Abstract
ABSTRACTWe explore marine reservoir effects (MREs) in seal bones from the northern Bering and Chukchi Seas regions. Ringed and bearded seals have served as dietary staples in human populations along the coasts of Arctic northeast Asia and North America for several millennia. Radiocarbon (14C) dates on seal bones and terrestrial materials (caribou, plants seeds, wood, and wood charcoal) were compared from archaeological sites in the Bering Strait region of northwestern Alaska to assess MREs in these sea mammals over time. We also compared these results to 14C dates on modern seal specimens collected in AD 1932 and 1946 from the Bering Sea region. Our paired archaeological samples were recovered from late Holocene archaeological features, including floors from dwellings and cache pits, that date between 1600 and 130 cal BP. 14C dates on seal bones from the northern Bering and Chukchi Seas show differences [R(t)] of 800 ± 140 years from to their terrestrial counterparts, and deviations of 404 ± 112 years (ΔR) from the marine calibration curve.
Highlights
Coastal northern Alaska holds an important place with regard to problems focused on understanding climatic and ecological change, as well as human adaptation and migration across the North American Arctic (Friesen et al 2013; Tackney et al 2016)
We explore marine reservoir effects (MREs) in seal bones from the northern Bering and Chukchi Seas regions
Our study provides an assessment of MREs of 14C content among seals in the northern Bering Sea over the last 1600 years
Summary
Coastal northern Alaska holds an important place with regard to problems focused on understanding climatic and ecological change, as well as human adaptation and migration across the North American Arctic (Friesen et al 2013; Tackney et al 2016). Radiocarbon (14C) dating of Arctic coastal archaeological sites can be problematic for several reasons, including, but not limited to (1) the use of driftwood or long-lived shrubs that produce older 14C ages, commonly referred to as the “old wood effect,” that incorrectly date the archaeological event; (2) organic materials can be preserved for relatively long periods of time (1000s to 10,000s of years) within permafrost (annually frozen) landscapes and incorporated into archaeological matrices; dating these materials yields erroneously old ages; and (3) some sites and features within sites may not contain terrestrial materials generally preferable for 14C dating, so that marine-derived materials are the only dateable material. Understanding the marine reservoir effects (MREs) of different marine mammal species is essential to establishing accurate chronologies for Arctic coastal prehistory (Krus et al 2019)
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