Thule and Historic Copper Use in the Copper Inuit Area

Abstract

The extensive use of native copper by historic Copper Inuit has been felt to be a fairly recent development, inspired in one way or another by indirect European contact. This conclusion seems to be based on the comparison of ethnographic historic collections and archaeological prehistoric ones. However, an examination of archaeological collections dating from the historic period suggests that copper and other metals are much less frequent in archaeological samples than in functioning, ethnographically-described assemblages. The difference appears to be due to curation, which in turn is a product of the high value and durability of metal. Archaeological collections from the prehistoric Thule culture in the area show a frequency of copper tools that is actually higher than the frequency of all metals at late nineteenth-century sites. This study illustrates some of the difficulties inherent in uncritical use of ethnographic data to solve archaeological problems.