The Pine Hill collection was discovered in the archaeology lab at State University of New York College at Potsdam after remaining unstudied for over 30 years since its initial excavation in the 1960s and 1970s. Pine Hill has been identified as a fifteenth century St. Lawrence Iroquois village site, located in St. Lawrence County, New York. The faunal remains and bone tools from the site indicate food procurement strategies, seasonal activities, the presence of discrete activity areas at the site, and the production and use of a wide range of bone tools. Replication experiments conducted on several bone tool types provide insight about how these tools were made, used, and how quickly they might be discarded. As one of the first reports on a St. Lawrence Iroquois site in the region, this study presents important information about this group.

Evidence suggests that purple dye was produced on the islet of Mitrou, a Bronze Age and Early Iron Age site in central Greece. The goal of this study is to determine the chronological and spatial patterning of Murex shells in order to better understand the emergence of dye manufacture. The research hypothesis is that Murex dye production was related to the rise of a visible political elite and that the scale of production was large enough at Mitrou to have exceeded the needs of the household, thus providing a cash crop for this elite to obtain imports from the Eastern Mediterranean. Multi-layered statistical analyses were employed to test this two-pronged hypothesis. The first hypothesis that Murex dye production was related to the rise of the elite at Mitrou was confirmed by a series of chi-squared analyses. Based on site-wide estimates of original Murex population, the second hypothesis that dye production exceeded domestic scale cannot be rejected. Since we know the prehistoric Mycenaeans produced very ornate, multi-colored and often banded garments, it is possible that Murex dye was produced at Mitrou to color raw wool for the production of thread, which could then be embroidered on fabric or traded as such. If it was in fact colored thread that was being produced, the site-wide estimates suggest that dye production could have exceeded domestic levels at Mitrou and dyed thread could have been a lucrative trading commodity.

<strong>Abstract</strong> This study seeks to expand the knowledge of Woodland subsistence practices in the Alabama River valley by presenting an analysis of the faunal assemblage from the Indian Hill site, 1WX15. Additionally, this study presents a comparison of 1WX15 to other sites from the Tombigbee, Alabama, and Coosa river valleys in order to present a broad picture of Woodland subsistence in and near the Eastern Gulf Coastal Plain. An intra-site comparison revealed the primary vertebrate resources exploited were mammals and turtles. The substantial amount of turtle fragments suggested the site was occupied during warm months, with a fall and winter occupation possible as well. Feature 38, a domestic dog skeleton, was of special interest. Characteristics of this feature indicated both intentional burial and post-mortem modifications consistent with food refuse. An inter-site comparison demonstrated that three variables were influencing the composition of the faunal assemblages from the Tombigbee, Alabama, and Coosa river valleys. These three variables were seasonality, geography, and time. Seasonality and geography appeared to have greater influence than time. This study has revealed three areas in which Eastern Gulf Coastal Plain faunal analyses are inadequate. There are few Middle Woodland faunal assemblages; those available have very small sample sizes. There are no faunal analyses available outside of alluvial valleys. Finally, there are very few winter assemblages; assemblages in which winter occupation is indicated are mixed with warm season material. Rectifying these shortcomings with future research will provide a more comprehensive picture of Woodland subsistence and variability thereof.

The Jot-em-Down Shelter (15McY348) was excavated by U.S. Forest Service archaeologists in 1986. The present study concentrated on the lithic assemblage, with a particular focus on the chipped stone debitage. The Jot-em-Down Shelter lithic assemblage was compared to assemblages recovered from four nearby sites, open sites 15McY570 and 15McY616, and rockshelter sites 15McY403 and 15McY409; and rockshelter sites located in and near the Red River Gorge, Cold Oak Shelter (15LE50) and Rock Bridge Shelter (15WO75). This study determined that Jot-em-Down Shelter was a multicomponent site utilized by mobile groups of people from the Early Archaic through Mississippi periods. Use of the site intensified around the Late Archaic and Early Woodland periods. Prehistoric peoples who occupied the shelter had contact with other groups from the surrounding area, hunted nearby, and processed hides.

No description available.

The role of bison in the prehistoric subsistence in southern Idaho is not fully understood. Bison remains from Baker Cave, a late Holocene archaeological site dating to cal A.D. 1042-1265, however, provide evidence of pre-contact subsistence strategies in the region. This thesis focuses on the paleoecology of bison and their role in prehistoric subsistence on the Snake River Plain (SRP). The ecological study of bison focuses on the hypothesized trans-Holocene diminution in bison body size in southern Idaho, while a second study focuses on how these animals figured into prehistoric responses to seasonal fat scarcity. Although bison diminution and its ecological determinants are well understood on the Great Plains, the history of diminution west of the Rocky Mountains is less clear. Bison morphometrics from Baker Cave present the opportunity to assess bison diminution on the Snake River Plain. Bison morphometrics from Baker Cave are indistinguishable not only from other late Holocene bison on the Snake River Plain but iv also from late Holocene bison from the Great Plains. Further, the Baker Cave bison are smaller than early Holocene bison from the Great Plains and Snake River Plain. These results suggest morphological similarity between Snake River Plain bison and Great Plains bison through the Holocene, pointing to similar bottom up ecological constraints on body size. Although bison are common components of SRP archaeofaunas, their role in prehistoric subsistence is poorly understood. To shed light on this problem, I hypothesize that the Baker Cave bison assemblage resulted from hunters seeking skeletal fat. I test predictions drawn from this hypothesis with assemblage-level patterns in element representation, impact scar distribution, and fragmentation. These assemblage-level patterns track the skeletal fat utility of elements. These patterns, combined with winter procurement evidenced by fetal remains, support the hypothesis that fat-seeking behavior was a response to winter fat scarcity. A comparison with smaller bison assemblages from southern Idaho suggests that this fat-seeking behavior might have persisted as far back as the middle Holocene, although this requires confirmation from future studies.

This thesis is a report on a pottery analysis which was carried out in the laboratory of the Department of Anthropology at Portland State University. The earthenware materials involved were collected from three surface sites on Batan Island, Philippines, during the summer of 1969. The interpretation of these potteries was based upon the direct-historical approach to archaeological research. The use of this method was proposed after a cursory examination of the earthenwares revealed certain general similarities between the archaeological potteries and the ethnographically-known wares produced in the area at the present time. One of the sites was a known habitation, and the wares in this collection were analyzed to determine the characteristic ceramic attributes exhibited by the sherds. A comparison of these attributes with those noted in the collections from the other two sites revealed that the surface treatment and vessel form of all the wares were similar enough to indicate only a minimal amount of functional variation between the sites. Ethnographic data concerning the manufacture and use of contemporary earthenwares in the town of Uyogan, on Batan Island, revealed that these potteries are all strictly utilitarian, and are used primarily in the preparation, handling, or storage of foodstuffs. By inferring similar uses for similar items in the past, the three collections of earthenwares appear to have been directly associated with habitation activities. Ethnographic and archaeological evidence from other areas in the Philippines indicate that the materials from Batan are also comparable to earthenware items produced elsewhere for "kitchen" purposes. The three surface collections of Filipino earthenwares have been analyzed with reference to function and use. It has been found that these materials are representative of the potteries used ethnographically in habitation activities in the area, and that the differences between the three collections may be attributable to diachronic rather than synchronic variation. It is argued that once the characteristic ceramic attributes for any particular site are determined, their functional interdependence with habitation activities can be demonstrated. It is concluded that the direct-historical and ethnohistorical approaches can be utilized in the determination of site activities based upon the archaeological potteries found in them.

Native Americans from the middle Connecticut River Valley of New England experienced massive social disruptions during the seventeenth century due to European settlement, but not much is known about their cultural continuities and/or discontinuities during this dynamic period. As an additive technology, ceramics embody the technical choices of potters made at the time of manufacture thus enabling the study of the effect, if any, of colonialism on indigenous material culture and practices in New England. This study examines ceramic assemblages from one Late Woodland period site and one seventeenth-century site in Deerfield, Massachusetts to explore the extent to which ceramics can demonstrate continuities and/or changes in traditional ceramic manufacturing practices in response and/or resistance to colonization.

This project was an inventory and analysis of human remains from the Aklis archaeological site (12VAm1-42), located in the Sandy Point National Wildlife Refuge, St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands. The human remains inventoried during this project were collected by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and MSU during surface collection and emergency salvage excavations at Aklis. The statistical analysis of the data focused on the minimum number of individuals (MNI) per square meter, the degree of long bone completion, skeletal element counts across excavated features, and the degree of weathering. Results indicate that the assemblage curated at MSU includes a minimum of 14 individuals, and the remains are heavily weathered and highly fragmented. The data reflects increased fragmentation and weathering in human remains recovered from erosional features as opposed to correlation with geographic area, and that there are differences in skeletal element counts across excavated areas of the site.

Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) research conducted in coastal environments is one area that is lacking in archaeology. Surveys conducted in this type of environment afford the opportunity to evaluate the practical use GPR under field conditions. Coastal environments are effective for this evaluation because they offer a host of conditions that GPR surveys do not normally encounter at one time. The relationship of the land to the coast, sub-surface conditions and reliable survey areas create a "perfect storm" to test how practical the use of GPR is in coastal environments. This research is a study of homestead cemeteries situated within the boundaries of Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS), using GPR. The research has three main goals. The first is to utilize GPR to identify if there are any unknown burials at CCAFS. The second is to test the practical effectiveness of GPR in coastal environments where high water table, geology and saline conditions can limit the capability of the technique to resolve subsurface features. The third is to correlate data from the GPR survey with ethnographic information to enhance the protection and maintenance with what is already available for the cemeteries. Research methods include field-based geophysical data collection in addition to archival and ethnographic historic research. The field component, to which this research pertains, entailed an on-site GPR survey at the nine sites on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. This was followed by analysis of the information from the survey using standard processing software. Subsequently, a thorough archival search was completed to link historic and ethnographic information with the archaeological data obtained on the cemeteries. The final result of this research was a report that provides a detailed description of the results of the GPR survey of the cemeteries at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.