Archaeological No
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Archaeological No. 38 ISSN 0701-1176 Spring 2003 Contents 2 Provincial Society Officers, Features 2002-2003 6 SCAPE Report of Activities 2002 News & Short Reports 14 Alberta Fieldwork in 2002 ASA Supported Field Research 3 Editor's Note 23 Project: Report by Liz Robertson 3 Shawn Bubel Appointment 29 Using Plaster Jacketing Techniques 3 The Intrepretive Value of to Collect Archaeological Firecracked Rock Specimens at St. Mary's 11 Chacmool 2002 Conference Reservoir Highlights 34 Alberta Graduate Degrees in Archaeology, Part 2 ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF ALBERTA Charter #8205, registered under the Societies Act of Alberta on February 7, 1975 PROVINCIAL SOCIETY OFFICERS 2002-2003 President Marshall Dzurko RED DEER CENTRE: 147 Woodfem Place SW President: Shawn Haley Calgary AB T2W4R7 RR 1 Phone:403-251-0694 Bowden, AB TOM 0K0 Email: [email protected] Phone: 403-224-2992 Email: [email protected] Past-President Neil Mirau 2315 20th Street SOUTH EASTERN ALBERTA CoaldaleAB TIM 1G5 ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY: Phone: 403-345-3645 President: Lorine Marshall 97 First Street NE Executive Secretary/ Jim McMurchy Medicine Hat AB T1A5J9 Treasurer 97 Eton Road West Phone: 403-527-2774 Lethbridge AB T1K4T9 Email: [email protected] Phone:403-381-2655 Email: [email protected] STRATHCONA CENTRE: President: Kristine Wright-Fedyniak Dr. John Dormaar Alberta Archaeological Provincial Museum of Alberta Research Centre Review Editor 12845 102 Ave Agr. & Agri-Food Canada Edmonton AB T5N 0M6 PO Box 3000 Provincial Rep: George Chalut Lethbridge AB T1J4B1 Email: [email protected] Alberta Archaeological Carol McCreary Review Distribution Box 611 Black Diamond AB TOL OHO Alberta Archaeological Review Phone:403-933-5155 Editor: John Dormaar ([email protected]) Email: [email protected] Layout & Design: Larry Steinbrenner ([email protected]) Distribution: Carol McCreary ([email protected]) REGIONAL CENTRES & MEMBER SOCIETIES Members of the Archaeological Society of Alberta receive a copy of the Alberta Archaeological Review. Non-members and CALGARY CENTRE: institutions may subscribe to the AAR for $ 15 per calendar year. President: Brian Vivian Cheques should be made payable to the Alberta Archaeologi 216 29th Ave NW cal Review and should be sent to Carol McCreary, Box 611, Calgary AB T2M2M1 Black Diamond, AB TOL OHO. Email: [email protected] The AAR welcomes submissions concerning Alberta archaeol Provincial Rep: Len Hills ogy or of special interest to practising or avocational archae ologists in Alberta. Contributions may be submitted to the AAR LETHBRIDGE CENTRE: Editor at the address above. Articles should be submitted on President: Dr. Shawn Bubel disk together with a hard copy in either WordPerfect or Microsoft Word. A clean typewritten copy is also acceptable. Department of Geography Please contact the Editor for information on formatting, etc. University of Lethbridge The Editor reserves the right to send out a paper for review. Lethbridge AB T1K3M4 Phone: 403-329-2531 Communications regarding membership in the Archaeologi Email: [email protected] cal Society of Alberta or other Society matters should be ad dressed to the Executive Secretary/Treasurer at the address Provincial Rep: Jim McMurchy given above. Our Cover: Views expressed in the AAR are those of the writers and do not Coring with the GeoProbe at the east edge of necessarily reflect those of the Archaeological Society of Al Elkwater Lake in summer of 2001. See page 23 berta. We welcome healthy debate. for related story. 2 The Alberta Archaeological Review Editor's Note The Interpretive Value of Firecracked Rock By John Dormaar As I look out of my window, it is clear that March has Extended abstract of The Interpretive Value of Firecracked roared in with some winter. Outside skiing and Rock. Archaeology in Montana (in press), by Patrick J. Rennie (Department of Natural Resources and snowshoeing in the mountains, it is also a good time Conservation, Montana), as prepared by John Dormaar to get organised for the Spring issue of The Review of the Archaeological Society of Alberta. A general literature review indicates that the use of heated stone in certain heating/cooking or processing practices was The other day, someone gave me a copy of a manu universal among non-industrialized cultures. In North script in status nascendi. June Carpenter, a founding America, several ethnographic accounts directly or indirectly member of the Lethbridge Centre of the Archaeologi reference the use of heated stone in heating, cooking, pro cal Society of Alberta, is attempting to put a short cessing or ceremonial practices of Native American societ history together about the Lethbridge Centre from its ies. inception to the founding of the Alberta Archaeologi A universal trait among stone subjected to intensive heating cal Society. 1 think this is an interesting idea. Maybe is that it tends to fracture. When archaeologists identify stones some of the other societies, particularly the ones from fractured as a result of intensive heating or heating and rapid Edmonton and Calgary, may want to have a go at this cooling in an archaeological context the materials are typi as well, even though it may only span a period often cally termed firecracked rock (FCR) or some variation of years. Could we call this historical archaeology? that term. Indeed, firecracked rock can be among the most common of artifacts in prehistoric human occupation sites Now the summer is soon upon us, the various chap where stone was intentionally or inadvertently heated for any ters will be out doing field work and visiting various of a number of purposes. However, if one were to review the sites. Some of you may well be working with Dr. archaeological literature for the Great Plains region one could Gerald Oetelaar in the Cypress Hills. While you are infer that firecracked rock recovered from archaeological sites is a near meaningless by-product of human behavior. The involved with these activities, make some notes and primary question to be addressed with this study is: write reports, observations and stories for submis sion to the Autumn Review, let others in the province When a given lithologic class of stone is subjected know what was exciting and what worked. Did you to heating and slow cooling, heating and rapid cool see archaeology-related news in your local newspa ing in water, or heating and being splashed with a limited amount of water, will the morphology of the per? Send it to me, so I can abstract it. Remember, ensuing fractures that form in those stones be simi The Review is not only for the membership, but also lar or distinctive? by the membership. If it can be confirmed that different kinds of activities in volving heated stone produce morphologically distinctive fractures among the resulting FCR, then the following ques tions can also be addressed: 1) If a given lithologic class of FCR exhibits signature fractures indicative of the general purpose for which it Archaeologist Joins was utilized, what inferences can be made about the heating/cooking activities that those materials were U of L Geography used in? 2) What is the percentage of distinctive FCR fracture Department types produced during either heating, or rapid cooling Dr. Shawn Bubel, Assistant Professor of Archaeology at The of a heated stone? University of Lethbridge, was born in Calgary and raised in 3) Are the number of pieces of FCR recovered from an northern Alberta. She holds a BSc (Archaeology, Geogra archaeological context indicative of the number of phy, Anthropology) from The University of Lethbridge, and times a stone was heated, or the number of times a an MA and PhD (Archaeology) from De Katholieke heated stone was rapidly cooled?; and Universiteit Leuven, Belgium. 4) If FCR is produced from lithic raw materials com Shawn has worked on archaeological excavations through monly used for chipped stone tool production, can that out the world, including Israel, Turkey, Egypt, Poland, Bel FCR be distinguished from some classes of chipped gium and Canada. Her research focus for her thesis was stone tool debitage? "Bioturbation and its Effect on the Archaeological Record." Some of Shawn's archaeological interests are geo-archaeol- In order to address this last question, fourteen materials used ogy, palaeo-environmental reconstruction, human evolution, in chipped stone tool production were selected for this ex palaeolithic technology, the Neolithic of the Near East, post- periment although they would not be expected to occur as depositional processes and soil genesis. FCR in an archaeological site. No. 38 Spring 2003 3 The replication of FCR through experimental studies is not a exhibit heat spalled fracture type if the stone is subjected to new concept. Previous studies of the subject have been con being heated and allowed to cool slowly. Further, when those ducted. Some of those studies confirmed that a distinction previously mentioned lithologic classes are subjected to be can be made between fracture morphology of FCR which ing heated and submersed into water the resulting FCR will was heated only, and fracture morphology of FCR that was consistently exhibit water fracture type on one or more sur heated and rapidly cooled in water. However, those studies faces. In contrast, softer or poorly-cemented rocks, such as are not sufficiently detailed to address all of the questions Fort Union Formation sandstones and conglomerates, may presented for this study. With this study it is the author's in redden and/or soften when heated, but tend not to spall or tent to clarify and expand upon the existing literature. fracture in the same manner as hard stones do when heated, or heated and rapidly cooled. Additionally, those lithic mate Summary and Discussion rials that are very high in silica (e.g., chert/chalcedony and sinter) tend to become quite brittle and tend to be affected by Brumley has defined three categories for classifying differ numerous crazed fractures when intensively heated.