Work

Ancient Burials at Upward Sun River, Central Alaska

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: In the late summer about 11,500 years ago, probably in the space of a few weeks, three young Paleoindian children died and were buried in a residential camp alongside Xasaa Na’ (Upward Sun River). An infant and neonate were buried together with associated funerary objects below a central cooking hearth, and later a ~three-year-old child was cremated and buried above the same feature. This article explores the lifeways of the Ancient Beringians that summer, reconstructed through zooarchaeology, stable isotope, spatial, and artifact analyses and implications of the mortuary treatment of these individuals with respect to the regional group, theDenali Complex, and early Paleoindian ideologies.

Source: Bioarchaeology International

DOI: 10.5744/bi.2023.0025

Authors: Ben A. Potter, Joel D. Irish, Joshua D. Reuther

Institutions: University of Alaska Fairbanks, Liverpool John Moores University

Language: English

Topic: Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology

Subfield: Anthropology

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

Open Access status: green

Funder: National Science Foundation

Awards: Collaborative Research: Fishing through antiquity in central Alaska: exploring the abundance and use of salmon through stable isotope, zooarchaeological, and ancient DNA analyses, G5925966420, Exploring intrasite variability at Upward Sun River (Xaasaa Na'), a terminal Pleistocene site in central Alaska: foraging behaviors and paleoenvironmental contexts., RAPID: Site Excavation, Central Alaska, SGER: Test Excavations at Little Delta Dune Site, Central Alaska