Late maritime woodland lithic technology in the Lower Saint John River valley
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Date
2012
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University of New Brunswick
Abstract
The Late Maritime Woodland has been a challenging period for archaeologists to interpret throughout the Maritime Peninsula, and has received little attention in the Lower Saint John River valley sub-region. Shallow stratigraphic positions disturbance, and acidic soil conditions have contributed to issues with determining chronology, non-lithic technology, and site use. This project focuses on the analysis and integration of information obtained from four lithic assemblages associated with Late Maritime Woodland sites or components. A dataset including a limited set of chronologically diagnostic artifacts, formal and informal tools, and flake debris - and associations of these artifacts with features - are analyzed to determine lithic technologies and tool-kits, the procurement, transportation and preparation of certain tool-stone materials, and prehistoric site use. Findings suggest that ancestral Wolastoqiyik in this last period of prehistory were practicing complex settlement and mobility systems balanced between increasingly sedentary "collector" behaviours and those of highly mobile "foragers".