ºìÐÓÊÓƵ

Topic

Midden Volume, Harvested Fish Biomass, and Pre-contact Minimum Population Estimates for Nuu-chah-nulth Territories in Barkley Sound

Department of Anthropology

Date & location

• Tuesday, December 10, 2024

• 10:00 A.M.

• Clearihue Building

• Room B007 and Virtual

Reviewers

Supervisory Committee

• Dr. Iain McKechnie, Department of Anthropology, University of Victoria (Co-Supervisor)

• Dr. Quentin Mackie, Department of Anthropology, UVic (Co-Supervisor)

• Dr. Chris Darimont, Department of Geography, UVic (Outside Member)

   

External Examiner

• Dr. Torben C. Rick, Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History 

Chair of Oral Examination

• Dr. Lyndze Harvey, Department of Curriculum and Instruction, UVic 

Abstract

Coastal shell midden deposits are a quintessential element of the archaeological record on the Pacific Northwest Coast recording thousands of years of daily life. This dissertation develops a methodology which contributes to understandings of pre-contact Indigenous demographics and marine resource use in Nuu-chah-nulth Territories in Barkley Sound, British Columbia, Canada. This dissertation combines spatial analysis, zooarchaeology, and human metabolic requirements to provide estimates of the volume of midden sites, the harvested fish that they contain, and the minimum local human population that could have been supported from these fish. These archaeologically derived estimates of population and biomass are grounded in a computationally conservative inductive theoretical framework which draws on archaeological data and minimizes the use of analogy and historical comparison. I show that known Barkley Sound shell midden sites contain 241,253 m3 of sediment and are features on par in size with better known monumental sites in the Americas. The estimated annual marine resource harvest practiced in this area was approximately 10% of modern fisheries catches and in total nearly 1.2 billion fish were harvested by Indigenous fishers. Lastly, the protein rich calories derived from these fish would be sufficient to support a population of nearly 1,000 individuals per day over the last three millennia. This research offers a framework for creating volume, biomass, and ultimately population estimates in other coastal sites globally and has important implications for governance and natural resource policy in Indigenous communities especially for the Tseshaht, Toquaht, Uchuklesaht, Ucluelet, and Huu-ay-aht peoples who have traditionally inhabited this area for millennia.