Abstract

Cultural Resource Management (CRM) survey of proposed forest harvest developments in the Swan Hills has resulted in the discovery of the Deer Mountain Locality. Preliminary investigation has resulted in the discovery of 12 prehistoric sites centered upon Deer Mountain, a distinctive upland feature situated along the Grizzly Ridge escarpment. Both habitations as well as lithic procurement and reduction sites are represented. The recovered lithic assemblages are noteworthy for exhibiting high quality lithic raw materials that include abundant quartzites, some chert and a novel material type identified as 'Grizzly Ridge Silicified Wood'. The target geological source of the 'opalized' wood raw material has been tentatively identified along the nearby escarpment slopes. This local raw material comprises up to 90% of some lithic assemblages. Previous archaeological research conducted in north-central Alberta has tended to relegate the Swan Hills as a 'hinterland' area largely devoid of focused prehistoric human activity. The new discoveries present evidence for intensive prehistoric human habitation and lithic resource extraction within uppermost elevations of the Swan Hills. A description of the nature and context of prehistoric assemblages recovered from Deer Mountain and other nearby sites will be accompanied by an examination of pertinent geological factors that may have stimulated repeated human occupation of the area. Based upon these preliminary findings, an hypothesis is forwarded suggesting that this pattern of prehistoric human settlement was initiated during Early Prehistoric times, eventually leading to the establishment of local populations into wide-ranging prehistoric trade networks that extended as far as the Northern Plains