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Ontario Archaeology – OA036, 1981

The Wabinosh River Site and the Laurel Tradition in Northwestern Ontario
Volume:  OA36
Year:  1981
Author:  DAWSON, K. C. A.
Page Range:  3 – 46
Abstract:  A review of the radiocarbon dates from Northern Ontario and adjacent regions in Manitoba and Minnesota suggests a late northern instrusion of the Laurel Tradition, (ca. 200 B.C.), in contrast to earlier interpretations of independent development commencing about 700 B.C. Based on recoveries from the multi-phase Wabinosh River Laurel Tradition site on Lake Nipigon, a small group composed of residual Archaic peoples and new peoples from the south can be identified as the first carriers of the Laurel Tradition. This early phase, ca. 200 B.C. to A.D. 500, is characterized by pseudo-scallop shell ceramics and sparse Archaic-like lithics. It was followed by a late phase which can be divided into two: (1) an era of expanded population marked by diverse Laurel ceramics, ca. A.D. 500 to A.D. 900, and (2) an era of reduced population and coalescence with a later Terminal Woodland period Blackduck Tradition, ca. A.D. 900 to A.D. 1200. The Blackduck Tradition carriers are seen as a new, but related, southern population who rapidly spread across Northwestern Ontario coincident with climatic amelioration ca. A.D. 700 to A.D. 900. They are seen as a distinct group ofAlgonkian-speakers known in historic times as Northern Ojibwa.

Indian Hills (33W04): A Protohistoric Assistaeronon Village in the Maumee River Valley of Northwestern Ohio
Volume:  OA36
Year:  1981
Author:  STOTHERS, D. M.
Page Range:  47 – 56
Abstract:  The Indian Hills site is a very late protohistoric village, radiocarbon dated to A.D. 1610, that is the type site for the Indian Hills phase of the Sandusky Tradition. It is suggested, in part on the basis of similarities of the shell tempered ceramic assemblages at Indian Hills and the Hamilton site in the Niagara peninsula of Ontario, that the Indian Hills phase may represent the enigmatic Assistaeronon who are reported to have been at war with the Neutral Indians during the protohistoric period. The Sandusky Tradition connects the prehistoric and later protohistoric archaeological assemblages of the region and indicates a developing cultural continuum into early historic times. The integration of the archaeological data from the west ends of Lake Erie and Ontario with the ethnohistoric information derived from early maps and documentation strongly suggests that the Indian Hills site, and the other components of this phase, represents the historic Assistaeronon (Mascouten), while the Whittlesey tradition, in the region of the south central Lake Erie shore, probably represents the Ontarraronon (Kickapoo), two very closely associated central Algonquian groups of the early historic period.

Distribution of Iroquoian Discoidal Clay Beads
Volume:  OA36
Year:  1981
Author:  PENDERGAST, J. F.
Page Range:  57 – 72
Abstract:  Following an extensive search of the literature involving 147 Iroquois sites, representing the whole of Iroquoia, seeking information on the distribution of discoidal clay beads, the author concludes that these beads are a St. Lawrence Iroquoian trait. It is shown that they originate in the late prehistoric era and persist into the protohistoric period. On Huron/Petun sites they are frequently in association with St. Lawrence Iroquoian pottery and sometimes with European material. It is concluded that the external distribution of these St. Lawrence Iroquoian beads, restricted as they are to the Huron/Petun area, supports further the hypothesis that the St. Lawrence Iroquoians were destroyed by the Huron/Petun.