SELECTED THESES ON THE CIRCUMPOLAR ARCTIC

This thesis is about the Pre-Dorset to Dorset transition, which is thought to have taken place around 2800 to 2600 B.P. in the Eastern Arctic. Three questions led the research. First, what are the cultural differences between the Pre-Dorset and the Dorset periods? Second, how can the differences in the archaeological record be interpreted? And third, is the concept of a Pre-Dorset/Dorset transition a valid one? To answer these questions, cultural elements that have been associated with the Pre-Dorset/Dorset transition in the literature were compared to those from five sites occupied from the Pre-Dorset to the Dorset periods in the Ivujivik area of the Eastern Arctic. The archaeological evidence suggests that around 4000 to 3000 years B.P., small groups of Pre-Dorset people started to occupy the Ivujivik peninsula for short periods of time. They left behind sites with few artifacts associated with the remains of tent rings. Around 2800 years B.P., the descendants of the Pre-Dorset people started to use the Ivujivik area more intensively. After occupying the territory in a highly nomadic and rather exploratory manner during the Pre-Dorset period, people were now coming back year after year to the same hunting grounds. This was a new adaptation based on the exploitation of the territory according to the availability of animals at specific seasons. On the Ivujivik peninsula people mainly hunted seals during the spring and accumulated food surpluses for later use. They also started to use a wider range of lithic sources and made changes in their use of technology. It is argued that it was the accumulation of traditional knowledge of their environment that allowed people to transform their land-use system. At this point in our knowledge of Arctic archaeology, the Pre-Dorset/Dorset transition is a workable concept. It is useful precisely for those sites which show a mixture of Pre-Dorset and Dorset materials and where it is impossible to isolate single occupations. When reused sites inhabited during the transition are compared with those occupied before and after them, gradual changes can be identified in the technology, subsistence, and habitation structures of their occupants.'