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Lab number
RIDDL-281
Material dated
bison bone collagen; collagène osseux de bison
Taxa dated
Bison sp. metacarpal (NiVk-1: 135)
Locality
right bank of the Firth River where it flows out of the Buckland Mountains, 152 m asl, just above the apex of the Firth River delta, northern Yukon Territory
Map sheet
117 D/05
Submitter
J. Cinq-Mars
Date submitted
May 6, 0097
Normalized Age
9770 ± 180
δ13C (per mil)
-20.0
Significance
Flint Creek
Context
"Buffalo Pit"
Associated taxa
Mammalia: Bison sp
Additional information
AMS date.
Comments
NiVk-1, Engigstciak, comment by R. McGhee: NiVk-1:341 is one in a small series of billet-like objects found in assemblage contexts interpreted by R.S. MacNeish (1956a) as related to both the Denbigh complex (ASTt) and the Norton tradition. This cylindrically-shaped object bears scars suggestive of its use as a flaking or flint-knapping hammer. The very heavy and dense bone with no cancellous tissue is almost certainly sea mammal bone (probably walrus mandible or baculum). There is no information on the 14C content of the Beaufort Sea marine reservoir. However for forty modern samples from arctic and subarctic marine reservoirs, Stuiver et al. (1986) list apparent ages ranging from 370 to 893 years with a mean of 554 years. We may expect that the date acquired on this sample is a few centuries older than a date which would be obtained from the atmospheric reservoir. Comment by J. Cinq-Mars: the available provenience data indicate at this time that NiVk-1: 341 belongs to artifact series attributable to MacNeish's (1956a) Firth River Cordmarked (Denbigh-like) or to the Firth River Dentate (Norton-like) complexes. The date itself, with or without the afore-mentioned correction, falls squarely into the presently known Denbigh or ASTt sequence (see Dumond 1984) indicating that the specimen is more likely to be associated with the Cordmarked complex, or possibly with the preceding New Mountain phase. It also indicates a relatively early ASTt presence in northwestern mainland Canada, and further suggests that data from Engigstciak may yet serve to elucidate the question of the eastward spread of this tradition from a western Alaskan homeland. Comments on RIDDL-281, 319, and 362: see Cinq-Mars, et al. 1991.

References