Northern Archaic

Peter N. Peregrine and Sarah Berry

6000-3000 BP

Follows the Paleo-Arctic tradition, overlaps the Western Arctic Small Tool and Eastern Arctic Small Tool traditions. Precedes and, in the interior of Alaska, overlaps the Norton tradition.

Non-glaciated arctic and subarctic regions of Alaska (excluding the Aleutians and Panhandle), United States, and western Yukon, Canada.

Leaf-shaped projectile points with wide and deep side notches and convex bases, to corner-notched and lanceolate forms, unifacially-flaked knives, endscrapers, and notched cobbles (perhaps net-sinkers or hammers for bone processing). Microblade technology, present during both the preceding Paleo-Arctic and the following Arctic Small Tool traditions, is present with side-notched points in certain areas. Some experts think side-notched point sites with microblade technology should be considered a subtradition.

Agiak Lake, Alaska; Anaktuvuk Pass, especially the site of Tuktu, Alaska; Batza Tena, Alaska; Ice Patch, Yukon; Kuparuk Pingo, Alaska; Onion Portage, Alaska; Security Cove, Alaska

None currently.

A variety of animals were present, with the following found in Northern Archaic sites: moose, muskox, wapiti, wood bison, Dall sheep, caribou, various bear species, gray wolf, fox, lynx, marmots, ground squirrels, waterfowl, and fish. Caribou comprise the bulk of faunal remains from archaeological deposits.

Sea level would have been close to that of today. Peatlands, about 75 percent of today’s size, were expanding during the Mid-Holocene. Today wetlands cover more than 40 percent of the state’s surface area, while 85 percent of the state is underlain by continuous to isolated permafrost soils. There are two main mountain ranges in Alaska and Yukon, Canada: the Brooks Range in the north and the Alaska Range in the south. No diagnostic corner-notched points are known from the Coast Mountains. Two volcanic eruptions occurred in southern Alaska around 4,500 BP, forming the Aniakchak caldera in the Alaska Peninsula, and there were multiple eruptions from the Hayes volcano in the Alaska Range between 3,800 and 3,500 BP. Dated Northern Archaic components decline in central Alaska after 3,500 BP, perhaps because the eruptions disrupted caribou calving grounds.

Northern Archaic peoples lived in the post-glacial environment that followed the Holocene Thermal Maximum. Although temperatures would have been close to today’s, the Holocene had periods of abrupt temperature and precipitation changes between 8,000 and 3,000 BP, with 7,900-6,300 BP one of the warmest and 5,600 BP one of the coolest. Warmer climatic periods were generally more arid; cooler ones wetter. The vegetation of boreal and tundra ecozones in central and northern Alaska was similar to the present, but the biomes of western Alaska and parts of the Alaska Range continued to change until 4,000-2,000 BP with the flora and fauna not quite matching today’s.

Lowland areas of the southern half of Alaska have boreal forests, also known as taiga, while alpine tundra and shrubs are found in the mountains over 500m altitude. Boreal forests, mainly found in central Alaska, are composed largely of conifers such as black spruce (perhaps not as abundant in the past), pines, larches, birch, willow, and alder with a ground cover of mosses, lichens, and ferns. Alder was found several hundred miles farther north than today, and may have been dominant. North of the boreal forest is tundra, starting in the Brooks Range, where it is classified as mixed tundra, with low bushes, grasses, sedges, mosses, and willow. Biomes of Alaska include, north to south: Arctic tundra, intermountain boreal, Bering tundra, Bering taiga, Alaska Range transition, Pacific Mountains transition, Coast Mountains transition, coastal rainforest, and Aleutian meadow.

Northern Archaic settlements were mostly small and short-term. There are residential campsites, hunting camps, game lookouts, and manufacturing localities; one finds a wider variety of tools and stone materials in base camps. Sites are commonly located in river valleys, inland lake shores, and on bluff tops where hunters could spot migrating caribou and other game. During summers when the climate was warmer, hunters visited higher elevation locations, such as ice patches, where caribou would have gone to escape the heat and pests such as mosquitos. Northern Archaic sites are found beyond the treeline in Arctic tundra and within the interior boreal forest, and from near the seacoast to interior mountains, with increasing use over time of upland areas like the Brooks Range or the Yukon-Tanana Uplands. Sites are found in all the major ecozones of Alaska except the Bering tundra, but the majority are found in the interior. Biomes with the fewest sites are the Aleutian Meadows, Coastal Rainforests, and the Pacific Mountains and Coast Mountains transitions. There is some evidence that Northern Archaic peoples favored the forest-to-tundra ecotone; sites trend later in the south, with the delayed spread of spruce trees.

The size of bands may have fluctuated seasonally, and bands may have aggregated into larger groups during caribou migrations, or during summer months when gathered foods and fish may have formed a major part of the diet. Evidence for band aggregation is found the sites of Agiak Lake and the Pond site, where there are caribou drive lines.

Rings of stone are the visible remains of houses roughly ten feet in diameter, with a central fire pit. They were likely a frame of bent saplings covered with skins anchored to the ground by the stones. In some cases the floors were dug below ground level.

When using the radiocarbon record as a proxy, the population appears to have been stable prior to the arrival of peoples during the overlapping Arctic Small Tool tradition.

Northern Archaic peoples were nomadic hunters of large game, particularly of caribou after 5000 cal BP. The presence of notched cobbles, often called net-sinkers, and site locations adjacent to fresh water suggests that fish formed part of the diet for at least some Northern Archaic groups. Both resources are seasonally abundant. Although caribou dominate faunal assemblages, a broad spectrum of animal resources was exploited, including: moose, muskox, wapiti, wood bison, bear, caribou, Dall sheep, canids (foxes, wolves, dogs), marmot, hare, beaver, Arctic ground squirrel, freshwater fish (burbot, pike, lake trout, whitefish), waterfowl, and ptarmigan or grouse.

The technology of the Northern Archaic peoples included a variety of flaked stone tools, the most characteristic being end-scrapers and side- to corner-notched projectile points, with the notches being wide and deep. Points hafted on spears would have been used at close range, perhaps for thrusting. Some notched bifaces, especially ones with wider or asymmetric blades, could have been used as knives for both cutting and sawing. Also present were lanceolate bifaces that may have served as projectile points, hafted knives or preforms, and microblades that would have been fitted into bone or wood hafts to create sharp edges for knives or projectile points. Microblade technology is a continuity from the Paleo-Arctic tradition. Over half of Northern Archaic sites at which wide-area excavations are performed yield microblades, microblade cores, or their debitage; they were produced and discarded in small special activity areas. Knives and scrapers were used to prepare hides for clothing, bags, and skin tents. Notched cobbles could have been hafted as hammers, used as fish net weights, or in extraction of bone grease. Different combinations of tools reflect the variety of activities conducted at different types of sites. Variability in weapon systems is likely due to different projectiles used in different hunting techniques (i.e. driving, ambush, stalking, pursuit) and the prey sought.

Obsidian from the Batza Tena source located south of the Brooks Range near the Koyukuk River provides evidence of trade or long-distance travel. Many sites with Batza Tena obsidian are seen in the Brooks Range, such as Agiak Lake, 250 km away, and Lake Matcharak, at 230 km away across rugged terrain. The Mumtruk Hill site, near Goodnews Bay in southwestern Alaska, is a remarkable 800 km as the crow flies.

Although direct archaeological evidence is lacking, the Northern Archaic peoples probably lived in small, egalitarian bands of under thirty people. Membership was likely fluid, with members joining and leaving regularly.

This tradition summary is based on the article "Northern Arctic," by Peter N. Peregrine, in theEncyclopedia of Prehistory, Volume 1,North America, Peter N. Peregrine and Melvin Ember, eds. New York: Plenum Publishing Corporation, 2001. Sarah Berry extensively revised or expanded most sections in the summer of 2023. We thank Peter N. Peregrine for bibliographic suggestions.

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