Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-ndw9j Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-02T18:52:09.570Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Kayuk Complex of Arctic Alaska

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

John M. Campbell
John M. Campbell*
Affiliation:
Yale University, New Haven, Conn.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Approximately 2400 stone and 77 bone and antler artifacts were obtained by extensive trenching of the Kayuk site, a large area on the banks of Kayuk Creek in Anaktuvuk Pass, Brooks Range, northern Alaska, where several Nunamiut Eskimo families now camp. No stratigraphy was noted and no structural features were encountered, but four fire areas were excavated. The most diagnostic artifact is the Kayuk point, a lanceolate form with finely executed parallel oblique flaking, which resembles most closely the Angostura point of the Great Plains. Other stone artifacts, some of which also exhibit the parallel oblique flaking, include blades, scrapers, angle burins, microblades, drills, and adz blades. Implements of bone and antler, mostly caribou, include harpoons, leister and fish spear prongs and barbs, and other forms common in recent and prehistoric Arctic sites. The Kayuk site is believed to have been a hunting camp used during caribou migrations through Anaktuvuk Pass by a prehistoric Eskimo group which probably wintered on the northern coast as do the modern Nunamiut. The Kayuk complex probably belongs somewhere in time between the Denbigh Flint complex and Ipiutak.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 25 , Issue 1 , July 1959 , pp. 94 - 105
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1959

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Giddings, J. L. Jr. 1951 The Denbigh Flint Complex. American Antiquity, Vol. 16, No. 3, pp. 193–203. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Giddings, J. L. Jr. 1952 The Arctic Woodland Culture of the Kobuk River. University Museum, Museum Monographs. Philadelphia.Google Scholar
Hughes, J. T. 1949 Investigation in Western South Dakota and Northeastern Wyoming. American Antiquity, Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 266–77. Menasha.Google Scholar
Irving, William 1951 Archaeology in the Brooks Range of Alaska. American Antiquity, Vol. 17, No. 1, p. 52. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Irving, William 1953 Evidence of Early Tundra Cultures in Northern Alaska. Anthropological Papers of the University of Alaska, Vol. 1, No. 2, pp. 55–85. Fairbanks.Google Scholar
Irving, William 1954 Preliminary Report on an Archaeological Reconnaissance in the Western Part of the Brooks Range of Alaska. Peabody Museum, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Larsen, Helge 1951 De Dansk-Amerikanske Alaska-Expeditioner 1949-50. Geografisk Tidsskrift, Vol. 51, pp. 63–93.Copenhagen.Google Scholar
Larsen, Helge and Rainey, Froelich 1948 Ipiutak and the Arctic Whale Hunting Culture. Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, Vol. 42. New York.Google Scholar
MacNeish, R. S. 1951 An Archaeological Reconnaissance in the Northwest Territories. Annual Report of the National Museum of Canada, Bulletin 123, pp. 24–41. Ottawa.Google Scholar
MacNeish, R. S. 1954 The Pointed Mountain Site Near Fort Liard, Northwest Territories, Canada. American Antiquity, Vol. 19, No. 3, pp. 234–53. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacNeish, R. S. 1955 Two Archaeological Sites on Great Bear Lake, Northwest Territories. Annnual Report of the National Museum of Canada, Bulletin 136, pp. 54–82. Ottawa.Google Scholar
MacNeish, R. S. 1956 The Engigstciak Site of the Yukon Arctic Coast. Anthropological Papers of the University of Alaska, Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 91–104. Fairbanks.Google Scholar
Mathiassen, Therkel 1927 Archaeology of the Central Eskimos, 2 Volumes. Report of the Fifth Thule Expedition, 1921-1924, Vol. 4. Copenhagen.Google Scholar
Murdoch, John 1892 Ethnological Results of the Point Barrow Expedition. Ninth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1887-88, pp. 6—441. Washington.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rausch, Robert 1951 Notes on the Nunamiut Eskimo and Mammals of the Anaktuvuk Pass Region, Brooks Range, Alaska. Arctic, Vol. 4, No. 3, pp. 147–95. Montreal.Google Scholar
Solecki, R. S. 1950 A Preliminary Report of an Archaeological Reconnaissance of the Kukpowruk and Kokolik Rivers in Northwest Alaska. American Antiquity, Vol. 16, No. 1, pp. 66-9. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Solecki, R. S. 1951a Notes on Two Archaeological Discoveries in Northern Alaska, 1950. American Antiquity, Vol. 17, No. 1, pp. 55–7. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Solecki, R. S. 1951b Archaeology and Ecology of the Arctic Slope of Alaska. Smithsonian Report for 1950, pp. 469–95. Washington.Google Scholar
Solecki, R. S. and R. J., Hackman 1951 Additional Data on the Denbigh Flint Complex in Northern Alaska. Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences, Vol. 41, pp. 85-8. Washington.Google Scholar
Thompson, R. M. 1948 Notes on the Archaeology of the Utokok River, Northwestern Alaska. American Antiquity, Vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 62–5. Menasha.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tolstoy, Paul 1958 The Archaeology of the Lena Basin and its New World Relationships. American Antiquity, Vol. 23, No. 4, pp. 397–418. Salt Lake City.Google Scholar