The Design of Arctic Small Tool Tradition Toolkits: An Example from Matcharak Lake, Alaska

Abstract

This article presents the results of an analysis of stone tools and debitage from a 3600–4000 cal BP Arctic Small Tool tradition (ASTt) component at Matcharak Lake (AMR-186), located in the Alaskan Brooks Range. The goal of this study is to understand how ASTt technology is organized at a caribou hunting camp located far from a high quality toolstone source, and to use this information to evaluate ASTt mobility and settlement patterns in northern Alaska. Reconstructions of the stone-tool reduction sequences demonstrate that ASTt people made use of blade and biface technologies, but they primarily transported small finished tools and biface cores to produce large flakes for tool blanks and microblade cores. The stone-tool assemblage recovered from at Matcharak Lake is one designed to maximize utility, transportability, and relatively rapid production, which is an adaptive feature of a culture that has high residential mobility in an environment with limited access to raw material sources and an economy specialized on caribou.