Some Problems in the Relationship between Tlingit Archaeology and Ethnology

Extract

In 1949, I undertook an archaeological and ethnological survey of northern Tlingit territory in Alaska. Whereas a good deal was known about Tlingit ethnology, the archaeology of these people was virtually unexplored. Although the northern Tlingit have a culture which is in many respects less rich than that of their southern neighbors, they were presumably middlemen in passing on to the latter those cultural influences which eminated from the Asiatic North Pacific. Also in northern Tlingit territory we ought to find an archaeological horizon or horizons characterized by those traits which link the ancient cultures of the Aleut and Pacific Eskimo area and the Coast Salish area.

The tribal territories of the Yakutat on the Gulf of Alaska and of the Angoon or Hootznuwu on Admiralty Island near the center of the southeastern Alaskan archipelago were found to be the most promising for a study of Tlingit culture history, and accordingly in 1950 a whole season was spent at Angoon.