Appendix H - Historical Archaeological and ... - CBP.gov

Site Types
Broad-scale changes in Native American land use from the end of the Pleistocene to first
encounters with Euroamerican explorers in the late 1700s are manifested in the archaeological
record by a variety of artifacts and features. Archaeologists have classified this material into
assemblages to infer chronological sequences and past lifeways. This brief overview describes
the kinds of pre-contact Native American archaeological deposits found in Western Washington
and the patterns in their distribution that have been formally studied since the mid-twentieth
century. Artifacts and assemblages characteristic of particular chronological periods are further
described in the subsequent section.
Archaeological sites clearly associated with any kind of residence are quite rare in Western
Washington. These sites contain hearths, cooking and food processing features, post-molds and
other structural remnants indicative of both domestic and economic activities. The
ethnographically derived categories of village and camp are often used to differentiate particular
residential sites in the prehistoric archaeological record of the Northwest Coast. In the
logistically-organized settlement patterns that characterized much of the Northwest Coast around
the time of contact, villages were the central residential unit of a particular community for at
least a portion of its seasonal economic round. Archaeological remains consist of either multiple
residential structures or a single very large house, a diverse artifact assemblage reflecting a wide
variety of economic and social activities, and the remains of subsistence resources harvested
across several seasons. In the same kind of settlement pattern, camps are more seasonally
limited residences of families and task groups and are situated at or near important resources.
They are usually manifested by features of a single dwelling, artifacts reflecting only a single or
a few economic pursuits, and deposits that are less extensive and lack the stratigraphic
complexity of village sites. Overall mobility of Native American communities was greater prior
to the village-oriented settlement pattern hypothesized for most of the central Northwest Coast
over the past few thousand years. Instead of a single village, community residences were
centered on several base camps throughout the annual economic cycle, and smaller camps were
used for specific tasks. Most residential sites that have been identified in this region are situated
in places that allow easy access to subsistence resources, fresh water, and transportation
corridors such as marine shorelines, river valleys, and mountain ridge lines and passes.
Much more common than residential sites along the central Northwest Coast are the
archaeological remains of harvesting and processing activities and lithic tool manufacture and
maintenance. Such deposits are also found as part of residential sites, but are more frequently
identified without additional evidence of dwellings. Examples of these kinds of sites include
most shell middens, comprised of shellfish and other faunal remains discarded during their
processing and consumption. Their size, thickness, extent of stratigraphic complexity, and
contents vary widely. All provide at least some information regarding past subsistence, and
often datable organic material as well. The soil chemistry of shell middens allows preservation
of bone, including human remains. Shell middens are usually situated along the shoreline at the
time of deposition, but subsequent tectonic activity and sea level change have resulted in the
discovery of middens today in both intertidal environments and inland along former beach
landforms. Other resource processing features such as camas ovens and storage and roasting
pits are found in a wider variety of settings, from huckleberry grounds in montane environments
to wetlands and prairies in both the coastal and interior lowlands. They are manifested by
concentrations of fire-modified rock, charcoal, and burned sediment, and sometimes the remains
Northern Border Activities H-58 July 2012