Research - Investigations On Agattu

Investigations On Agattu:
Joint USF&WS - Smithsonian Research in the Aleutians
- by Stephen Loring

The Agattu Archaeological Field Crew: left to right - Stephen Loring, Elise Manning, Bruce Sterling, Tori Oliver, Leslie Hines.
The 1996 summer field season was the fifth for the Western Aleutians Human Paleoecology and Biodiversity Project centered in the Near Islands in the Aleutian Islands National Wildlife Refuge. Previous field work (at Buldir in 1991 and 1993, Kiska in 1992 and Shemya 1994) had revealed almost 4000 years of human occupations in the western Aleutians and provided a cultural-chronological framework for subsequent studies on the evolution of maritime cultural complexity in this remote archipelago.

Carefully controlled and fine-scaled faunal recovery procedures will enable detailed reconstructions of former subsistence strategies as well as provide a proxy-record of changes in the biological communities of the Western Aleutians. We assume that human beings have been a significant component of the Aleutian ecosystem for at least the past 4000 years, and that a clearer understanding of the consequences of human impact on species abundance and distribution can provide significant time depth to studies of Aleutian biodiversity and biogeography.

During the summer of 1996, archaeological and paleoecological research was centered on Agattu Island. Agattu was chosen for research because of its unique geological situation; tectonic activity has uplifted an impressive series of sedimentary deposits, including beds of fine-grained cherts that we suspected would be a critical source for the former inhabitants of the Near Island archipelago. The field-team was directed by Stephen Loring (ASC / Smithsonian), and assisted by Tori Oliver (Smithsonian / Brown), Elise Manning and Bruce Sterling (Greiner Associates), and Leslie Hines (Seward, Alaska).

Everyone assembled on Adak June 1st and then rendezvoused with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service research vessel Tiglax. The outbound voyage to the Near Islands included a brief stop on Segula to check on a fox eradication program, which enabled the archaeology team to visit previously reported sites around Zapad Head. While walking along the flank of the island's volcano cone, large blocks of glassy volcanic stone - not obsidian, but excellent material for stone-tool manufacture - were encountered. This was the same material observed eroding from the midden at Zapad Head.

The Tiglax reached Little Kiska Harbor on the evening of June 2nd in time to weather out a passing storm before crossing to Buldir. Here we visited the prominent midden mound on Little Kiska that was the locality of our 1992 field season. We were pleased to find that our back-filling and re-sodding of the excavation was completely successful and that the scene of our work was now covered with luxuriant midden vegetation. Buldir was reached on the morning of June 4th. While the ornithological team was being unloaded, we inspected the North Cove midden. Later that evening the Tiglax ran along the southeast coast of Agattu to our destination at Karab Cove. Camp was established the following morning adjacent to a small Aleut village site, Karab Cove-1 (AG-27), and the Tiglax departed.

Deep stratigraphic excavations at the Karab Cove site.
In the course of the summer we concentrated our investigations at Karab Cove-1, where we opened up a 4x6 meter block excavation in the 3-meter deep midden. Our excavation revealed a large number of features: pits, hearths, cracked and fire-burned rock clusters, architectural constructions, butchering stations, and chert-reduction activity areas. On completion of the block excavation, a ten meter long trench was cut through the central axis of the house-pit adjacent to the midden.

The Karab Cove excavations provide the best definition to date of the late prehistoric sequence from the Near Islands. Over four thousand artifacts were collected from the block excavation as well as forty-three boxes and seven trunks of debitage, faunal remains and soil samples. When analyzed, these will provide important insight into the nature of the Aleut social, economic and physical world prior to the arrival of Russian promyshelenniki and the maelstrom of change that swept over the archipelago after 1741.

However, a few observations about the site at Karab Cove can be made at this time based on our field observations and an initial suite of radiocarbon dates. The portion of the site we excavated appears to contain traces of three principal components: (1) a Russian-Aleut sea-otter and sea-lion hunting camp ca. 1765-1785, evidenced by limited trade goods and Aleut sea-otter hunting equipment (and the astonishing discovery of a large sculpted stone penis!); (2) a prehistoric component ca. 1200 A.D.; and (3) a prehistoric component ca. 200 A.D. The last component contained circle-and-dot motif toggling harpoon heads; beautiful, tiny ivory carvings; extensive evidence of whaling; and DENSE concentrations of lithic debris. Clearly an important activity at the site was the acquisition and reduction of chert for stone tool distribution.

We also intensively surveyed much of the southeastern third of the island. We visited most of the previously documented village middens along the southeast coast and documented a number of chert localities. Chert is abundant all along the coast, in the adjacent interior plateau, and in blocks at the base of cliff faces and stream embankments. We did not identify any specific quarry sites per se; rather, it appears that prehistoric people were acquiring blocks of stone from the adjacent beaches and bringing them back to the site to work.

Karab Cove on Agattu Island in the western Aleutians.
We spent two rainy afternoons at a second prominent site in Karab Cove, AG-26 (in the northeast corner of the cove) where we cleared the exposed edge of a post-WWII road cut through the midden in order to get an intact profile with in situ charcoal and faunal material for dating. A few artifacts (ca.25) were collected and a detailed map of the site prepared. Another afternoon was spent visiting AG-23, a village site at Island Cove on the east coast of the island. Here a small stream bisects the midden, and we collected some very interesting stone tools (ca.50) that had eroded into the stream bed. A casual typological examination of this material suggests that it slightly predates the Karab Cove assemblage and is estimated to date to around 2200-2500 B.P. The collection is large enough to compare with the material from Karab Cove as well as Hrdlicka's collection from Aga Cove and Spaulding's collection from Krugoli Point.

The site at Karab Cove was completely backfilled and camp more or less packed-up when the Tiglax returned for us on August 18th, and we accompanied the Tiglax as it circumnavigated Attu Island. Then we continued on around Cape Wrangell at the end of the Aleutian chain

Stephen Loring on Agattu, attempting to radio the U.S.F. & W.S. Aleutian Wildlife Refuge Headquarters on Adak: During the return voyage archaeological observations were made on a previously unrecorded cave site on the eastern shore of Temnac Bay on Attu. While no evidence of burial activity was apparent on the surface, the cave was full of midden debris from both a prehistoric and WWII occupation. We also discovered a previously unrecorded village site on Semisopochnoi and visited a remarkable burial cave in the Delarof Islands. Standing columns of rib-like basalt inside the cave create the impression of being inside the body of a whale!

Fieldwork on Agattu was with the permission of the Aleut Corporation, the financial support of Smithsonian Institution (through a Scholarly Studies award), and a permit from the Department of the Interior U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

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