer,
1956, pp. 23 f.; de Laguna, 1956, pp. 49, 266) as indicating the rela-
tively late appearance among the Pacific Eskimo of the steam bath.
This type of bath has a more limited distribution and so is presumably
more recent than sweat bathing in heated air without steam. It
also necessitates far greater use of hot rocks than does stone boiling
of food. The steam bath seems to be older on Prince William Sound
than on Cook Inlet and Kodiak Island, which suggests diffusion from
the Chugach or the Northwest Coast Indians.
No clear proof of this hypothesis has yet been established. Thus
Drucker (1943) noted no great concentration of fire-cracked rocks
in the Tsimshian and Kwakiutl middens he explored, although such
rocks were common and appear to have been fairly evenly distributed
through the middens. We do not know, however, if there were
so many as to suggest the steam bath. Ethnologically, sweat houses
on the Northwest Coast are confined to the Tsimshian, Haida, and
Tlingit, although the steam bath was also taken by the northern
Kwakiutl (Drucker, 1950, Traits 375 and 667). Fire-cracked rocks
are common in Tlingit sites in the Angoon area. Although Birket-
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 4]
Smith (Birket-Smith and de Laguna, 1938, pp. 369 f.) has raised the
question whether the steam bath may not have been introduced by
the Russians, the evidence would indicate that it is prehistoric,
although probably not very ancient.
The fire-cracked rocks in Mounds C and D would suggest that the
sweat bath with steam was already known to the oldest inhabitants
at Old Town, while House 8 in the lowest layers of Mound B appears
to have been a bathhouse. However, the concentrations of fire-
cracked rocks in the upper levels of Mounds A and B may indicate
increased popularity of the steam bath in later times.
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HOUSES AND CACHES
By Francis A. RippELL and FrREDERICA DE LAGUNA
HOUSE PITS
There were seven large rectangular depressions at Old Town that
seem to have been the remains of houses. In addition, three more
houses were found and excavated: House 8 and the Storage House,
buried under the debris of Mound B, and House 9 which had been
erected inside House Pit 1.
The houses seem to have been scattered over the site without
reference to any regular plan or alinement, except that the ends,
where presumably the doors were located, faced the beach. Except
for the two largest pits, the dimensions of the others are similar
to house pits at Nessudat and Diyaguna’st on Lost River, although
the latter are on the whole deeper.
House Pit 1 is one of the largest at the site (pl. 2, a), with maximum
measurements of 50 feet by 50 feet, not including what appears to
be the entranceway toward the southeast. It was dug when Mound
B was about half its present height, and some of the excavated sand
was thrown back onto the mound, covering the stratified deposits
above House 8, a structure already abandoned and filled with midden
when House Pit 1 was excavated. (See Tan Sandy Midden in the
profile of Trench 51, fig. 5.)
After the abandonment of House Pit 1 and the structure which it
presumably contained, a much smaller building, House 9, was erected
in the southeastern (front?) end. Still later, after House 9 had
been destroyed by fire, a third structure was built over the ruins.
This last house evidently contained a place for sweat bathing. These
three buildings in House Pit 1 (see figs. 6-8) may have been the
last permanent houses to be erected at the site. What is known about
them is described in later sections.
House Pit 2, about 50 feet southwest of House Pit 1, was about
30 feet long (northeast-southwest), 25 feet wide, and 2 feet deep.
A small test excavation in the bottom revealed no trace of timbers
or floor planks. These had probably rotted.
House Pits 8 and 4, lying close to the present beach and from 220
to 230 feet southwest of House Pit 1, are completely overgrown by
a stand of small spruce trees (the grove in the center of pl. 2, 6).
House Pit 4 is about 30 feet long (northeast-southwest), 28 feet
43
44 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
wide, and from 1 to 2 feet deep. House Pit 3, a rather irregular
depression on the southeast side of House Pit 4, is about 18 feet long,
15 feet wide, and is somewhat deeper. It may have been a store-
house, smokehouse, or bathhouse associated with a dwelling in House
Pit 4, but since no excavations were made in either pit, their functions
are unknown.
House Pit 5 lies between House Pits 1 and 4. It is about 20 feet
long (northeast-southwest), 10 feet wide, and 2 feet deep. The
small mound southwest of the house may be sand removed in ex-
cavating the pit. Neither the house pit nor the mound was excavated.
House Pit 6 is an indistinct depression about 240 feet west of
House Pit 1. It is roughly 30 feet long (northeast-southwest), 18
feet wide, and less than 1 foot deep. The slight elevation around
the pit may be earth removed from it and refuse from the house built
in it. A test hole in the mound revealed only very shallow midden.
House Pit 7 lies in the forest about 180 feet north of House Pit 1.
It is a shallow, indistinct depression, about 50 feet square, bordered
on the south and west by Mounds C and D. Test excavations
made in Mound C and the house pit (fig. 9), indicate that the latter
was dug through the lower levels of the mound. Mound D was
abruptly cut off as if it had lain against the wall of the house, although
no trace of timbers was found.
Mound A probably represents the debris from House Pits 3, 4,
and 5. Mound B presumably contains the rubbish from Houses 1, 2,
and 9, and from House 8 within it, and probably from other houses
not yet discovered. Mound C antedates in part the digging of House
Pit 7, although the fill of that pit also forms the upper levels of the
mound. Mound D seems to represent the trash from House 7.
Although House Pits 1 and 7 are of approximately the same size,
and are the largest at the site, the latter is probably the older. Thus,
large trees are growing init and on Mound C. The artifacts removed
from this area, including Mound D, were not very different in type
from those found in other parts of the site, except that no specimens
of iron were present, although pieces of iron were recovered from
Mounds A and B, and from the houses associated with the latter.
It is reasonable to assume that the rubbish in Mounds C and D and
House Pit 7 came from that house or from other dwellings in the
vicinity, rather than from houses nearer the beach, and that this
material is the oldest recovered at Old Town.
The Storage House and the sweat-bath house (House 8), described
below, were probably later. They were contemporaneous and were
the oldest buildings discovered in Mound B. Since both of these
were excavated through the lowest layers of the mound, it is evident
that these accumulations of rubbish must have been derived from
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 45
some dwelling which we did not discover. Both the Storage House
and House 8 were destroyed by fire, probably at the same time, and
it is tempting to suppose that this may have been set by a raiding
party. The fill in both belongs to the lower levels of Mound B.
At a considerably later period, when Mound B had accumulated
over the ruins and was about half its present height, House Pit 1
was dug, presumably for a large house. Still later, after the destruc-
tion or abandonment of the latter, a small dwelling (House 9) was
erected at one end of the large pit. Finally, after this in turn was
burned, another more substantial structure, which seems to have in-
cluded a room or place for sweat bathing, was built in House Pit 1,
over the remains of House 9. The fill in House Pit 1 and House 9
(and over the third structure) is apparently contemporaneous with the
upper levels of the midden in Mound B, and probably also with all of
the deposits forming Mound A.
Unfortunately, the relative ages of the other structures at the site
could not be determined, although there was nothing to suggest a
long period of occupation of the site as a whole. House Pit 5 would
indicate a structure about the size of House 9; House Pits 2, 4, and
6 were probably for larger buildings, but smaller than those for which
House Pits 1 and 7 were presumably intended. House Pit 3 may
have been a bathhouse like House 8. This evidence, as well as the
house pits at Nessudat and Diyaguna’rt, suggest that in the late
prehistoric and early historic period most Yakutat houses were in-
tended for occupancy by not more than four families, that some much
larger multifamily dwellings were built, as well as small houses
suitable for only one or two couples and their children.
SMALLER SURFACE AND SUBSURFACE PITS
In addition to the larger house pits, a number of depressions, about
5 to 12 feet in diameter and from 6 to 18 inches deep, were scattered
over the site (see map 7). These were called “Surface Pits,” only
because they were visible before excavation, not because they had
been originally dug from the present surface. Thus, Surface Pit 1
was excavated when the top of Mound B was about 2 feet below its
present level; Surface Pit 6 when it was 1% feet lower; and Surface
Pit 7 when it was about 1 foot lower. Some of these surface pits had
evidently been dug through earlier pits that were already filled with
rubbish, perhaps because this facilitated digging. In turn, they be-
came partially filled with midden material, generally the black rocky
midden, and also with some gray sandy midden, together with scat-
tered lenses of shell, charcoal, and rocks. Unbroken strata over the
tops of most of these surface pits indicate that these were older than
the last period of occupation of the site. Some pits contained
46 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BULL. 192
materials belonging to both the lower and upper levels of Mound B.
About 40 completely buried pits were also discovered (see fig. 6).
These had been dug into the sterile sand at the bottom of Mound B,
when the top of the mound was much lower than it is at present.
Subsequently they became filled with trash, mostly from the lower
levels, so that no surface indications of their presence were visible.
They were therefore called ‘Subsurface Pits,” although they differ in
no respects from the ‘‘Surface Pits.”
Some pits were rectangular, ranging from boxlike holes, 3 by 1%
feet, to larger structures over 12 feet long and 6 feet wide. There
must have been some kind of support for the walls, probably a lining
of planks or bark, since there was usually no sign that the sand or
midden had slumped in. In most pits no trace of such lining re-
mained, but in several cases planks were preserved by carbonization.
Probably there was also a wooden superstructure over the pit. These
structures seem to have been underground or partially underground
caches, like the Storage House described below.
Surface Pit 3 was marked by a depression 11 feet in diameter and
18 inches deep. When excavated, it proved to have been originally
a rectangular pit, about 10 feet long and 8 feet wide. It contained
some burned and unburned fragments of planking, probably the
remains of the lining.
There were also bowl-shaped and basin-shaped pits, generally cir-
cular in plan, less often oval, and differing from each other chiefly in
depth relative to the diameter. Both forms differed greatly in size,
ranging from 16 inches to over 5 feet in diameter. A number of both
kinds had bark linings. The fill ranged from relatively clean sand to
layers of shell and rock with strata of pure shell and bone, apparently
representing the refuse of individual meals. Some pits contained
artifacts (see below); others did not. The functions of these pits
are hard to determine. ‘Those covered with bark or wood may have
been caches, or pits where food was buried to become slightly rotten,
as required for some native recipes; others may have served as bath-
houses. Uncovered pits may have been ovens for roasting food or
for heating rocks; some may have been dug simply to hold refuse.
Special mention should be made of Subsurface Pit 38 (see fig. 2),
a bowl-shaped depression, 2 feet in diameter and 15 inches deep,
under the south end of the Storage House. Since it may have been
a cellar of the latter, it will be described with it (see pp. 48-51).
There were also depressions or pits in the floor of House Pit 1
and House 9, and a box in the floor of House 8. Such features, as
well as fireplaces and pits with sweat-bath rocks, will be discussed
in the detailed descriptions of the houses with which they were
associated.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 47
The articles recovered from the various surface and subsurface
pits are listed below (field catalog Nos. are in parentheses). As may
be gathered, most of these holes contained nothing other than midden
fill. In each case, it is indicated whether the material belongs to
the upper or lower levels of Mound B.
Surface Pit 1 (upper levels):
Broken head for sea otter harpoon arrow, pl. 13, f
Chipped green chert (29)
Surface Pit 3 (upper levels):
Copper fragment (17)
Surface Pit 6:
Upper levels:
Small woodworking tool, pl. 8, l
Schist drill (?) (14)
Rubbing tool, pl. 10, b
Copper ulo blade, fig. 10, d
2 rectangular stone scrapers, fig. 11, c (and 83)
Broken double-edged slate blade, fig. 11, g
Green chert flake (92)
Slate fragment (85)
3 hammerstones (75, 76, 77)
Lower levels:
2 hammerstones (104, 122)
2 hammerstone-abraders, one with red paint (36, 103)
Beaver tooth chisel, pl. 16, b
Bone gorge (51)
Surface Pit 8:
Level unknown, probably lower:
Bird bone awl, pl. 16, m
Tooth pendant, pl. 17, g
Lower levels:
2 small woodworking tools (114, 121)
Broken lamp (138)
Broken harpoon head, pl. 18, 7
Sea otter harpoon arrowhead, pl. 13, d
Barbed bird bone point, pl. 15, k
Bone gorge, fig. 18, b
Tooth pendant, pl. 17, h
Cut bone (214)
Cut wood (213)
Subsurface Pit 9 (lower levels):
Whetstone (9)
Subsurface Pit 11:
Upper levels:
Small woodworking tool (15)
Lower levels:
Fragment of bone point (36)
Subsurface Pit 14, containing traces of fire (lower levels):
Broken splitting adz (40)
Small woodworking tool, pl. 7, 7
Broken barbed bone arrowhead, fig. 17, e
Cut bone (48)
48 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLn. 192
Subsurface Pit 15—see Storage House (below)
Subsurface Pit 23 (lower levels):
Broken bird bone point (211)
Subsurface Pit 24—see House 8 (below)
Subsurface Pit 31 (lower levels):
Tooth chisel, pl. 16, c
Subsurface Pit 32 (lower levels):
Drift iron adz or scraper blade, pl. 4, k
Subsurface Pit 36 (small cache house) (lower levels) :
Small woodworking tool, pl. 7, m
2 whetstones, pl. 10, e (and 377)
Unbarbed bone arrowhead, pl. 15, v
Bone shaft fragment (398)
Cut wood (385)
Subsurface Pit 37 (lower levels):
Hammerstone-abrader, pl. 10, f
Toy lamp (394)
Subsurface Pit 39 (lower levels):
Cut wood (692)
THE STORAGE HOUSE
One of the oldest plank-lined cache pits uncovered during the exca-
vation of Mound B was a structure in the southwestern portion of
the mound (see fig. 2). It was probably a storage house that had been
burned down by a fire that started at its southern end and which con-
sumed all but the floor planks and the lower ends of the wall planks.
The Storage House (originally designated as ‘‘Subsurface Pit 15’’)
was 7 feet 9 inches long and 4 feet 6 inches wide. It had been built
in a pit, sunk about 18 inches into the sterile sand below the midden.
The floor level was between 3% and 4% feet below the present uneven
surface of the mound. Above the remains of the house were about
2 feet of undisturbed stratified deposit, consisting of black rocky
midden, shell midden, and gray sandy midden belonging to the upper
levels of Mound B. The fill inside the house, belonging to the lower
levels, consisted of a fairly homogeneous deposit of stained sand, char-
coal fragments including remains of the wall and roof, fire-cracked
rocks, ash, and bits of charred bone. There were small lenses of clean
sand in the fill, and about 3 inches above the floor planks was a thin
layer of light-gray sand. Below the floor planks were 1 to 3 inches of
midden that had probably sifted under and between the boards; at
the south end this deposit deepened into the fill of Subsurface Pit 38.
The latter contained brown midden, rotted bark, bits of charcoal,
bone, shell, and fire-cracked rocks. This stratigraphy may suggest
that the pit was older than the Storage House, but it may be simply
a cellar.
The walls of the house were of roughly split planks, 4 to 22 inches
wide and about 1 inch thick, which with two exceptions were set verti-
cally in the sand at the bottom of the pit to an average depth of 10
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 49
as Cc PLAN OF STORAGE HOUSE
———
— : ExcavaTeD
[8 ----- RECONSTRUCTION
seesnevere OBSCURED FROM VIEW
a be gd
Floor Plank |} Floor Plank
PLANK LASHING TECHNIQUE
lp Bottom’ View
—— eee)
—>—
CROSS SECTION
Su bsureace Pit 38
PLAN VIEW Dark brown
Sandy midden
Srttl S149
Red- brown ashy
sand
fem coerce
y.vie #)
ae ae
Ficure 2.—Storage House and Subsurface Pit 38. Drawn by Donald F. McGeein.
inches. The entrance was at the south end where a horizontal plank
(A), 40 inches long and 13 inches wide, formed a sill some 7 inches
high. Two posts and the small vertical planks (B,B), 534 inches wide,
20 inches long, and % inch thick, formed the sides of the doorway. One
of the wall planks (Q), 48 inches long and 15 inches wide, was set on
edge.
The three floor planks, 81 inches long and 11 to 25 inches wide,
rested directly on the sandy bottom of the pit. They had probably
been inserted after the walls were erected, since the westernmost
plank overlapped the central one and had not been trimmed to fit the
50 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLn. 192
floor space. The eastern and central planks were fastened together
at the ends near the doorway. Here a rectangular area had been
chiseled into their lower surfaces, into which was fitted a flat wooden
crossbar. The latter was secured by a lashing of split spruce root
that passed between a pair of holes in each plank. This arrangement
may have been intended to facilitate lifting the floor planks in order
to reach the pit below.
The structure was probably roofed, but of this we have no direct
evidence because fire had destroyed all of the upper part of the house.
The quantities of carbonized moss and grass, found between the floor
planks, between these and the walls, and under fragments of charred
wood fallen on the floor, suggest that the Storage House had been
chinked at floor, walls, and roof (?), presumably to prevent the con-
tents from freezing.
Identification of this structure as a cache was based partly on the
following artifacts found in it and in the pit below.
In Subsurface Pit 38:
Point of a large double-edged slate blade, another fragment of which
was found in the lower levels of Mound B above the Storage House,
fig. 14, b
2 barbed bone points for arrows (or leisters), fig. 17, b, /
Bone barb for gaff or fish spear, fig. 18, g
Below floor of Storage House:
Bird bone tube (422)
Bone shaft fragment (420)
Wooden spatula, fig. 24, c
Wooden blade, fig. 24, 6
On floor of Storage House:
Ulo with wooden handle and copper blade, fig. 10, a
Whetstone, pl. 10, ¢
Bear canine, pl. 16, z
Wooden comb, fig. 20, c
Wooden figurine, fig. 22
Fragments of 2 wooden boxes or dishes, fig. 23, a, b, b’
Wooden rod scarfed at both ends, fig. 16, d
2 spatulate wooden objects, fig. 24, a (and 416)
Fragment of bidarka rib (?), fig. 24, e
Fragments of twined grass or bark matting (418)
Fragments of carbonized two-ply cord (195, 196, 254, 365)
Band of strung ryegrass stems, fig. 23, d, d’
Calcined bone fragments (428)
2 fragments of cut wood (199, 284)
Just above floor of Storage House:
Stone ax, pl. 5, 7
Cobblestone anvil (392)
Small stone lamp (412)
Slate blade for arrow or knife, fig. 14, a (associated with basketry fragments,
pl. 18, a)
Broken barbed point for arrow (?) (288)
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 51
Bone shaft fragment (205)
Fused bone (411)
Slag (200)
Copper fragment (287)
2 drift iron blade fragments, pl. 4, e (and 201)
5 seraps of drift iron (258)
Barbed wooden spear point, fig. 16, a
Wooden box fragment (413)
Wooden pin, fig. 24, d
12 fragments of worked wood (181, 182, 224, 257, 285, 286, 364, 366, 378,
386, 415, 425)
Fragment of two-ply cord (208)
Knotted spruce root (?) (226)
Fragments of twined basketry: some with false embroidery, pl. 18, a
(and 232/233); some plain, pl. 18, a (and associated with slate blade,
fig. 14, a, and with salmonberry seeds)
Fill of Storage House (i.e., lower levels of Mound B)
2 sea otter harpoon arrowheads, pl. 13, c, e
Broken barbed bone arrowhead, fig. 17, k
2 beaver tooth chisels (881, 409)
Broken bone knife or scraper (302)
Bone awl (?) (406)
Fragment of bone shaft (407)
Notched cobblestone (295)
Cut bone (197)
Bone figurine worn as pendant, fig. 20, a
11 pieces of worked wood (87, 120, 171, 173, 175, 176, 178, 180, 183, 186,
187)
Fragment of two-ply cord (431)
2 teeth of wooden comb (?) (179, 184)
The perishable materials—wood, cordage, and basketry—were
preserved because they were charred, probably in the fire that de-
stroyed the Storage House. The baskets may have been used to
store food and other objects, or to gather berries, as is suggested by the
association of salmonberry seeds with one group of undecorated
basketry fragments.
HOUSE 8
The burned remains of a small house (figs. 3 and 4) were discovered
at the bottom of the midden near the southern edge of Mound B
(see map 7 and fig. 5). The house (first called ‘Subsurface Pit 24’’)
was almost 18 feet square, and had been built inside a pit about 20
feet square, dug into the sterile sand for a depth of 30 inches. The
floor of this pit was level. Vertical wall planks were driven into the
sand to a depth of 1 foot, leaving a space about 1 foot wide between
the walls and the edges of the pit. Later this space was filled with
sandy midden to brace the walls, and the floor planks were laid.
Eventually the house was destroyed by a fire that evidently started
inside it and consumed all but the floor and the walls to about 15
52 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buny. 192
—==—WALL PLANKS
Ficure 3.—Plan of House 8. Drawn by Donald F. McGeein.
inches above the floor. These charred remains were eventually
buried under midden deposits 2 to 4 feet deep. The stratigraphy of
the mound (see X—Y on the profile of the south face of Trench 51, fig.
5) shows that the house had been built during the early history of
this part of the site; the unbroken layers above the fill attest its
relatively great age.
WALLS
The walls of House 8 were of planks split from straight-grained wood
that was free of knots, probably spruce. They were not smoothed on
the surfaces. They varied in width from 1 to 2 feet and in thickness
from about % to over 1% inches. When the house was burned, the
upper parts of the walls fell into the house; no wall fragments were
found outside.
The plan (fig. 3) shows that a number of wall planks were missing.
Possibly these had been salvaged after the fire. The gap in the
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA
693-818—64——5
Ficure 4.—Reconstruction of House 8. Drawn by Donald F. McGeein.
53
54. BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Burn. 192
otherwise complete line of planks along the southwest wall suggests
an entrance, although a very narrow one. However, since the floor
was 2 to 2% feet below the surface, this gap would have allowed sand
to spill into the house in the absence of some kind of sill or ramp, no
evidence of which was found. Probably the wall planks in this area
had simply been removed, and the doorway was a hole cut through
the wall at or above ground level, with a step inside the entrance.
ROOF
In the center of the northwest wall was a post that had been burned
down to about 19 inches above the floor. The bottom was 40 inches
below floor level. The post was originally 10 inches in diameter,
and had been placed in an oval hole, 20 by 16 inches and 42 inches
deep, partly filled with rocks to anchor the post. Three split planks
were set around it, making a small alcovelike bulge in the wall. About
5 inches of the post below floor level showed charring, indicating that
it had been exposed to this depth. The side of the post facing outside
the house was relatively unburned as compared to that on the inside.
When found, the post leaned several degrees toward the center of the
house, its lower end well outside the floor area.
Although no other posts of the same type or size were found,
this post probably supported one end of a ridgepole, the other end of
which presumably rested on top of the large plank in the opposite
wall (beyond the container of fire-cracked rocks). The roof was
partly or completely covered with sheets of bark, carbonized remains
of which were found on the floor. It is reasonable to assume that the
roof was gabled. If the eaves were too low at the sides to permit
entry, the doorway would have been at one of the gabled ends.
FLOOR
The floor of the house was entirely covered with planks except
at the sunken box in the center and the portions filled with fire-
cracked rocks, as indicated on the plan (fig. 3). There were from
29 to 33 such planks, ranging in thickness from \% to slightly over
linch. Their sizes varied, the maximum lengths being 8 feet and the
maximum widths 3 feet. Their upper surfaces and edges had all
been smoothed. All were charred in the fire.
SWEAT-BATH ROCKS
A container of fire-cracked rocks in the middle of the southeast
wall was not a hearth for cooking but seems to have been a receptacle
for sweat-bath rocks. It was 5 feet long and 3 feet wide, made of
several large stone slabs, about 2 inches thick and set on edge
—aousi :
A adh A nda =
besa yale Stowe Lav ob)
boos bamintenn woot. pen
trod :
heawb
novel
b
| 51-51 |
HOUSE PIT 1
| 48-5) | 47-5| l
Soutn Face
Ey Gravel, small pebbles, sand.
Bea Clean, unstained sand
Rock.
NAN Unburned wood,
GB Burned wood, charcoal,
5 Indistinct gone.
Thin bark, black midden.
° ' 2 FT.
tb 1 1 —
HOUSE PIT 1 | ora
f 56-5I | 5551 | 54-51 53-5 = _
(es
— De BSM
osm Gsm
osm ~ ~— _ -
- CO rng Se e
-_ csm mn UD) Ts nt QD Hs =-
RED-BROWN Rocky
MIDDEN)
eo ree = TTD asm ia
15m
conn ‘cannowseeD
con woop
Post Hole?
$ T E R \ L E S A N D
Ficure 5.—Cross section of Trench 51, through House 8 and House Pit 1. Drawn by Donald F. McGeein.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 55
(indicated on the plan by dark shading). The southwest side of this
bin was formed by a plank (A) that had fallen out.
The rock deposit inside this container was about 10 inches thick,
the lowest part consisting of small rocks, above which was a gravel-
like layer of fine rock fragments, sand, and occasional bits of charcoal
and ash; on top were larger rocks, averaging 6 inches in diameter.
These were mostly rounded sandstone cobbles, burned a dull red brown.
The reddish gravel below had probably resulted from fracturing the
heated stones when water was poured on them to produce steam.
At a depth of 9 inches below the bottom of the rocks in the container
was another layer, about 2 feet long and 3 feet wide and 4 inches
thick, made up of the same kind of fire-cracked sandstones. This
layer was at the bottom of a pit almost 2 feet below the floor of the
house, which apparently represents a period when the house was
first occupied. Later, it was evidently decided that the pit was too
deep, so it was filled with a homogeneous layer of brown sandy
midden, on top of which the rock container was built (see the cross
section in fig. 5).
Fire-cracked rocks were found scattered over the floor of the
house outside the bin. The latter had been built up some 8 to 10
inches above the floor level, but when the house burned, the slabs
and boards forming the sides were displaced, allowing the rocks to
spill out. Except for the unplanked area between the container
‘and the box in the center of the floor, this spillover is not indicated
on the plan.
BOX
A small plank-lined pit, below the level of the floor, is in the center
of the house. The upper edges of the plank lining were either flush
with the floor planks or projected only an inch above them. The
sides of the box were of small planks, set on edge with the grain
running horizontally. These enclosed a space 3 feet long, 2 feet
wide, and about 8 inches deep. The planks themselves were about
3 feet long, from 12 to 18 inches wide, and \% to % of an inch thick.
They were not fastened together at the corners, but were simply
held in place by four stakes, 1% inch in diameter and 40 inches long,
set inside the box. These projected 2 inches above the sides, but
may originally have been longer.
The box was covered with short boards, not part of the regular
flooring, and the bottom was lined, at least in part, with pieces
of bark. Quantities of carbonized moss were found on or just below
the bark. Above this was a layer of burned sand, ash, and minute
shell fragments, all of a very uniform texture, and a number of fire-
cracked rocks. On top of the sandy fill was a large angular boulder
56 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
which, surprisingly enough, showed no evidence of having been sub-
jected to fire. While such stones are said to have been put on roofs
to hold down planks or sheets of bark, this stone does not seem to
have fallen through the roof or the cover of the box. Its significance
is unknown. The upper 6 or so inches of fill in the box consisted
of a mass of carbonized wood fragments, burned sand, bark, and
some pieces of shell.
Near the center of the southwest wall, in front of the post, was
set a vertical board (B). It was 20 inches long, 20 inches wide, and
3 inches thick, and extended 18 inches below the floor. The 2 inches
that projected above the floor was battered as if the plank had served
as an anvil; the wood fibers were considerably ‘‘broomed.”’ The
lower end was not sharpened, so it must have been inserted into a
small pit, not driven into the ground. Although this plank evidently
provided a working surface for some task involving pounding, the
nature of this cannot be determined.
House 8 would appear to have served primarily as a sweat-bath
house, and this function was also suggested by the natives with
whom the field data were discussed. Such bathhouses were sometimes
used also as sleeping places. One might assume from the battered
board (B) and from the artifacts found on and below the floor planks
that the building had been used as a workshop. These objects
include the hammerstones, whetstone, grinding slab, paint, lamps,
scraps of iron, small woodworking tools, adzes, and fragments of
worked wood and bone. The broken war club head and splitting
adz, and to a lesser degree the harpoon head and barbed arrowheads,
suggest that the workers were men, not women. However, the box
in the center of the floor which contained so much moss resembles
very closely that described by our informants as made in the women’s
birth house. This birth house was a permanent structure, used by
all the women of a large lineage house at childbirth and during
menstruation. It was described as containing facilities for sweat
bathing. The birth pit was said to have been as deep as the distance
from the fingertips to the elbow, and was filled with soft moss almost
to the top to receive the baby. The woman in labor squatted over
the pit, grasping a vertical pole in front of her. No remains of such
a pole, it should be noted, could be identified in House 8. Further-
more, this house is considerably larger than the birth hut, which was
supposed to be just big enough to accommodate the parturient,
the midwife, and two assistants.
It is possible that House 8 was originally a bathhouse and workshop,
later converted by the women into a birth house. It could hardly
have been entered by men after contamination by women in childbed.
Why the box should have contained the boulder we cannot explain.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 57
In any case, after the house was burned, the pit was used as a trash
dump. The stratigraphy indicates that House 8 was contemporary
with the Storage House. Both belong to the early part of Mound B,
and the fill in both consists of its lower levels.
The following objects were found in House 8:
Below the floor:
2 hammerstones, one with red paint (1005, 1009)
Whetstone (665)
Drift iron blade fragment, pl. 4, 7
Drift iron nail, found in a small bark-lined pit (651)
Broken harpoon head, pl. 13, 1
Bird bone point (687)
Wooden stake (680)
Piece of skin (646)
In container of bath rocks:
Hammerstone (1008)
In central box:
2 broken barbed bone arrowheads (?), fig. 17, c, d
On the floor:
Splitting adz, pl. 5, a
Broken planing adz, pl. 6, a
2 small woodworking tools (982, 994)
Hammerstone (989)
Whetstone (1003)
Grinding slab (628)
Rock with red paint (619)
Broken head for war club, pl. 5, ¢
Wooden plank (744)
Just above the floor:
Small woodworking tool (995)
2 hammerstones (983, 991)
Piece of red ocher (903)
Stone lamp, pl. 11, a, and fig. 12, a
Broken lamp (1007)
Curiously shaped limestone pebble (amulet?) (547)
Section of cut whale rib (1014)
Fragment of cut wood (1000)
Fill of House 8 (i.e., lower levels of Mound B):
2 small woodworking tools (598, 694)
Hammerstone (981)
2 abrading stones or whetstones (985, 986)
Rubbed stone (956)
Lump of red ocher (571)
Cobblestone with red paint (952)
Chipped slate knife(?) (666)
Sea otter harpoon arrowhead, fig. 15, b
Bird bone awl, pl. 16, 0
Bone peg (621)
Large quartz crystal (146)
Mica scrap (907)
Copper pin, fig. 18, d
58 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bunn 192
Copper dangler, fig. 19, z
Lump of coal (637)
2 fragments of worked wood (177, 597)
Carbonized cordage (629)
2 pieces of bark (614, 615)
HOUSE SPER
House Pit 1 in Mound B is roughly rectangular, measuring 50 feet
in length. ‘The width is about 45 feet at the front(?) end toward the
southeast, but widens to about 50 feet near the rear, and then abruptly
narrows to form an alcove 40 feet wide and 7 feet long. The pit is
surrounded by a low pile of earth that is broken only at the south-
eastern end, where it is thrown up on each side to leave a sunken
approach about 20 to 30 feet long. The maximum depth of the pit
before excavation was about 3% feet below the top of these earthen
walls, the deepest part being just inside the sunken entranceway,
where the later pit for House 9 was dug (fig. 6).
As already mentioned, House Pit 1 was excavated through the lower
layers of Mound B, and some of the tan sandy midden which was
dug out was thrown on top of the fill overlying House 8 (fig. 5). House
Pit 1 and all its contents belong, therefore, to the later levels of
Mound B.
In 1949 a narrow test trench was made in the northern quarter of the
house pit, from the side wall just forward of the rear alcove to the
center (i.e., to Surface Pit 10 on map 7). Charred timbers revealed
by this trench suggested that there had been a bench about 6 or 7 feet
wide along the northeast sidewall, and that a pair of central beams
supported a gable roof, as on the large Tlingit houses of historic
times. The floor was about 14 inches below the present surface of
the pit. It was assumed that the alcove represented a line of sleeping
cubicles across the back of the house, although this was never ex-
cavated. | ee ee Se ee ee 4
VWiviitile ne eR CRO Se ee ae, Serene See 2 Sta [Eek Fa = eee 1 1
ee ee ees =| Seed ee ee ee (2?)
Canis familiaris (domestic dog) ------------
| Meee a WR | REN (1)
2 Numbers indicate the bones removed from the test areas. Numbers in parentheses indicate the probable
number of individuals represented. X indicates that remains were found in the mound, but not in the
test areas, and that no numerical count was recorded.
[BuLL. 192
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY
80
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de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA
™
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82
TABLE 2.—Frequency of unmodified mammal bones, by type and depth, in the test areas—Continued
Oreamnos (mountain goat)
Enhydra (sea otter)
Phocoena (porpoise)
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BULL. 192
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2 Includes a porpoise skull, in Square 46-58, 12-24 inches.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 83
TABLE 2.—Frequency of unmodified mammal bones, by type and depth, in the test
areas—Continued
Lutra Castor Marmota| Rodentia Canis Whale
(land otter) (beaver) (marmot) (dog)
Depth s rey
Test Bee. : 2¢| ® 4s
area inches | & = z oo rs = "op =
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Se Li | kee |= cereal [apa ateal a baa bet Ge al PRES OS 2) SS Se ae Se ee ee (ae
ANGRGS a es | se id Rae tf Me ea pane aoa be Bie Dba ei Sa jase) Lh Ot Ye (ay (ae | ae
Mound D.-._- VR |e ll [atest |e ee al | ies] bp tier ol se et al he eee fe Bl eh el Hea oe |
SPAN aie aaa pepe pl ES fe BaD ee ee a) ee oS ae ee ee ee See
UP pee ee fee ee as | ea al | ec | ane Ra a YE RS a | Fe ee Be ee ee ee | eee
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Bitentotal.|-—.---=— 1 1 1 1 1 ul 1 | 1 I
Total number of animal bones from test areas
Test area Depth in | Number of Test area Depthin | Number of
inches bones inches bones
INIGINION AS eo 0-6 Oar vlound) ©. a eee ene 0-6 3
6-12 57 6-12 7
12-18 57 12-18 3
18-24 8 he ones
24-30 3 24-30 i
- 30-36) |Socsecs5-2>2
NTF a ne ee a [oe Se ee 148 36-42 1
42-48 1
NUTT O Eo 3 ia 0-6 43
6-12 95 TROL AI ee ee eee oes eo meee 16
12-18 344
18-24 DOS Noung = ee meee eee a 0-6 8
24-30 55 6-12 10
30-36 8 12-18 8
18-24 17
SU eee ie BRE hee ee 748 24-30 5
TOGA Eee eee eee Semcon 48
[BuLL. 192
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY
TABLE 3.—Occurrence of molluscan, crustacean, and echinoid remains in the test
areas
84
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Ficure 23
(For legend, see opposite page.)
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA Lea
technically advanced type, requiring straight grained wood and skill.
Cedar is ideal for this purpose and was always used for such boxes,
except that Chilkat (Drucker, 1950, p. 257) and Yakutat informants
reported the use of carefully selected spruce. ‘Tlingit, Haida, Tsim-
shian, and Kwakiutl boxes, especially those for holding liquids, had
flanged, morticed bottoms (Drucker, 1950, Trait 449). Similar boxes
were made at Yakutat in recent times, and one of the specimens from
Old Town has this type of bottom, even though it is oval.
Very large boxes on the Northwest Coast were sometimes made
with two or four separate pieces for the sides (Niblack, 1890, p. 319;
Birket-Smith and de Laguna, 1938, pp. 413 f.). This type was easier
to make than that with a single bent piece for the side, since it did not
require skill in bending wood, nor such fine planks. Presumably,
such boxes were also made at Yakutat, since they were by the Copper
River Eyak and the Chugach, and are quite old among the Eskimo
(Birket-Smith, 1953, pp. 57 ff., 202, pl. 26, 6; Birket-Smith and de
Laguna, 1938, pp. 78 f., 413 f.). Pegging or nailing was employed to
fasten the sides of these boxes together, but the method typical of the
northern and central Northwest Coast is to sew the parts together.
The Coast Salish used both methods (Barnett, 1939, Traits 359-361,
365-367). Both are represented by the Old Town specimens and were
reported by our Yakutat informants, although we gathered that
pegging was more common.
The cylindrical vessel with a flat round or oval bottom, like that
from Old Town III (fig. 23, c), may have been a still older type than
any form of square-cornered box, for it is less difficult to make. The
sides of such vessels are usually of pliable bark or baleen, or of thin
wood which is easily bent after soaking in warm water. Cylindrical
pails of this kind were made by the northern Alaskan Eskimo at least
as far back as Birnirk and Old Bering Sea times, and have been re-
ported ethnologically from the Pacific Eskimo, Aleut, Eyak, Tanaina,
Tena, and many interior Athabaskan groups (Birket-Smith and de
Laguna, 1938, pp. 413 ff.; Birket-Smith, 1953, p. 202). The ends of
the side piece on such vessels are commonly joined by sewing, which
may explain why the northern and central Northwest Coast Indians
have adopted this essentially interior bark-working technique and
adapted it to the manufacture of wooden pails and chests.
Ficure 23.—Box fragments and band of grass. Drawn by Donald F. McGeein. a, Side of
small wooden box or dish (restored), from floor of Storage House, Old Town II (No. 367);
b, b’, fragment of a similar box or dish, same provenience (No. 367); c, bottom of wooden
box or vessel with copper nails, from just above floor of House 9, Old Town III (No. 974);
d, band of ryegrass stems, strung together, from floor of Storage House, Old Town II
(No. 283); d’, diagram to show method of stringing d.
178 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buiu. 192
BARK
Two small fragments of birch (?) bark, one of which had been folded
twice, were found in House 8, Old Town II. No birch grows in the
Yakutat area, but birchbark baskets full of soapberries were sometimes
traded from the Southern Tutchone at the head of the Alsek River.
Both berries and baskets were considered a novelty at Yakutat.
Two pieces of spruce (?) bark were found on or near the floor of
House 9 in Old Town III. They may have been part of the roof, or
of some big container such as the large sheets of spruce bark which
were set on posts above the fire as pans in which to cook berries for
storage.
CORDAGE, BASKETS, AND TEXTILES
CORDAGE
There are seven carbonized pieces of two-ply Z-twist cords, from
2 to 8 mm. in diameter, probably made of spruce root. Six were on
the floor of the Storage House, as was a knotted length of spruce
root (?), and the seventh was from the fill of House 8.
Examples of two-ply S-twist sinew (?) thread or string, about 0.5
mm. in diameter, were preserved on the stem of an arrowhead from
Old Town II (pl. 14, 6) and on two copper hooks from Old Town IIT
(fig. 18, 7).
Informants mentioned heavier ropes or cords of spruce roots, ropes
of untanned seal and sea lion hide, fishing lines of kelp, and braided
square sennit cords of porpoise sinew for bowstrings and harpoon
lines. Thread of porpoise sinew was used for sewing garments.
TWINED BASKETS
Carbonized fragments of several fine, twined spruce root baskets (pl.
18, a) were found on or just above the floor of the Storage House in
Old Town II. The direction of twining is downward from left to
right; the fragments vary from about 6 warps and 8 wefts per square
centimeter to 9 warps and 10 or 11 wefts. Salmonberry seeds were
found with one of the coarser baskets, suggesting that it had been
used to gather or store berries. The finer baskets were decorated
with false embroidery, a technique in which the northern Tlingit
excel (Mason, 1904, pp. 308 ff.). ‘The Yakutat have always held
first place in basketry,”’ and legend credits them with the origin of
this art (Emmons, 1903, pp. 229-231). Yakutat women claim that
their baskets were superior because they held the weft strands tight
with their teeth while weaving, whereas other Tlingit women used only
their fingers (sic).
Baskets of a variety of shapes and weaves were formerly made.
Those designed to hold liquids were soaked and then rubbed on the
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 179
inside while still damp with a brown bear canine, which polished and
flattened the strands, making the weave watertight. A bear canine
(pl. 16, 2), found on the floor of the Storage House, was probably used
for this purpose, for there is a worn facet in the enamel and both edges
of the root have been cut flat.
There is nothing about the archeological basket fragments to
distinguish them from modern baskets of the Yakutat and other
northern Tlingit (cf. Niblack, 1890, pl. xxxv1). The Haida make
similar baskets, except that among them overlaid designs are said to
be recent. Decorated twined baskets are not found elsewhere on the
Northwest Coast until we reach the Makah (and the Nootka who have
recently copied them), but their baskets are rather different from those
of the Tlingit. Twined, decorated baskets are, of course, made by
many southern Northwest Coast tribes, including the Coast Salish
and northwestern California groups.
In southwestern Alaska, the Copper River Eyak, Chugach, and
Tanaina also made baskets of Tlingit type, similarly decorated, and
the Koniag made some twined baskets. The finest work was done by
the Aleut, although their baskets were of grass and different in
design. ‘Twined baskets were also made sometimes north of Bering
Strait (Birket-Smith and de Laguna, 1938, pl. 14; Birket-Smith,
1953, fig. 28; Osgood, 1937, pl. 10, A-C). This type of basketry has
a circum-Pacific distribution, while coiled baskets occur in areas
beyond its limits. Unfortunately, archeological specimens are too
seldom preserved to give clear evidence of the antiquity or sequence
of types in any given area. However, twined basketry with false
embroidery is found from southern Oregon to the Columbia, with
radiocarbon dates indicating an age of 9,000 years. Except for the
materials, it resembles Tlingit work very closely, and Cressman
(1960, p. 73) reports that he saw the same kind of basketry in Heizer’s
collections from Kodiak. Fragments of rather coarse, open twined
baskets, as well as of coiled baskets, were found in the Platinum
Village site in Bristol Bay (Larsen, 1950, fig. 57, 1-4). ‘This site
seems to be older than others in the area with pottery, and the material
from it shows similarities to both the Near Ipiutak of Point Hope and
the lower levels of Kachemak Bay. All available evidence, therefore,
suggests great antiquity for twined baskets on the Northwest Coast.
MATTING
A fragment of twined grass (or shredded bark?) matting was
found on the floor of the Storage House. Our informants had heard
that shamans used such mats in their seances, but could not describe
them. At a still earlier period, mats were undoubtedly used for
ordinary domestic purposes. The weft elements of this mat are about
180 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bunn. 192
1 cm. apart and are twined upward from left to right, so that it is
identical with specimens from late prehistoric burials of the Chugach,
Aleut, and Tena, as well as with the sleeping and kayak mats of the
modern Kuskokwim-Kotzebue Eskimo (de Laguna, 1947, pls. x1x, xx;
1956, pls. 52 and 53; Oswalt, 1952, pl. 18, A, B). The undecorated
grass mats on the walls and floor of the Eyak sleeping room may
well have been the same (Birket-Smith and de Laguna, 1938, p. 34).
Coarse twined grass mats were found on the floor and sleeping plat-
form of a burned house at the Platinum Village site in Bristol Bay
(Larsen, 1950, p. 184). Twined cedar-bark mats are common on the
Northwest Coast (Drucker, 1950, Traits 718, 733, etc.). In general,
twined mats, used for bedding, seats, and for shrouds, have a very
wide distribution in both the Old and New Worlds, and the oldest
direction of twining seems to have been up from left to right (de
Laguna, 1947, pp. 217 ff., 272).
BLANKETS
The geometric patterned woolen blanket, known at Yakutat in
early historic (and late prehistoric?) times (see pp. 171 and 196),
is an obvious link with the Tlingit of southeastern Alaska. According
to our informants, a number of Yakutat women knew how to make
Chilkat blankets of conventional, modern type with representative
crest designs, since they had at one time been “married into Chilkat.”’
There was no specific reference to pattern boards which they may
have used; certainly there is none at Yakutat now.
The knowledge of weaving blankets may have extended even farther
northwest than Yakutat. Thus, Captain Cook (1785, vol. 2, p. 368)
who visited Prince William Sound in 1778 reported ‘one or two
woolen garments like those of Nootka.” Strange (1928, pp. 42 f.)
also said that the Chugach in 1786 had thick warm woolen blankets,
but valued them too highly to sell any. He bought the skin of the
animal from which it was obtained, and described it as very similar
to a sheepskin. In a report by Potap Zaikov, who explored Prince
William Sound in 1783 (Tikhmenev, 1863, App., p. 6 7), the Russians
observed ‘‘. . . a blanket made of white wool, similar to sheep’s wool,
plaited and fringed. The blanket was ornamented with yellow and
coffee color.’”? Our Chugach informants, however, believed that it
was not until after the arrival of the Russians that they themselves
learned how to weave goat wool blankets (Birket-Smith, 1953, p. 64).
In 1884, Abercrombie noted that the Eyak slept under woven goat
wool blankets about a yard wide and 5 feet long, but our informants
2 Translation by Ivan Petroff. Permission to quote this passage has been given by the Director of the
Bancroft Library, University of California at Berkeley.
de Laguna} ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 181
denied that the Eyak knew how to make them (Birket-Smith and
de Laguna, 1938, pp. 43, 70).
The lack of specific mention of designs on Chugach and Eyak
blankets and the description in Tikhmenev suggest that they were
either plain or had only simple geometric patterns, like that of the
Yakutat blanket, for surely anything resembling the elaborate crest
patterns of modern Chilkat blankets would have been remarked.
On the basis of her detailed study (see pp. 187 ff.), Carolyn Osborne
recognizes a northern center for woolen blankets with geometric
designs.
MISCELLANEOUS WORKED BONE, STONE, AND WOOD
WORKED BONE
A flat piece of bone from Old Town ITI, (7.5) cm. long and 1.9 by
1 cm., may have been the handle of a tool. There is a shallow cut
across one face near the unbroken rounded end. Another possible
handle is a flat piece of seal (?) bone, (9.2) cm. long, 2.3 by 1.2 cm.,
from Old Town II. It is ground on several sides; one end is rounded
and smooth, the other broken. A somewhat similar worn bone frag-
“ment from Old Town IT, (4.7) cm. long, has a hole through the rounded
end. Also from Old Town III is a cut section of animal rib, 7.8
em. long, with one rounded end; the other is damaged. This also
may have been a handle.
A flat piece of whalebone from Old Town III has been whittled
into a disk, 1.8 cm. in diameter and 1.2 cm. thick (for a top?).
In addition, 28 nondescript pieces of bone, most of which appear
to be workshop debris, show that bones were split by cutting grooves
in one or both surfaces and that bone was also shaped by adzing,
whittling, and grinding. Two pieces from Old Town II are the
articular ends cut from animal long bones.
The distribution of these pieces is: 1 from Canoe Pass, 15 from Old
Town III, 15 from Old Town II, 2 from Old Town I, and 3 from
Old Town, level unknown. It should be noted that these worked
bones include fragments of whale or porpoise bone, mostly from Old
Town III, of large mammal (bear? and mountain goat), of small
mammals, and of birds.
CHERT CORES, NODULES, AND CHIPS
Three cores of green chert, two about the size of the fist, from
which flakes were struck by direct percussion, are from Old Town
III, and another core is from an unknown level. Three nodules
of green chert, about 3 by 4 cm., struck from larger pieces, are from
Old Town ITI.
693-818—64——_13
[BuLyu. 192
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY
182
Ficure 24
(For legend, see opposite page.)
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 183
Some 45 chips of chert, mostly green in color, range in length from
1 to 6.5 em. A few might have been used for scrapers or knives,
but most seem to be the debris of manufacture. We do not know
what was being made, however, since the few finished artifacts of
flaked stone include no specimens of chert. The proveniences of
these flakes are: 4 from Old Town III, 2 from Old Town II, 1 from
an unknown level, and all the rest from Old Town I, including the
upper and lower levels of Mounds C and D and of the fill in House
Pit 7.
Thus, of 52 pieces of worked chert only 9 came from Old Town
III, 2 from Old Town II, and 2 from an unknown level in Mound B,
showing that the flaking of chert, whatever the purpose, had become
virtually obsolete by the period represented by Mounds A and B.
WORKED QUARTZ, GREENSTONE, AND SLATE
From Old Town III is a flake of quartz, 4.8 em. long, which could
have been used as a knife or scraper.
In addition to the fragments of adz blades, already described
(p. 95), there are 6 flakes of greenstone. One is from Diyaguna’st,
one from Old Town III, three from Old Town I, and 1 piece from Old
Town, level unknown. The last could have been used as a scraper.
Of chipped and ground slate, a piece from Little Fort Island may
have been intended for a knife blade. The proveniences of other
fragments are: one from Old Town III, one from Old Town II, and
three from Old Town I.
MISCELLANEOUS WOODEN OBJECTS
In addition to the artifacts described elsewhere, many pieces
of carbonized wood were found, chiefly in the burned houses. These
are mostly fragments of firewood, workshop chips or splinters, a few
of which show the marks of adz and knife but only 10 appear to have
been purposely shaped.
Among the latter, there are two slender wooden pins, well made
and polished. One (fig. 24, d), pointed at both ends and 17.5 cm.
long, is from the Storage House in Old Town II; the other (fig. 15, c),
from Old Town III, is now broken, but was evidently pointed at one
end. A more roughly made pin, originally over 30 cm. in length,
came from House 8 in Old Town II.
Figure 24.—Wooden objects. Drawn by Donald F. McGeein. a, Spatulate object, from
floor of Storage House, Old Town II (No. 388); 6, wooden blade, from below floor of
Storage House, Old Town II (No. 423); ¢c, spatulate object, from below floor of Storage
House, Old Town II (No. 429); d, wooden pin, from just above floor of Storage House,
Old Town II (No. 256); ¢, fragment of bidarka rib (?), from floor of Storage House, Old
Town II (No. 399); f, cut branch, from floor of House 9, Old Town III (No. 658).
184 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buu. 192
A stick (fig. 16, d), 42.5 cm. long, has been trimmed smooth, and
both rounded ends are beveled from one side. It may have been
used to spread fish for drying or cooking.
There are four spatulate wooden fragments, also from the Storage
House. One (fig. 24, c), now (14.4) cm. long, has a series of finely
incised chevrons on the flat blade near what appears to be the handle
(on the side not illustrated). This may have been a paddle for
beating up soapberries, an imported delicacy. Another (fig. 24, 6),
looking like an asymmetric wooden knife, 17.8 cm. long, suggests
the implement used for eating sea urchin ovaries. A third may
have been intended for a wedge, although it shows no signs of wear.
The functions of the other two specimens (fig. 24, a) cannot be guessed.
There is also a section of a slightly curved branch (fig. 24, f), now
(18) em. long and 2.5 cm. in diameter, which has been cut with a
sharp metal (?) knife. Both (?) ends were originally bluntly pointed.
It was found in a litter of charred shavings, twigs, and moss on the
floor of House 9 in Old Town III.
The proveniences of the other pieces of worked wood are: 15 from
Old Town III, and 37 from Old Town II. Some of the larger pieces
were sent to Dr. J. Louis Giddings, at the Haffenreffer Museum of the
American Indian, Brown University, with the hope that these, to-
gether with borings from livings trees in the area, might furnish
materials for dedrochronological dating. ‘The samples were, however,
insufficient. Other pieces of wood were given to Miss Elizabeth
Ralph, in the Department of Physics, University of Pennsylvania, for
radiocarbon dating. We are extremely grateful to her for the results
reported below (p. 206).
CANOES
There are two bluntly pointed, slightly curved wooden sticks
(fig. 24, e), flat on one side and rounded on the other. One from the
Storage House in Old Town ITI is (13.4) cm. long; the other, smaller
fragment is from House Pit I. It is possible that these were pieces
of ribs for bidarkas or kayaks, since they resemble some Chugach
specimens (de Laguna, 1956, p. 247), and our Yakutat informants
reported that their ancestors long ago used sealskin canoes. These
included large boats like umiaks, one-hole kayaks, and two-hole
bidarkas. Obviously, there could never have been a complete boat
in the Storage House.
While the ethnographic evidence (cf. de Laguna, 1963) is sufficient
to establish that the prehistoric Yakutat once made skin boats like
those of the Chugach, this cannot be said of the Tlingit, with the
possible exception of the Chilkat. However, the skin canoe used by
the latter for crossing lakes when on trading trips to the interior, had a
de Laguna} ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 185
covering of moose or caribou hide, not of sealskin (Drucker, 1950,
Trait 390, p. 254), and was probably, therefore, of Athabaskan type;
it was paddled, not rowed. The Chilkat tradition that they once had
only skin boats, “before they knew there were other people living to
the south and west on the coast,” is also suggestive of an interior
origin.
While the Yakutat themselves made or purchased from their
southern neighbors several well-known Northwest Coast types of
dugout, they made two distinctive types of their own. The forked-
prow canoe for the open sea or swift currents was made only by the
Eyak-speaking Gulf of Alaska Indians, from Yakutat to the mouth
of the Copper River; the canoe with spoon-shaped bow and ram for
sealing in the ice floes was made only at Yakutat and Icy Bay. Weare
inclined to consider dugouts as peculiar to the Northwest Coast, so
it is important to remember that they were made by the Chugach,
Tanaina (the latter possibly in imitation of the Kenai Peninsula
Eskimo), and even by some of the northern Koniag, although among
these peoples the dugout was never as common as boats of other kinds
(de Laguna, 1956, pp. 241 ff.).
While the dugout is the modern type of craft on all the Northwest
Coast, Borden (1951, pp. 46 ff.) had argued that the ancient inhabi-
tants of Whalen Farm I and Locarno Beach I and II must have hunted
seal and porpoise from skin canoes because they lacked antler wedges,
pestle-shaped hand mauls, and large adz blades—tools which he
believed were essential to making dugouts. Although the presence
of such implements does indicate a well-developed woodworking
industry, their absence cannot prove that boats were made of skin,
not of wood, since the modern Coast Salish fell trees by burning or
chiseling with a relatively small adz (Barnett, 1939, Traits 571, 572),
and the Tlingit, at any rate, shape their dugouts with a small planing
adz and crooked knife. This question has been further discussed by
Osborne, Caldwell, and Crabtree (1956, p. 121). However, we
should also note that Borden (personal communication) believes
that the dugout was made in the Marpole Phase, which was in large
part contemporaneous with that of Locarno Beach. Probably the
question of boat types on the southern Northwest Coast in the most
ancient days is not yet ready for solution.
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THE YAKUTAT BLANKET
By Carotyn OsBoRNE?
The blanket remains which were recovered from a shaman’s grave
on Knight Island, Yakutat Bay, were cleaned between two frames
of plastic screening with sprayed detergent suds and clear water.
Even though unfolding was done carefully the largest fragment meas-
ures a very ragged 10% (warp) inches by 12% (weft) inches. This
fragment, which is apparently from the main body of the robe (or
ceremonial blanket), contains neither warp (top and bottom) nor
weft (side) selvages. Fragments of both warp (top) and weft (side)
selvages do exist, but I was unable to piece these to the other frag-
ments to give continuity of design or weave or to give an indication
of size of the blanket. There can be no doubt that all of the fragments
belong to a single blanket. The many fragments have been placed
with a high degree of accuracy, in the following order: i.e., the heavy
geometric-patterned twined fragments with the fur binding as top
selvage; the twilled-twined gold or yellow with the concentric rec-
tangles of dark brown and with multiple tassels as the main body of
the textile; the heavy warpwise-twined rows and the attached fringe
and the wrapped bundles as side border. One fragment of this side
border had a section of three-strand braid attached (?) to it; it may
possibly have been part of the lower border.
DESCRIPTION
Materials—Samples of the various yarns (warp; light-colored
weft; decorative yarn used both weftwise and warpwise; tassels; fur
edging) were sent to the laboratory of the Federal Bureau of Inves-
tigation, which very kindly consented to identify the fibers used in
this and other local aboriginal textiles. Their findings are as follows:
Warp yarn: Goat (includes mountain goat) dyed light brown. [There is a
possibility that this might be burial staining; it seems probable that the original
color was either natural white or light yellow.]
Weft yarn: Goat (includes mountain goat) dyed light brown. [This isthesame
color as the warp yarn.]
3 I wish to express my gratitude to the following: Mr. J. Edgar Hoover, who directed the laboratory of
the Federal Bureau of Investigation to identify the fibers; Dr. Kaj Birket-Smith, who supplied photographs
of the Copenhagen blanket; and the Portland Art Museum for lending the Tsimshian blanket from the
Rasmussen Collection. This paper was read, in part, at the 1957 meetings of the Society for American
Archaeology, in Madison, Wis. After this reading Dr. Arnold Pilling kindly sent me his notes on the
original catalogs of the Cook and Vancouver Collections in the British Museum.
187
188 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuL. 192
Tassel of blanket and decorative yarn: Goat (includes mountain goat) dyed
dark brown.
Side border decorative yarn: Goat (includes mountain goat) dyed dark brown.
Fur edging: Otter (Lutra‘) or sea otter (Enhydra) natural light brown to dark
brown.
The warp yarns are two-ply, Z-twist (singles S-) approximately
one-sixteenth of an inch in diameter; loose to medium degree in twist.
They are invariably light colored. Warp yarns were set up 14 to the
inch and were used in pairs or fours; never singly. The light weft
yarns, which form the background color of the blanket, are also two-
ply Z-twist as is the warp, but are smaller in diameter and somewhat
harder twisted. The dark-brown decorative yarn and fringe yarn is
considerably smaller in diameter (a minimum of one-thirty-second of
an inch); it is also two-ply Z-twist and medium to hard in degree. The
dark-brown side border decorative twining yarn is approximately
one-eighth of an inch in diameter; two-ply Z-twist and usually hard
twist. The attached fringe at the side selvage is light colored, two-ply
Z-twist about one-eighth of an inch in diameter.
Technique.—As previously mentioned, there are fragments of three
or possibly four sections of weaving, of distinctive design and
technique. Five fragments of the top border of the blanket are
present, of which two show the complete complex of techniques
(pl. 19, a). The larger of these measures 5% inches long (warp) by 6%
inches wide (weft); this fragment and the next larger have portions
of the top selvage andfur. The warp, as is common for the suspended-
warp weaving of all Northwest Coast blankets (with the exception of
the Salish which were ring-woven on a tension bar loom) was doubled
at the top over a heavy loom cord, and secured with an inital row of
plain twining. This row of twining was covered with the otter or sea
otter fur band (hide and fur) about 1 inch wide, which was folded over
the top edge so that it appears equally on both sides, and sewn. All
of the twining in the blanket is carried over paired or quadrupled
warps. The pitch of the background weave of the light-colored
wefts, of the weftwise decorative twining (three-strand), and of the
vertical decorative wefts (three-strand twining) is invariably up-to-the-
left. This is in contrast to the elaborate stylized naturalistic Chilkat
blankets in which change of direction of pitch of twining may be used
to emphasize design breaks and changes.
The sequence of the twining rows from the first weft working
downward is: two rows of plain twining over paired warps; five rows
of twilled-twining over paired warps; one row of three-strand dark-
brown twining; 10 rows of twilled-twining over quadrupled warps.
4In view of the horror which the modern Tlingit and Eyak have of the land otter and the taboo against
wearing its fur, we may assume that this was sea otter fur.—F. de L.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 189
The pattern then proceeds into a geometric zigzag design of dark-
brown and light-brown wefts. There is no “eccentric” wefting in
this section as is common in the Chilkat blankets; all of the wefts are
at right angles to the warps. In all of this zigzag section, the weaving
is accomplished with one light twining element and one dark. The
pattern is therefore reversible; when the light appears on one surface,
the dark forms the identical pattern on the reverse. Of necessity,
in this zigzag design, therefore, the twining proceeds on a twill-line
over paired warps (see fig. 25, a). Between each rectangle of the
bold zigzag design are four vertical bands, one-half of an inch wide,
alternating light and dark wefts. In the fragments preserved, there
is not one of the complete rectangles of the zigzag design; their width
is uncertain. The maximum of width of the zigzag block of any
fragment, which is therefore a minimum for the design, is 5% inches.
The warp length of the design band, which is complete in several
fragments, is 2% inches.
Unlike the Chilkat blanket weaving in which short pieces of weft
yarns were inserted in the design pattern and locked with the adjoining
wefts, all of the wefts in this textile proceed from selvage to selvage
and were woven directly across the entire width, forming the zigzag
designs and the vertical bars as these design elements appear in turn.
Warp count throughout the blanket is 14 to the inch, used primarily
in pairs. The Chilkat blankets often had warps added to aid in
shaping the blanket to a curved shape. There was no evidence of
added warps in the fragments of the Knight Island blanket.
The weft count in these top fragments is 32 single wefts used in
pairs (i.e., 16 weft courses or rows) an inch.
At the base of this bold pattern is a single row of dark three-strand
twine, followed by four rows of the twilled-twining of the light-
colored wool; another single row of dark twining, three-strand; and
two-rows of light twilled-twining. At the very bottom of one of the
fragments, following the above series of twined rows, is a row of
twining showing two light wefts and contiguous to these two dark
wefts. These may well indicate that there were originally two
complete rows of the horizontal bands of zigzags and bars. No more
than this hint was present.
The fragments of what appear to be the main body of the blanket
are more numerous than the top border pieces. Completely cleaned
and in good enough condition to be teased apart for thorough analysis
were four large fragments, the largest of which is 10% by 9% inches.
It is exceedingly unfortunate that none of this series could be fitted
to the preceding pattern section. This portion of the blanket is
primarily light wefted with designs of concentric rectangles of a
deep reddish brown (pl. 19, 6). The basic weave is twilled-twining
190 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buuy. 192
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Ficure 25.—Diagrams of weave of Chilkat blanket from shaman’s grave, Knight Island,
Yakutat Bay. (Not to scale.) a, Zigzag top portion of the Yakutat blanket, drawn by
Arlie Ostlie; b, One set of concentric rectangles of three-strand dark wool on light-colored
weft, central part of the Yakutat blanket (arrows indicate directions of yarn movements),
drawn by Irene Brion from sketch by Carolyn Osborne.
over paired warps. There are 8 courses or rows of wefts to the inch
indicating 16 weft yarns. The decorative rectangles are accomplished
in three-strand twining in which the yarns follow the outlines warp-
wise and weftwise (fig. 25, 6); the three yarns needed for the rectangle
were measured, halved and inserted at the midway point at the upper
left-hand corner of each rectangle. At this point one-half of the
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 191
length is twined across the warps to form the upper line of the rec-
tangle; these yarns, then, round the corner and, as the light wefts
of the basic twined background reach this vertical line of twining,
are twined around them (the wefts) to form the right side of the rec-
tangle. Simultaneously, the second half of the length of yarns was
being twined over the light basic wefts as these were met, and after
rounding the lower left corner, crossed the warps to complete the
lower side of the rectangle. At the lower left corner, the three yarns
of each half were braided for about 114 inches, knotted and permitted
to fall free as a tassel. The longest tassel yarns in place are 7 inches
long. The complexity of the meetings of the basic weft and deco-
rative yarn is increased by the fact that there are five concentric
rectangles and a single center line. All of the vertical lines were
inserted during the weaving process. None of them is embroidered
as are many of the vertical lines in the stylized Chilkat blankets
(in which the overlaid three-strand yarns cannot be seen from the
reverse side of the fabric). The complications of the selvage to
selvage wefting of the light yarns with the addition of the design
elements during weaving is indeed a tribute to the skill of the weaver.
At one stage she manipulated the basic weft to the outer vertical
line; here these light-colored wefts act as warp to the dark-brown
decorative yarns; then they are light wefts again for two warp pairs;
then again they act as warp for the next concentric rectangle. At
10 places across each group of rectangles, the light wefts were re-
leased to be the passive element as the dark-brown yarns were lifted
to be twined around them. Each of these wefts moved through many
such rectangles to the opposite selvage, there to turn around the
end warp and begin the return in the opposite direction. None of the
rectangles is complete in the fragments preserved. However, two
fragments contain enough of the interior rectangles so that the length
(warpwise) of 2% inches and width (weftwise) of 4% inches for the
outer lines can be considered accurate. As each of the concentric
rectangles ended in a self tassel, the blanket must have been well
fringed.
Each of the three large fragments contains portions of three rec-
tangles, two of these on the same horizontal line and one on the next
vertical line above or below the others. The rectangles were ap-
parently distributed across the width of the blanket spaced 3 to 3%
inches apart (distortion of the blanket may account for some of this
discrepancy). Between the rows vertically (warpwise) the space
was apparently 3% inches. The rectangles were not staggered; the
top decorative lines of the rows of rectangles were inserted on the same
weft line, and the vertical lines inserted between the same warps.
192 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
There is no way of knowing the total number of rectangles in the
blanket.
There are four fragments of side border, of which one may possibly
be a lower fringe corner as well. ‘The largest of these measures 5 inches
long by 2 wide. The weft yarns, on reaching the edge of the blanket,
turn on the outside warp and begin the next course below. The
two outer warps are only slightly larger than the main body warps.
Alternate rows begin the twilled-twining by (a) twining between
warp 1 and warp 2, joining warps 2 and 3, and then proceeding to
double-warp twilled-twining and (6) twining between the single
warps 1, 2, and 3, to double warps 3 and 4, etc. Around each of the
(b) rows is attached the extra fringe of mountain goat wool; the larks-
head knot, with two cut ends, which forms the fringe is tied around
the first warp, embracing the (b) row of twining. This fringe is
now, at its longest, about 3 inches. The yarn is the light-colored
mountain goat wool, two-ply Z-twist and as fine as the weft.
Working inward from the selvage, between the third and fourth
warps is a single vertical row of three-strand twining with fine dark-
brown yarns. The next 15 warps are twined with the light weft
yarns, but inserted between warps 18 and 19 is a very heavy (three-
sixteenths of an inch wide) vertical row of three-strand dark-brown
twining. Both of these are woven into the wefts as the weaving pro-
ceeded to their longitude, even as the vertical lines of the rectangles.
Immediately joining the heavy twined row (this connection has
since broken) is a group of seven wrapped bundles. This wrapping
resembles a loose coiling or sewing, inserted here in a vertical posi-
tion. I cannot picture it in the blanket; there is no counterpart in
ethnologic or known specimens, and these fragments were too disin-
tegrated to provide an answer. I can only surmise that they func-
tioned as the plaited bands which reinforce the sides of the Chilkat
blankets. Nothing of its sort is present on any of the geometric
blankets known.
COMPARATIVE DATA
The analysis of the blanket fragments may be summarized as
follows for comparative purposes:
1. Warp and weft and decorative yarns are entirely of mountain goat wool.
2. The construction is entirely twining: two-strand and three-strand.
3. All of the twining wefts (excluding the dark rectangles in three-strand
twining) pass from selvage to selvage of the blanket.
4. Decorative three-strand wefts were woven into the blanket; there is no sur-
face embroidery.
5. Tassels of integral yarns suspend from some of the decorative elements.
6. A fur border was sewn to the top of the blanket.
7. Side selvages had an attached fringe of mountain goat wool yarns.
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 193
8. The design is entirely geometric.
9. Two colors only were used in the blanket; a light yellow or gold and a dark
reddish brown. It is, of course, possible that there was also the natural wool
used, but I could see no shading of the light-colored yarns.
10. All wefts cross the warps at right angles; there is no eccentric wefting.
There are actually only two ethnological specimens which are com-
parable to this archeologic blanket; and one ethnologic fragmentary
specimen.
The first of these is the comparatively well-documented ‘Swift’
blanket described by Willoughby (1910, pp. 1-10). Of the 10 above-
summarized techniques and qualities, the Swift blanket shares 7 with
the Yakutat fragments: 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, and 10. The Swift blanket
exhibits the wrapped lattice twining (Willoughby, 1910, p. 5, fig. 4)
which is widely used in the Chilkat weaving but is not present in the
fragments of the Yakutat blanket. This type of weaving involves
weft yarns which show on one surface only. Both the Swift blanket
and the Yakutat blanket exhibit a closely comparable weave: the
vertical bands which divide the zigzag sections of both blankets in-
volve two wefts of different colors, one of which provides a temporary
lattice for the other. The yarn which acts as lattice for one colored
band is the twining element for the alternate vertical band. This
may be resolved as a matter of tension on one of the twining elements.
This reversibility of design is not a regular feature of Chilkat blankets.
It is seen occasionally in very small areas of design, such as the teeth
motifs.
The Swift blanket has side fringes which are extensions of the weft
yarns; the Yakutat blanket has added yarns for the side fringe.
Neither exhibits the braided or plaited band of the Chilkat blankets.
The Swift blanket uses three colors: two dyed and an undyed
natural white wool. The yellow and the dark brown are comparable
to those of the archeologic specimen; as I have stated, it is difficult
to be certain of the light color in the Yakutat blanket, but no variation
in the light-colored wefts can be seen.
There can be almost no closer design elements than the alternate
zigzag and bars of the Swift blanket and the ones described above;
the weaving technique of the bars is certainly similar and that of the
zigzag identical (Willoughby, 1910, fig. 4, 6). The design of concen-
tric ‘lazy’? H’s of the Swift blanket is very like the concentric rec-
tangles of the Yakutat blanket, and the tassels pendent from the lower
right-hand corner of the design appear in both specimens. The Swift
blanket seems to have, in addition, tassels pendent from the bold
geometric diamonds. ‘These are braided and may or may not be
integral weft yarns.
In general, the Swift blanket is more complex in design than is the
194. BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
Yakutat blanket. This complexity is accomplished, however, with
the addition of only a single technique: the double wrapped lattice
twining which appears only in the borders of that blanket.
The Swift blanket was collected about 1800, without provenience,
although Willoughby considered it to be a northern British Columbia
coast product. J would consider it, in view of the subsequent remarks,
to be from farther north.
Willoughby (1910, p. 8) notes that there is a dilapidated sample of a
geometric-patterned blanket in the British Museum collected in
about 1793. Kissell (1928, fig. 2 and p. 118: her text has the figure
numbers reversed; figure 3 is the Ottawa blanket illustrated by
Emmons, 1907, p. 388, and by Willoughby, 1910, pl. 2) states that this
blanket was probably collected by Vancouver somewhere between
Prince Frederick Sound and Lynn Canal in 1794. I have at hand a
series of notes from Arnold Pilling on the following manuscripts:
Hewett, George Goodman: “Vancouver Voyage, Hewett Coll*.’? British
Museum Ethnological Document #1126. Manuscript catalogue written during the
Vancouver Expedition, 1793-1794. Original document in the British Museum.
The following entries are noted:
TiS, WNeamakizat oe 2. = Ae oe ne ee ee Shoulder piece.
PAO :serhee et GGJi. ULF OLE Ss. AEs Oe. eae Bark garment.
111 Mowachut or Nootka Sound___---.-----~-- Bark and wool garment.
267), | Rock tVillaceus 22 ets. Pa ee ee Garment.
None of these, it seems to me, can identify the British Museum speci-
men. However (also in the notes taken by Arnold Pilling), there is
mention of two blankets collected by the Cook Expedition in 1778
and presented to the Museum in 1789 by Joseph Banks. These
specimens are:
NWC 49 Cloak of woven fibre with heavy fringe of rough fibre and twisted
cord intermixed.
NWC 51 Robe of brown and white twisted cord of a woolen material
woven in a diamond pattern: wool of the mountain goat.
There is no way of determining the age of this catalog or whether
it is Banks’ original notes or notes made by later museum workers.
However, I am satisfied that item NWC 51 is this fragment, and that
it was probably collected by Cook in 1778. It seems likely that Miss
Kissell assumed that it was collected by Vancouver because his
journals describe a native of the Lynn Canal wearing a robe of this
description.
Neither Kissell nor Willoughby states that this blanket is of pure
mountain goat wool (though the catalog notes indicate that it is).
From the fragment pictured by Kissell I would state that this frag-
ment shares characteristics 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 9 and 10 with the Yakutat
fragments. There are no sections of top border pictured and it is
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 195
possible that elsewhere in the blanket there are design elements of
three-strand twining. Its boldness relates it to the Copenhagen
blanket. It shares the zigzag patterning with all the others. The
illustration shows no tassels. What is most interesting is the sug-
gestion of wrapped bundles at the lower border. A detailed analysis
of this blanket fragment is certainly a desideratum.
A third known blanket, very inadequately described, is illustrated
by Boas (1951, pl. 10) and is a part of the collections of the Ethnologi-
cal Museum at Copenhagen. This blanket was formerly part of the
Leningrad collections and was acquired by early Russian explorers on
the coast. It seems possible that it could have been collected by
Lisiansky, who described Indians wearing tasseled blankets at Sitka
(Kissell, 1928, p. 117) in 1805. Dr. Birket-Smith very kindly sent
photographs of the blanket (Museum No. K.c.119) including enlarge-
ments of details. Its overall similarity to the Yakutat blanket and
the Swift blanket is very apparent. The horizontal diamond bands
and the zigzag bands are of the same temporary-lattice type twine
weave as has been noted for both of the preceding blankets. It
would seem to share characteristics 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, and 10 with the
Yakutat robe, lacking only the fur binding and decorative three-
strand twining. The tassels appear to be inserted yarns. Its design
elements are bolder in overall pattern than either the Yakutat or
Swift blanket; it lacks the lighter design of concentric rectangles or
“lazy” H’s.
In all three of these blankets the zigzag designs are separated by
vertical bars. The Swift and Copenhagen blankets share the hori-
zontal diamond pattern. ‘The British Museum specimen has a zigzag
border both horizontal and vertical, as do the Copenhagen and the
Swift. This pattern does not appear to have been present in the
Yakutat blanket, but, of course, the fragmentary condition of the
specimen does not permit a positive statement of the absence of the
pattern.
Only the Yakutat blanket has wrapped bundles. None of the
four has the sewn-on plaited band or bands of the Chilkat blanket.
A blanket which stands as unique up to the present is the often-
illustrated cedar-bark and wool blanket (Emmons, 1907, pl. xxrv, 1;
Boas, 1951, pl. x1) in the British Museum. It would seem that this
cape or blanket ° is probably the ‘111” of the Hewett Collection of
the Vancouver Voyage (see Arnold Pilling’s notes, mentioned above,
p. 194):
111 Mowachut or Nootka Sound—Bark and wool garment.
5 All-cedar-bark garments are commonly called capes, while the wool and wool and cedar-bark garments
are generally referred to as blankets. The term ‘‘cape”’ is certainly more accurate in a functional way.
196 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLy. 192
It resembles the fine cedar-bark capes of the Nootka in its open
space twining. It lacks the heavy rolled and plaited side binding of
the specimens that I have observed in the Washington State Museum,
and it has the addition of mountain goat wool in a twined geometric
upper and lower border. It is also deeply fringed at side and bottom.
The geometric patterning is simpler than in any of the previously
discussed blankets and the lack of a photograph from the reverse side
leaves us with no indication as to the type of weave.
All of the blankets discussed have been assigned to the same general
period. The earliest would seem to be the 1778 (?) collected British
Museum fragment. The archeologic specimen (Yakutat) could date
from the 1780’s. All the rest were collected before or at the turn of
the 19th century. The only one of the blankets with known pro-
venience is the blanket from the shaman’s grave on Knight Island
in Yakutat Bay. With, however, the added information that Van-
couver saw a tasseled blanket at Lynn Canal and Lisiansky saw
Indians wearing tasseled blankets at Sitka, I submit that it fixes the
geographical provenience of the all-wool geometric-patterned blanket
as the northern coastal area of southeastern Alaska. All of these
predate any specimens known as “‘T'simshian”; and all fall in Tlingit
territory.
The earliest known garment of mixed cedar bark and wool comes
from a more southern location—Nootka—but dates (if my assumption
about the Hewett collection of Vancouver Voyage is correct) from
approximately the same period—i.e., the 1790’s. It also exhibits geo-
metric patterning.
All of this patterning is evident in the fine twined basketry of the
Tlingit and other Northwest Coast tribes, and also of the Aleut. It
would seem to me that, in the earlier aspects of weaving, wool blanket
weaving was, like basketry, a woman’s craft, and she used designs and
patterns and skills (witness the selvage-to-selvage welts; three-
strand twining; wrapped lattice weave; lack of eccentrics and vertical
overlay twining) with which she was familiar as a basket weaver, in
both the northern and southern areas.
The new art style—the highly elaborate stylized naturalistic design
of the Chilkat blanket—was probably a male development. The
Chilkat blanket was woven by women who copied pattern boards made
by the men, and who of necessity invented and adapted new techniques
to meet the requirements of design. This new style was in accord
with the total artistic and social development of its time.
It is the Tsimshian who have been credited by Emmons, and by Boas
following the mythology, and by most later writers, with the origin of
the Chilkat blanket. Because of the apparent antecedence of the
northern blankets of geometric style, and largely because of the lack
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 197
of evidence of early weaving in the Tsimshian area, I would assume
that the mythology refers to the elaborate ‘‘totemic” or heraldic
designing of the so-called Chilkat blanket. A total lack of information
on Tsimshian weaving and the very dubious provenience of the great
majority of blankets that are tentatively labeled Tsimshian makes
further discussion of this origin mythology fruitless.
Of the development of the historic Chilkat blanket, the following
items are outstanding:
There are no blankets with stylized naturalistic designs (unless the
fragment in the National Museum of Canada is an exception) which
do not have the cedar bark and mountain goat wool wrapped warp.
There are no blankets with the stylized naturalistic designs which
are dated before the beginning of the 19th century, and the oldest
with known date of collection appears to be about 1830 (Willoughby,
1910, p. 10). Emmons (1907, p. 390) says that his earliest blanket
was supposedly the first woven by the Chilkat and was copied from
an old Tsimshian blanket; it was said to be several generations old.
The introduction of the elaborate designs brought new weaving tech-
niques unknown to basketry and necessary to develop the patterns
of a multiplicity of small bodies of color. All of the Chilkat blankets
have the rounded lower edge, the so-called five-sided shape. None
of the Chilkat blankets is as finely woven as are the geometric pat-
terned; none is as flexible. The addition of cedar bark made for
greater rigidity; it also, of course, supplemented a probably limited
supply of mountain goat wool. It permitted an expansion of the quan-
tity of production which agreed with the need for wealth-display items.
There are only a few blankets which fill the technologic and decora-
tive gap between the geometric Yakutat, Swift, Copenhagen, and
British Museum specimens and the historic Chilkat (and/or Tsimshian)
blankets.
A cut-up blanket, incorporated into a dancing shirt, in the former
Museum of the Geological Survey of Canada (now the National
Museum of Canada) is illustrated in part by Kissell (1928, fig. 3:
n.b. that the description of this fragment on page 117 wrongly refers
to fig. 2); by Emmons (1907, fig. 58, p. 388) and by Willoughby (1910,
pl. 2). None of the authors states whether the fragment is of pure
mountain goat wool or mountain goat wool and cedar bark mixed.
This fragment shares the zigzag and bar design with the geometric-
designed blankets and has a form of concentric triangle designs. The
selvage-to-selvage wefts in the geometric pattern are interrupted by
a stylized naturalistic design in which short lengths of yarn are
inserted to make the pattern in typical Chilkat techniques. There
are a few tassels added to the naturalistic design, though the geometric-
693-818—64——_14
198 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Buuu. 192
patterned section seems to have none. This fragment is totally
without provenience either temporal or geographical.
The blanket illustrated in Davis (1949, p. 64) is part of the Rasmus-
sen collection of the Portland Art Museum (cat. No. 49.3.546).
The card on the blanket reads as follows:
Chilkat Blanket. Tsimshian. 10-18-39. A very old blanket collected by
Mrs. Kirk, wife of the soap Mfg. in San Francisco in 1880. ... Date? Un-
usually fine weaving. Moth eaten places. Sea otter fur ? Laced in top. A
remarkable piece. Its faded colors match the Chilkat blanketry leggings I got
from Nass River.
This blanket was lent for comparative study by the Portland Art
Museum. It is indeed a remarkable and beautiful blanket. It has
the typical five-sided shape of the Chilkat blanket with the very deep
lower fringe (never characteristic of the geometric-patterned blankets).
It has a wool-wrapped cedar-bark warp and fringe. The warp and
weft counts indicate greater fineness of yarns than any Chilkats that
I have observed. The center yoke is a geometric-patterned, two-
colored section in which the wefts proceed from one side of the yoke
to the opposite. The geometric pattern is obviously not as intricate
as any of the previously observed; but its technique is the same.
The stylized naturalistic section surrounding the yoke uses every
known Chilkat technique. The colors are unique insofar as my
observation and Emmon’s remarks are concerned. The green is a
decidedly yellow green and rather deep in the unfaded reverse side;
the usual pale yellow, dark brown or black, and the natural white
complete the colors. The pattern is simpler than in many blankets;
the faces are upside down to the observer as in old dance kilts. The
wing design is also reversed and it lacks the common three-section
division of design.
Emmons (1907, p. 388, fig. 581, a) illustrates one other blanket
which he calls Tsimshian. It has no geometric patterning, but the
design is aberrant from the usual Chilkat designing. This is also
true of his oldest Chilkat blanket which he was told was copied from
a Tsimshian blanket (ibid., p. 390, fig. 580).
A few old dance shirts have bands of geometric designs in selvage-
to-selvage twining. Washington State Museum cat. No. 1-631,
Chilkat Tlingit, is a shirt that shows the geometric band in the back
of the shirt only; it is simpler in its development than any of the wholly
geometric-patterned blankets. The shirt has a wool-wrapped cedar
bark warp, as, I believe, do all of the dance shirts.
It is on the basis of the known provenience of the Yakutat blanket
that it has been possible to place more accurately the all mountain
goat wool, geometric-patterned blankets. Their more northerly location
seems to indicate an earlier center of blanket weaving than that
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 199
attributed to the Tsimshian. The stylized-naturalistic design
blankets seem to combine traits from three earlier weaving centers:
(1) the mountain goat wool blankets from southern Alaska; (2) the
highly developed art style of the Tsimshian (with its probable heraldic
significance) ; and (3) the cedar-bark cape weaving of the Nootka and
southern groups (which probably added the more rounded shape,
the plaited bands at the side selvages, and the very long lower
fringes, as well as the new fiber).
The intermediate blankets show a gradual blending of design;
they are few in number, and though one at least is designated as
Tsimshian they are really of unknown provenience.
pial «otal yh oe ea 7
Besos) ana esihele wereslt
' arhhe (BY. Sabet, teat de, sine af ae
i oibiweal aidachotc ped lier): aidan Tada sty Rie
ial ns Hoot will ra gal BA Cogn sade abag edi | (la
ante Polya sat’ out -ond babies ydadors dots) a :
mene -aiol, gem ab Dales <4 oa ties 3 bikiay ont Te ‘ll
a Cede goed ald a@ He
“raw: “bireted lanier R wild ali7r caine Adelie 2g
find, imitash at 2 val oh AIO) iano he ‘t9 dp phe: a 15
Peak. &
CONCLUSION
By FREDERICA DE LAGUNA
AGE OF THE SITES
Since Yakutat archeological materials have many striking similarities
to those from Prince William Sound, the criteria used to suggest a
relative chronology for Chugach sites (de Laguna, 1956, pp. 64 f.)
may be partially applicable. Chugach cultural periods were:
(1) Older prehistoric (perhaps contemporaneous with Kachemak
Bay sub-III and III, and with most of the lower levels at Uyak Bay,
Kodiak Island): Decomposed shells in middens, incised stone plaques,
relative abundance of planing adzes over splitting adzes and small
woodworking tools, relative abundance of tanged slate blades and
slender slate points like awls over barbed slate blades, chipped ulo-
shaped scrapers, and absence of native copper.
For the beginning of occupation at Palugvik, Prince William Sound,
which must have been within or possibly at the beginning of this
cultural stage, Rainey and Ralph (1959, p. 368) have published two
radiocarbon dates. These are based on one house post (P-174 and
P-192, cat. No. 33-37-476) found at the bottom of the midden.
This post had 105 rings and had been coated on the outside with
paraffin. The date obtained from the outer part of the post was
1753 + 105 B.P., or A.D. 100 to 310. The second date from the core
of the post, from which 83 years was subtracted, was 1727 + 105 B.P.,
or A.D. 126 to 336. A wooden shovel blade, similarly treated with
paraffin (P-173, 33-37-481), gave a date of 2265 + 112 B.P., or 419
to 295 B.C., which was discarded because of suspicion of paraffin
contamination. While the dates from the same house post corroborate
each other, they should only be taken as suggestive of the age of the
older prehistoric period in Prince William Sound, since they are not
part of a series. The assumption of relative contemporaneity with
similar cultures on Kachemak Bay and Kodiak is only a guess.
We should note that the single date obtained from five pieces of
caribou antler from the Period III level of the Yukon Island site in
Kachemak Bay (P-138) is 1369 + 102 B.P., or A.D. 487 to 691,
but it stands alone. It can at best only suggest that this date fell
somewhere within the timespan of Kachemak Bay, but can determine
neither its beginning nor its end. Nor is it possible to exclude the
suspicion of contamination from sea water or from preservatives.
The same hesitations should apply to the interpretation of the single
201
202 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bunn. 192
date for Kachemak Bay I, obtained by combining eight pieces of
antler from Yukon Island I (P-139). This gave a reading of 2706
+ B.P., or 866 to 630 B.C. (Rainey and Ralph, 1959, p. 371). Again
this stands alone (de Laguna, 1962).
(2) Later prehistoric (possibly contemporaneous with late Kachemak
Bay III and IV, and with the upper levels at Uyak Bay): Less de-
composed sheils, abundance of fire-cracked rocks (probably used for
the steam bath), predominance of the splitting adz and of small
chisels and other small woodworking tools over the larger planing
adz, development of variants of the splitting adz such as the grooved
ax, the ax-pick, and the adz-ax, presence of war club heads (double-
pointed stone pick and chipped stone pick), increased popularity of
barbed stone blades, appearance of native copper in the latest deposits.
There are no radiocarbon dates for this period.
(3) Protohistoric: The same types as in the later prehistoric except
for the addition of blue glass beads of the type seen by Captain Cook
in 1778. Presumably iron was also present, although we found none
in Chugach sites.
(4) Historic (since 1783-84, with the beginning of Russian expansion
into Prince William Sound and along the Gulf of Alaska): Trade goods,
especially small glass beads (like those found in the grave on Knight
Island), skeletal remains with lesions of syphilis and tuberculosis, and,
still later, the appearance of Christian burial.
Admittedly, the only distinction between late prehistoric and proto-
historic sites rests on the presence or absence of Cook type glass beads.
Since these were undoubtedly rare and precious, their absence from a
site that yielded few personal ornaments cannot be taken as proof of
prehistoric age.
It is, however, probably significant that no beads or any objects
proving direct contact with White men were found at Old Town, while
Cook type beads and an iron arrowhead came from Shallow Water
Town on Little Lost River. This suggests that such beads would have
been encountered in Old Town middens, caches, and house pits, if the
latter site had been inhabited at the same time as the small settlement
on Little Lost River. Old Town was probably abandoned before these
beads became available to the Yakutat people.
Cook type beads were among the trade goods carried by the Rus-
sians, although they were disseminated to the Chugach before the
Russians themselves came to Prince William Sound. They were prob-
ably of Chinese manufacture, and it is tempting to surmise that the
first to reach Alaska may have been the 20 strings of Chinese beads,
left by Bering’s expedition in 1741 in a Chugach house on Kayak
Island in Controller Bay (de Laguna, 1947, pp. 242 f.; 1956, pp. 60
ff.). In any case, we may hazard that Cook type beads, without other
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 203
trade goods, might appear at sites dating from the middle to the late
18th century, and that Old Town may have been abandoned some-
what earlier.
It will be remembered that scraps of iron were found only in
Mounds A and B (Old Town III and IT), and not in what is considered
the oldest section of the site, Mounds C and D and House Pit 7.
Theoretically, there are three possible sources of such iron (de Laguna,
1956, pp. 61 ff.). First, it might have been obtained from Asiatic
sources by purely aboriginal trade via Bering Strait, where the
Eskimo apparently had iron points for engraving tools from one to
two thousand years ago. Although this source may have supplied
the tiny scraps of metal used for incising the compass-drawn dot-and-
circle designs on artifacts from Kachemak Bay III, early Kodiak, and
early Aleutian sites, the iron found at Old Town must be more recent,
for it is in larger pieces, and there is no evidence that any but the most
minute fragments were known in Alaska until after the middle of the
17th century, when the Russians had established themselves on the
Anadyr River in Siberia. Thus, the earliest iron knives in northern
Alaska do not antedate the end of that century.
A second possibility is that iron was obtained by the Aleut and
Pacific Eskimo by more direct trade with Asia, perhaps as their tradi-
tions suggest, from Russian or Chinese voyagers who may have
preceded Bering in the early 18th century.
The third, and most likely, source of iron is nails and bolts in drift-
wood and wreckage, which increased maritime activity during the
17th and 18th centuries would have made available (cf. Rickard,
1939). While we do not know how early the Yakutat people may
have obtained drift iron, it is likely to have been before they acquired
glass beads, since the latter could only have been obtained through
trade. We may, therefore, be able to distinguish an early protohis-
toric period with drift iron but without beads, and a later proto-
historic period with both drift iron and Cook type beads. This is, in
fact, what is suggested by the Yakutat sites, if Old Town II and III
represent the earlier phase and Shallow Water Town the later.
Another clue to the relative age of Old Town is provided by the
occurrence of native copper. This is, as far as we know, the richest
Alaskan site for native copper with the possible exception of Dixthada,
near Tanacross, on the upper Tanana River, close to the source of the
metal (cf. Rainey, 1939, pp. 364-371). Copper first appears at Old
Town in the form of three pieces in the upper layers of Old Town I,
and steadily increases in quantity through the deposits of later periods.
There is, of course, some uncertainty as to the age of copper working
in Alaska. Because it is undoubtedly old in many parts of the New
World—the Old Copper Culture of the Great Lakes area yields radio-
204. BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
carbon dates of 5,600 or 7,150 years ago +600 years (Wormington,
1957, p. 150)—it is natural that Birket-Smith (1953, pp. 225 f.)
should suggest that it was accidental that copper was found only in
sites of the very late prehistoric period in Prince William Sound and
Kachemak Bay. We should also note that ornaments of native copper
occur in both Beach Grove and Marpole (Eburne), with radiocarbon
dates from the latter site ranging from 943 B.C. +170 to A.D. 179
+60 years (Borden, personal communication). Despite this range
in dates, and Dr. Borden’s hestitation to accept the earliest count
from the site, there seems to be no question but that copper working
was old on the southern Northwest Coast. However, the Yakutat
and Atna stories about the origin of copper working lack the mytho-
logical character which would suggest great antiquity for this art;
rather, the protagonists appear to have been ordinary Indians, though
supernaturally blessed with luck. There is, of course, no necessary
connection between the copper work in these two areas.
We may assume, therefore, that Old Town was settled in the late
prehistoric period and abandoned before the late phase of the proto-
historic period. However, it is possible that the postulated “earlier
protohistoric period” of drift iron may overlap in time the ‘later pre-
historic period” of native copper alone. The Yakutat natives had
easier access to the great ocean beaches where wreckage was found
than did most of the Chugach, and may always have had more iron
than the latter, and have found it earlier. Absence of iron from
Chugach sites where it might have been expected, may, therefore, be
due to geographical factors.
We do not know how early in post-Wisconsin times the Yakutat
area may have been open for human settlement. Riddell has reviewed
the geological and botanical data which may indicate at what period
or periods southeastern and southwestern Alaska could have been
inhabited. In summarizing these findings (1954, p. 105), he concludes
that: “Even the currently most heavily glaciated region of the coast,
of which Yakutat Bay is the approximate center, probably was suffi-
ciently deglaciated and populated with the necessary types of flora
and fauna to allow human occupation about 6,000 years ago.”” The
Aleutian Islands and the southern Northwest Coast were habitable
several thousand years earlier. About three to five thousand years
ago occurred the post-glacial optimum in southeastern Alaska, followed
by a glacial advance (Riddell, 1954, pp. 75 ff., 177).
It must be remembered ... that the present icefields in the Pacific Coast
region are not remnants of the Wisconsin advances, but are the residue of a rela-
tively small ice advance of approximately 3,000 years ago. This period of ice
advance is sometimes referred to as “‘the littie ice age.”’ Before this advance,
the glaciers in Alaska had retreated a greater distance than have the present
glaciers. [Ibid., p. 108.]
de Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUTAT BAY AREA, ALASKA 205
In general, during the past two millennia, the glaciers in the Pacific
Northwest have been retreating, except for local fluctuations, for
example, an advance culminating between A.D. 600 and 920 in Icy
Bay and between A.D. 970 and 1290 in Yakutat Bay (Plafker
and Miller, 1958). The earlier “‘little ice age’ and this (and other
local) readvance may not have prevented human occupation of all of
the northern Northwest Coast and Alaska Gulf Coast regions, yet
they may have been severe enough to have discouraged or even pre-
vented travel and hence cultural exchanges along this part of the
coastline. Furthermore, we cannot be confident that we yet know
what parts of that coastline or what present foreshores were above
sea level in critical periods in the past, although raised beaches in the
Gulf of Alaska and in southeastern Alaska attest to uplift in both
geologically and historically recent times.
In any event, there are no archeological remains known at present
which suggest habitation in the Yakutat area before the glacial
advance between A.D. 970 and 1290 in Yakutat Bay. These dates
are based on radiocarbon analyses of wood from an end moraine near
Ocean Cape. Occupation may well have begun, however, some time
during the 15th or 16th century, when the ice had retreated.
According to recent studies made by the U.S. Forest Service, the forest growing
on the outwash apron at the outer margin of the end moraine near Yakutat is a
relatively even-aged spruce stand with an average age of nearly 550 years .. .
The oldest of 27 spruce trees on which an accurate age count was obtained in 1953
was then 553 years old .. . This indicates that recession of the Yakutat Bay
lobe began before 1400 A.D., assuming that the outwash apron did not become
stabilized and suitable for forest growth until after the recession had begun .. .
the spruce forest probably did not become established on the outwash apron near
Yakutat for at least 50 years after the tidal ice front began to retreat into Yakutat
Bay. ([Plafker and Miller, 1958.]
Knight Island itself would not have been uncovered until somewhat
later, and a permanent village would hardly have been established
directly under the end of a huge glacier. During 1953, logging opera-
tions were carried out near Redfield Cove, on the east shore of Yakutat
Bay, opposite Dolgoi and Kriwoi Islands. Borings from some of the
trees cut at that time were examined by Dr. Giddings, who informs
us (letter of April 4, 1958) that these trees began to grow in A.D. 1530,
1630, and 1660. This information gives us some clue as to when
Knight Island might have been occupied. Spruce trees growing in
House Pit 7, and thus indicating the abandonment of the oldest part
of the site, had circumferences ranging from 5 feet 6 inches to 8 feet;
a hemlock had a circumference of 3 feet 10 inches.
Borings of spruce trees growing in House Pit 7 and in other parts of
the site were examined by Dr. Giddings. Unfortunately the blade of
206 BUREAU OF AMBRICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuLL. 192
the core extractor was only 12 inches long and thus much too short to
reach the center of the larger trees. It was impossible to cut them
down and secure core samples from logs, as was done with the speci-
mens from Redfield Cove. In consequence, we do not know when the
oldest trees on the site began to grow.