We have finally gotten to the point of all this digging in the dirt. Natasha unearthed a point last night during an after-dinner bit of excavation work and Joe found one this morning. Natasha's point was complete but Joe's, although larger, was broken.
This is the point Natasha found last night. It is complete, but does not have the fluting, or groove, down its length that is found in Clovis style points.
This is the point that Joe found this morning. You can see that it is larger than last night's discovery, but since it is broken there is no way of knowing how big it really was when it was made. Maybe the rest will appear tomorrow.
Neither was of the 'fluted' style that has been the signature of this site. Both were found in sediment layers that are higher up in the profile than those that revealed the fluted point last year. What kind of story does this all tell? This is just the kind of archaeological mystery that we are looking at here. Was the smaller point unfinished and dropped? Was the larger point broken while it was being manufactured or was it left here after it was broken during use? Maybe the rest of the point will show up tomorrow as the next layer of dirt is removed.
In my section we uncovered a large piece of bone that Jeff identified as a piece of Caribou tibia. The bone was next to a chunk of chert around 60cm down in our section.
The piece of bone (the object with the curve near the end) was found next to a chunk of chert. It is around 13 cm long and is, most likely, a piece of caribou tibia.
While yesterday's weather was the kind that makes Arctic archaeologists willing to sell their souls to the devil (sunny, breezy, mid-50s) because it made for perfect working conditions, today's weather was another story. It was definitely a day to dress in multiple layers with rubberized raingear on top. We started out with a few mosquitoes, but they quickly lost the battle with the wind and cold temperatures. Did I mention in yesterday's journal that we have small, propane-powered heaters in the arctic oven tents? It was a treat to head down to lunch today to have hot soup in a warm tent to heat us inside and out. The afternoon temperatures dropped with each successive rain shower and by the time we finished work around 6:30 it was 45F. Time to head down to camp to put on dry, warm wool socks and take off those dirt-crusted pants in favor of some warm fleece ones.
Just in case you're keeping track of our menus--tonight was stir-fried vegies with walnuts and chicken served over rice. The vegetarian option I concocted substituted a spoonful of peanut butter for the chicken and mixed in some Sriracha chili sauce. Bon Appétit!