As an archaeologist, I often get asked about what I do in the winter. I would like to say my winters consist of spending weeks on tropical sandy beaches to even out the glove tan from the summer, but the winter is often a busy time of year. Snow and frozen ground generally stop archaeological field work for the year (not always, but I won’t get into that here). Although the winter season offers relief from long hours of digging shovel tests and sifting dirt, there are specific tasks that archaeologists must complete in the winter months prior to the start of the next field season.
During the winter months archaeologists are kept busy writing reports and summarizing the data collected during the field season in order to present project results and recommendations to local communities and clients. Providing summary reports is also a requirement to fulfill archaeological permit obligations to the Provincial Government and First Nations.
Additionally, specific forms must be filled out to document the location and provide information about any new archaeological sites discovered. These forms and associated mapping information are kept in a database regulated and maintained by the BC Archaeology Branch. There are well over 45,000 archaeological sites currently recorded in BC and this number continues to rise annually. It’s important that archaeologists document and report the locations of newly discovered archaeological sites in a timely fashion so that the database is current and accurate.
Depending on the type of project undertaken in the summer, archaeologists are often left with many stone artifacts and faunal (animal) remains to inventory and analyse over the winter. The stone and bone artifacts are classified and studied prior to submitting the items to an approved museum (another archaeological permit requirement). Commonly, the debris from stone tool manufacture makes up the bulk of the artifacts recovered during a field program. Formed tools, such as spear points or arrowheads, are found more rarely. Although classifying hundreds or even thousands of small stone chips may sound like a mind-numbing task, we can learn a lot from the waste left behind from making tools.
There are many different ways to categorize lithic artifacts but typically the size of the item, the stone material type (is the artifact made of chert, basalt, or obsidian, for example), and certain characteristics present on the stone chip itself are used as basic ways to sort the artifacts. Previous installments of Dig It have explained what can be learned from analysing stone tools and stone chips (https://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/dig-analyzing-stories-past/; https://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/dig-stoned-souls/).
When archaeologists get to work collectively to catalogue the artifacts it can really enhance the process and make it much more enjoyable. I was recently cataloguing a few thousand stone artifacts with the field crew from a large project we had all worked on together in the summer. As we were constantly opening bags and looking at different artifacts, the task never felt monotonous as there was always something new to look at and examine. Opening the dirty ziplock bags housing our finds from the summer caused us to fondly reminisce over the past field season. The information gathered through classifying the artifacts allowed us to really delve into what types of archaeological sites we were dealing with, the antiquity of the sites, and what types of activities occurred there.
Although the winter season comes with specific and time-sensitive tasks for archaeologists to complete, come spring you might see some of the local archaeologists eagerly awaiting the snow to melt to start the process all over again.