Abstract

Recent archaeological work in Labrador has resulted in long-sought-after settlement data for Maritime Archaic cultures which occupied this region 7500-3500 years ago. Previous information on the development of these cultures has come from the field of technology, subsistence, culture area distribution, and mortuary and exchange systems. By themselves, these data suggested that Maritime Archaic culture was technologically and socially advanced compared with later prehistoric and ethnographic groups of the coastal northeast. Recent discoveries strengthen this view and provide our first clues about social organization and demography as revealed by site settlement patterns and domestic architecture. Changes in site size and complexity and in the size of dwelling structures through time suggests shifts from simple to larger and more complex forms of social organization, and are in turn related to intensification of mortuary patterns and increased movement of exotic materials. These changes are discussed together with local and regional environmental and culture history. The new data provide a more secure basis for supporting and understanding developmental processes in Maritime Archaic culture and their distinctions from later Indian groups of the far northeast. Comparisons are drawn to northwest coast and other cultures and speculation is offered on some of the factors that may be involved.