Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-xtgtn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-19T23:58:31.344Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Fishing for Dog Food: Ethnographic and Ethnohistoric Insights on the Freshwater Reservoir in Northeastern North America

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 February 2016

William A Lovis  and
John P Hart
William A Lovis*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology and MSU Museum, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA
John P Hart
Affiliation:
Research and Collections Division, New York State Museum, USA. Email: jph_nysm@nysed.gov
*
Corresponding author. Email: william.lovis@ssc.msu.edu.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

A review of current research reveals multiple lines of evidence suggesting that no single freshwater reservoir offset (FRO) correction can be applied to accelerator mass spectrometer (AMS) ages obtained on carbonized food residue from cooking vessels. Systematically evaluating the regional presence, magnitude, and effects of a freshwater reservoir effect (FRE) is a demonstrably difficult analytic problem given the variation of ancient carbon reservoirs in both space and time within water bodies, and which should be performed in advance of AMS assays. In coastal and estuarine contexts, a priori partitioning FRE from known marine reservoir effects (MRE) is also necessary to eliminate potential mixed effects. Likewise, any FRE varies based on the proportional mix of resources producing the residues and the ancient carbon uptake of those products. Processing techniques are a significant component of assessing potential FRE, and each pot/cooking vessel is therefore an independent context requiring analytic evaluation. In northeastern North America, there is little ethnohistoric/ethnographic evidence for fish boiling/stewing in ceramic cooking vessels; rather, fish were more often dried, smoked, or cooked for immediate consumption on open fires. Assays of fatty acids extracted from prehistoric vessel fabrics even on known fishing sites reveals no evidence for fish in the food mix. These observations suggest that the likelihoods of FRE in carbonized food residue in northeastern North America is therefore low, and that assays potentially suffering from FRO are minimal. In turn, this suggests that AMS ages from carbonized food residues are reliable unless analytically demonstrated otherwise for specific cases, and should take primacy over ages on other associated materials that have historically been employed for critical threshold chronological events.

Type
Articles
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 57 , Issue 4 , 2015 , pp. 557 - 570
Copyright
Copyright © 2015 by the Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Ascough, PL, Cook, GT, Hastie, H, Dunbar, E, Church, MJ, Einarsson, Á, McGovern, TH, Dugmore, AJ. 2011. An Icelandic freshwater radiocarbon reservoir effect: implications for lacustrine 14C chronologies. The Holocene 21(7):1073–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Briggs, JC, Ficke, JF. 1977. Quality of Rivers of the United States, 1975 Water Year—Based on the National Stream Quality Accounting Network (NASQUAN). Open-File Report 78-200. Reston: Geological Survey, U.S. Department of the Interior.Google Scholar
Brock, F, Higham, T, Ditchfield, P, Bronk Ramsey, C. 2010. Current pretreatment methods for AMS radiocarbon dating at the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit (ORAU). Radiocarbon 52(1):103–12.Google Scholar
Butman, DE, Wilson, HF, Barnes, RT, Xenopoulos, MA, Raymond, PA. 2015. Increased mobilization of aged carbon to rivers by human disturbance. Nature Geoscience 8:112–6.Google Scholar
Cabot, WB. 1912. In Northern Labrador. London: John Murray.Google Scholar
Densmore, F. 1929. Chippewa Customs. Bulletin 86. Washington, DC: Bureau of American Ethnology, Smithsonian Institution.Google Scholar
Fernandes, R, Dreves, A, Nadeau, M-J, Grootes, PM. 2013. A freshwater lake saga: carbon routing within the aquatic food web of Lake Schwerin. Radiocarbon 55(2–3):1102–13.Google Scholar
Fisheries and Environment Canada. 1978. Hydrological Atlas of Canada. Government of Canada, Natural Resources Canada, Earth Sciences Sector, Quebec. http://geogratis/geogratis/en/option/select.do?id=29A33AD7-6CD3-DD8B-ECE4-6BD7C-07C562A. Last accessed 11 August 2014.Google Scholar
Geyh, MA, Schotterer, U, Grosjean, M. 1998. Temporal changes of the 14C reservoir effect in lakes. Radiocarbon 40(2):921–31.Google Scholar
Harrington, MR. 1908. Some Seneca corn-foods and their preparation. American Anthropologist New Series 10:575–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hart, JP. 2014. A model for calculating freshwater reservoir offsets on AMS-dated charred, encrusted cooking residues formed from varying resources. Radiocarbon 56(3):981–9.Google Scholar
Hart, JP, Lovis, WA. 2007a. The freshwater reservoir and radiocarbon dates on cooking residues: old apparent ages or a single outlier? Comments on Fischer and Heinemeier (2003). Radiocarbon 49(3):1403–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hart, JP, Lovis, WA. 2007b. A multi-regional analysis of AMS and radiometric dates from carbonized food residues. Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology 32(2):201–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hart, JP, Lovis, WA. 2014. A re-evaluation of the reliability of AMS dates on pottery food residues from the late prehistoric Central Plains of North America: comment on Roper (2013). Radiocarbon 56(1):341–53.Google Scholar
Hart, JP, Lovis, WA, Schulenberg, JK, Urquhart, GR. 2007. Paleodietary implications from stable isotope analysis of experimental cooking residues. Journal of Archaeological Science 34(5):804–13.Google Scholar
Hart, JP, Urquhart, GR, Feranec, RS, Lovis, WA. 2009. Nonlinear relationship between bulk 13C and percent maize in carbonized cooking residues and the potential of false negatives in detecting maize. Journal of Archaeological Science 36(10):2206–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hart, JP, Lovis, WA, Jeske, RJ, Richards, JD. 2012. The potential of bulk δ13C on encrusted cooking residues as independent evidence for regional maize histories. American Antiquity 77(2):315–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hart, JP, Lovis, WA, Urquhart, GR, Reber, EA. 2013. Modeling freshwater reservoir offsets on radiocarbon dated charred cooking residues. American Antiquity 78(3):536–52.Google Scholar
Hilger, I. 1951. Chippewa Child Life and Its Cultural Background. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society.Google Scholar
Hohman-Caine, CA, Syms, EL. 2012. The Age of Brainerd Ceramics. Minnesota Historical Society Contract No. 4107232. Hackensack, MN: Soils Consulting.Google Scholar
Keaveney, EM. 2010. Investigations into freshwater radiocarbon reservoir offsets from Britain and Ireland [PhD dissertation]. Queen's University Belfast.Google Scholar
Keaveney, EM, Reimer, PJ. 2012. Understanding the variability in freshwater radiocarbon reservoir offsets: a cautionary tale. Journal of Archaeological Science 39(5):1306–16.Google Scholar
Kinietz, WV. 1940. The Indians of the Western Great Lakes 1615–1760. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Kooiman, SM. 2012. Old pots, new approaches: a functional analysis of Woodland pottery from Lake Superior's south shore . Normal: Illinois State University.Google Scholar
Kubiak-Martens, L, Brinkkemper, O, Oudemans, TFM. 2015. What's for dinner? Processed food in the coastal area of the northern Netherlands in the Late Neolithic. Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 24(1):47–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lajewski, CK, Mullins, HT, Patterson, WP, Callinan, CW. 2003. Historic calcite record from the Finger Lakes, New York: impact of acid rain on a buffered terrane. Geological Society of America Bulletin 115:373–84.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leacock, EB. 1954. The Montagnais “hunting territory” and the fur trade. Memoir 78. American Anthropologist 56(5), Part 2. p 1–59.Google Scholar
Leacock, EB, Rothschild, NA, editors. 1994. Labrador Winter: The Ethnographic Journals of William Duncan Strong, 1927–1928. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press.Google Scholar
Lovis, WA, Urquhart, GR, Raviele, ME, Hart, JP. 2011. Hardwood ash nixtamalization may lead to false negatives for the presence of maize by depleting bulk δ13C in carbonized residues. Journal of Archaeological Science 38(10):2726–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Malainey, ME, Figol, T. 2012a. Appendix A: lipid residue analysis report – Sand Point Site. In: Kooiman, SM. Old pots, new approaches: a functional analysis of Woodland pottery from Lake Superior's south shore . Normal: Illinois State University. p 211–34.Google Scholar
Malainey, ME, Figol, T. 2012b. Appendix A: lipid residue analysis report – Naomikong Point Site. In: Kooiman SM. Old pots, new approaches: a functional analysis of Woodland pottery from Lake Superior's south shore . Normal: Illinois State University. p 235–59.Google Scholar
Martelle Hayter, H. 1994. Hunter gatherers and the ethnographic analogy: theoretical perspectives. Totem: The University of Western Ontario Journal of Anthropology 1(1):39–49.Google Scholar
Mullins, HT, Patterson, WP, Teece, MA, Burnett, AW. 2011. Holocene climate and environmental change in Central New York (USA). Journal of Paleolimnology 45(2):243–56.Google Scholar
Needham, AE. 1965. The Uniqueness of Biological Materials. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
O'Brien, DM, Schrag, DP, del Rio, CM. 2000. Allocation to reproduction in a hawkmoth: a quantitative analysis using stable carbon isotopes. Ecology 81(10):2822–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Olsen, J, Rasmussen, P, Heinemeier, J. 2009. Holocene temporal and spatial variation in the radiocarbon reservoir age of three Danish fjords. Boreas 38(3):458–70.Google Scholar
Parker, AC. 1910. Iroquois Use of Maize and Other Food Plants. New York State Museum Bulletin 44. Albany: University of the State of New York.Google Scholar
Peregrine, PN. 1996. Ethnology versus ethnographic analogy: a common confusion in archaeological interpretation. Cross-Cultural Research 30(4):316–29.Google Scholar
Philippsen, B. 2008. Hard water or high ages? 14C food crust analysis on Mesolithic pottery from northern Germany . Faculty of Physics and Astronomy, University of Heidelberg, Germany.Google Scholar
Philippsen, B. 2013. The freshwater reservoir effect in radiocarbon dating. Heritage Science 1:24, doi:10.1186/2050-7445-1-24.Google Scholar
Philippsen, B, Heinemeier, J. 2013. Freshwater reservoir effect variability in northern Germany. Radiocarbon 55(2–3):1085–101.Google Scholar
Philippsen, B, Kjeldsen, H, Hartz, S, Paulsen, H, Clausen, I, Heinemeieier, J. 2010. The hardwater effect in AMS 14C dating of food crusts on pottery. Nuclear Instruments and Methods Physics Research B 268(7–8):995–8.Google Scholar
Reber, EA, Hart, JP. 2008. Pine resins and pottery sealing: analysis of absorbed and visible pottery residues from central New York State. Archaeometry 50(6):999–1017.Google Scholar
Rogers, ES. 1962. The Round Lake Ojibwa. Occasional Paper 5. Toronto: Royal Ontario Museum.Google Scholar
Rogers, ES. 1973. The Quest for Food and Furs: The Mistassini Cree, 1953–1954. Publications in Ethnology 5. Ottawa: National Museums of Canada.Google Scholar
Sagard, TG. 1865. Le Grand Voyage du Pays des Hurons, Situé en l'Amérique vers la Mer douce, ès derniers confins de la Nouvelle France dite Canada avec un Dictionnaire de la langue Huronne par F. Gabriel Sagard Theodot, Recollet de S. François, de la province de S. Denys en France. Nouvelle édition. Paris: M. Émile Chevalier.Google Scholar
Speck, FG. 1935. Naskapi, The Savage Hunters of the Labrador Peninsula. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.Google Scholar
Steinbring, J. 1981. Saulteaux of Lake Winnipeg. In: Helm, J, editor. Handbook of North American Indians, Volume 6, Subarctic. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press. p 244–55.Google Scholar
Taché, K, Craig, OE. 2015. Cooperative harvesting of aquatic resources triggered the beginning of pottery production in north-eastern North America. Antiquity 89(343):177–90.Google Scholar
Taché, K, Hart, JP. 2013. Chronometric hygiene of radiocarbon databases for early durable vessel technologies in northeastern North America. American Antiquity 78(2):359–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Upton, A, Lovis, WA, Urquhart, GR. 2014. An empirical test of shell tempering as a proto-hominy processor. Paper presented at the 79th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Austin, TX, 26 April 2014.Google Scholar
Waugh, FW. 1916. Iroquois Foods and Food Preparation. Memoir 86. Anthropological Series 12. Ottawa: Geological Survey, Canada Department of Mines.Google Scholar
Yoshida, K, Kunikita, D, Miyazaki, Y, Nishida, Y, Miyao, T, Matsuzaki, H. 2013. Dating and stable isotope analysis of charred residues on the Incipient Jomon pottery (Japan). Radiocarbon 55(2–3):1322–33.Google Scholar
Zigah, PK, Minor, EC, Werne, JP. 2012. Radiocarbon and stable-isotope geochemistry of organic and inorganic carbon in Lake Superior. Global Biogeochemical Cycles 26:GB1023, doi:10.1029/2011GB004132.Google Scholar