Southwest Anderson Plain ASTt in the Regional Context

The southwest Anderson Plain ASTt sites lie well within the interior and might appear to be part of the inland ASTt distribution so well documented further east in the Colville Lake region, to the north and south of Great Bear Lake and into the District of Keewatin. Not only is there a semblance of geographic unison, but radiocarbon dates from the southwest Anderson Plain and chronological estimates for the onset of the ASTt occupation of the interior are similar.

However, there are key elements which do not articulate well with this hypothesis and suggest an alternate view of the southwest Anderson Plain ASTt occupation.

Between Great Slave and Great Bear Lakes and even further east in the Keewatin, bipointed projectile points are virtually absent. Instead, there is a fairly homogenous distribution of straight or concave-based triangular points to be found throughout those areas. North of Great Bear Lake and in the Colville Lake region, these varieties are also the principal ASTt styles with the possible addition of rare bipointed examples. However, these have been described as "asymetric side-blades". Projectile point styles within the southest Anderson Plain ASTt sites are almost always bipointed varieties. Bipointed projectiles were also found at Dismal-2, on the Old Horton Channel at ObRw-11, and at the Engigstciak site at the mouth of the Firth River on the north Yukon coast.

Along with the obvious differences in projectile point styles, we must also wonder about the shafts to which these implements were connected and their manner of hafting. This in turn might indicate significant differences in the weaponry employed and the kinds of hunting strategies used. In the Arctic Islands, there is no question that the small triangular projectiles were inset into the ends of harpoon sockets. Did the Barrenlands Pre-Dorset continue to use harpoon-related technology inland?

So-called "mitten-shaped" burins are not only a hallmark of the Denbigh Flint Complex, but they have also been found in related cultural expressions such as Independence I and Pre-Dorset. On their own, they can simply serve to identify the cultural tradition and not the specific regional phase or sub-tradition. Burins have been described in a myriad of ways; handedness, faciality, and number and orientation of burin facets to name but a few. In the southwest Anderson Plain, there seems to be a marked selection for thin unifacial blanks. Both left and righ-handed varieties are produced. However, as noted earlier, a distinctive thinning technique is characteristic of the Anderson Plain burins. This technique may also be present elsewhere but nowhere in the same proportion. However, the Dismal-2, ObRw-11, Engigstciak and southwest Anderson Plain sites stand in contrast to the Great Slave Lake, Great Bear Lake, and Keewatin ASTt sites where facial grinding appears to be the technique commonly employed to thin the bit of the burin. Grinding as a techique is present on other artifact forms in the southwest Anderson Plain, but is not applied to the thinning of burins. Similarly, ground stone tools occur north of Great Bear Lake and at Bloody Falls. There also we find facial grinding of burins to be a common trait.

Radiocarbon dates from the southwest Anderson Plain ASTt sites
(Calibrated using CALIB-3, Stuiver and Reimer 1993)

Laboratory
Number		Material
Dated		Radiocarbon
Age B.P.		Calibrated
Age		One Sigma
Range
NbTj-8S-3000wood
charcoal		3390±2551680 B.C.2015-1407 B.C.
S-3363wood
charcoal		2650±80810 B.C.843-790 B.C.
NbTj-17S-3377wood
charcoal		3470±4301750 B.C.2450-1267 B.C.
NbTj-9S-3362wood
charcoal		820±70A.D.1230A.D.1167-1282
S-3378wood
charcoal		<100modernmodern
MlTk-2BETA-51302caribou bone380±50A.D.1483A.D.1448-1648


The chronological placements of sites in the western Canadian Arctic is problematical and for the most part rests upon estimates arrived at through stylistic comparisons. The initial movement of the ASTt into the Barrenlands is generally agreed to be about 1500 B.C. Coincidentally, available radiocarbon dates from the southwest Anderson Plain are contemporaneous with this initial shift into the Barrenlands. As well, estimates for ObRw-11 and Dismal-2, as well as a radiocarbon date from Engigstciak range from 1500 B.C. to 2000 B.C., or sometime before the southern shift of ASTt people into the interior.

To summarize, it appears that the Arctic Small Tool tradition sites of the Beaufort-Amundsen region--Engigstciak in the north Yukon, ObRw-11 on Cape Bathurst Peninsula, the four southwest Anderson Plain and perhaps Dismal-2 near Coppermine--share a number of traits which set them apart from the Pre-Dorset who moved into the Barrenlands about 1500 B.C. These include projectile point styles and possibly the equipment to which the points were attached, as well as the attendant techniques and strategies surrounding their use. Similarities also include techniques for thinning burin bits, the general use of grinding as a shaping technique, and the dating of the occupations themselves.