Huron-Wendat Engagement with Archaeological Heritage in present day Ontario and Québec

Date/Time: 
Thursday, May 16, 2019 - 9:00am to 5:00pm
(CST)
Room: 
Villeray
Organizer(s): 
  • Louis Lesage, Bureau du Nionwenstïo, Nation Huronne-Wendat
  • Alicia Hawkins, Laurentian University
  • Stéphane Noël, Ville de Québec
  • Allison Bain, Université Laval
Contact Email: 
ahawkins@laurentian.ca
Session Description (300 word max): 

Huron-Wendat ancestral landscapes, sites, and artifacts are a rich source of knowledge and pride for present day Huron-Wendat peoples. To help protect this precious heritage, in the last decades the Huron-Wendat Nation has become increasingly involved in the management of this cultural heritage. This session will explore collaborative research projects between the Nation and archaeological researchers, projects which aim to address questions of importance to the Nation from both before and after European contact.

Presentations
09:10 AM: In Search of Carhagouha: Three Field Seasons of Investigation at Tay Point
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Bonnie Glencross - Wilfrid Laurier University
  • Gary Warrick - Wilfrid Laurier University

The Tay Point Archaeology Project (TPA) involves a multiyear program of historical and archaeological research. Beginning in 2014, students from Wilfrid Laurier University have been active in the investigation of Ahatsistari (BeGx-76) and Chew (BeGx-9), two early 17th century Huron-Wendat village sites. TPA has adopted a variety of minimally invasive and standard field methods including magnetic susceptibility, metal detecting, surface and shovel test pit surveys, as well as 100% recovery through fine screening, and the examination of archived collections. Archaeological and historical evidence collected to date suggest that Ahatsistari is a good candidate for the historically referenced village Carhagouha, visited and described by Samuel de Champlain and Recollect priest, Joseph LeCaron circa A.D. 1615.
09:40 AM: Minimally Invasive Soil Chemistry and Settlement Pattern Investigation at a 17th Century Huron-Wendat Village
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Beatrice Fletcher - McMaster University
  • Bonnie Glencross - Wilfred Laurier University
  • Gary Warrick - Wilfred Laurier University
  • Eudard Reinhardt - McMaster University

Archaeologists and Indigenous communities are constantly seeking minimally invasive methods of investigation that balance the utility of archaeological knowledge with the importance of site preservation and conservation. In this paper, we assess the feasibility and utility of multi-element x-ray fluorescence soil analysis at the Ahatsistari site (BeGx-76). This 17th century Huron-Wendat village, located on Tay Point in Simcoe County, Ontario, provided an excellent opportunity to test new analytical methods at an unplowed village site. Following magnetic susceptibility and metal detecting work undertaken during previous field seasons, soil chemical analysis was employed to confirm longhouse orientation, assess village boundaries, and identify the chemical impacts of surrounding agricultural fields. This paper presents the concentrations of six key anthropogenically enriched elements across 213 systematically sampled locations. Our analysis employed Itrax™ core scanning, a high-resolution, non-destructive x-ray fluorescence technique. This technique generates concentrations of over 80 different elements for each bulk soil sample while also providing the capacity for future investigations of intact stratigraphic sequences. Our preliminary results suggest a potential boundary for the village along with highly variable chemical signatures within the village boundaries. Our results, though requiring future ground-truthing, present the utility and ambiguities of interpreting anthropogenic chemical signatures generated through minimally invasive surveying, sampling, and analysis.
10:30 AM: Un regard archéologique sur la mission Notre-Dame-de-Lorette (1673-1697), à L’Ancienne-Lorette, Québec
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Stéphane Noël - Ville de Québec

Établie sur un plateau sablonneux surplombant la rivière Lorette, la mission Notre-Dame-de-Lorette est le lieu fondateur de la ville de L’Ancienne-Lorette, près de Québec. Fondée en 1673, cette mission jésuite était occupée au départ par environ 300 autochtones, majoritairement des Hurons-Wendat, mais aussi des Iroquois convertis. Les familles occupaient des « cabanes » en écorce disposées en carré autour d’une place centrale au centre de laquelle se trouvait une chapelle en briques. En 1697, pour différentes raisons, la mission déménage plus au nord, près des chutes de la rivière Saint-Charles à l’endroit qui deviendra Wendake.

À l’été 2018, des fouilles archéologiques intensives financées par la Ville de L’Ancienne-Lorette ont été menées par l’équipe de GAIA, coopérative de travail en archéologie, en collaboration avec la Nation huronne-wendat. Cette intervention majeure a eu lieu préalablement à la construction du nouveau centre communautaire de la municipalité. Ce site revêt une grande importance puisqu’il permet d’explorer archéologiquement, pour la première fois, la période charnière entre la dispersion des Hurons-Wendat vers 1650 et leur établissement permanent à Wendake en 1697. Cette communication présente les principaux résultats des recherches archéologiques de 2018 qui permettent de jeter un regard unique sur l’architecture, les modes de vie, l’économie et l’alimentation des familles autochtones qui occupaient la mission à la fin du 17e siècle.
11:00 AM: Fouilles archéologiques sur le site de la mission Notre-Dame-de-Lorette (1673-1697) : portrait de la culture matérielle
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Marie-Hélène Daviau
  • Anja Herzog
  • Michel Plourde
  • Roland Tremblay
  • Stéphane Noël - GAIA, coopérative de travail en archéologie

Les fouilles archéologiques menées en 2018 sur le site de la mission Notre-Dame-de-Lorette (L’Ancienne-Lorette, QC) par GAIA, coopérative de travail en archéologie, ont livré plusieurs milliers d’artéfacts provenant des différentes phases d’occupation du site. Dans cette communication, nous dresserons un portrait général de cette riche collection et examinerons plus particulièrement les artéfacts issus des contextes de la mission jésuite (1673-1697) ayant fait l’objet d’études ciblées comme la céramique de tradition autochtone, les perles de verre et de catlinite, les pipes en terre cuite fine argileuse, ainsi que les témoins de fabrication de pipes de pierre.
11:30 AM: Compositional Analysis of Glass Beads from Wendat contexts at L'Ancienne - Lorette
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Heather Walder - UW-La Crosse
  • Stéphane Noël - GAIA, coopérative de travail en archéologie

Glass trade beads recovered during the 2018 excavations of CeEu-11, the site of a c. 1673-1693 Huron-Wendat village at L'Ancienne-Lorette, were analyzed using Laser Ablation - Inductively Coupled Plasma - Mass Spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS). This minimally-invasive analysis, conducted with permission from the Huron-Wendat Nation of Quebec, provides information about glass bead recipes that can be compared to other known samples from across eastern North America.  This paper compares L'Ancienne-Lorette glass beads compositions to those from other 17th century Wendat archaeological sites in the Western Great Lakes and in Southern Ontario. These sites are dated both prior to and after the dispersal of Huron-Wendat people from Wendake c. 1650. Temporal and spatial patterning of the glass bead recipes is examined at inter-site and intra-site scales. Preliminary results indicate that glass beads from across many of these sites are compositionally similar, which we may interpret as evidence of continued acquisition and use of glass beads from long-standing trading partners. 
01:40 PM: Comment l’archéologie est vue et souhaitée par les hurons-wendat : collaboration, recherche, interprétation et limites
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Louis Lesage - Conseil de la Nation huronne-wendat
  • Jean-François Richard - Conseil de la Nation huronne-wendat
  • Michel Plourde - Université Laval

Les connaissances de la communauté scientifique à l’égard de la Nation huronne-wendat sont indéniablement liées à la discipline de l’archéologie. Les nombreuses fouilles exécutées depuis plusieurs décennies sur des sites archéologiques hurons-wendat ont généré un corpus considérable de données qui permettent de mieux comprendre la culture matérielle et les coutumes de cette société. Un mouvement nommément appelé « la recherche collaborative » s’opère actuellement quant à l’usage de l’archéologie par et pour les Hurons-Wendat. Bien que des étapes importantes aient été franchies, les Hurons-Wendat souhaitent s’engager davantage dans une relation de collaboration avec les professionnels de cette discipline dans le cadre de projets de recherches fondamentaux, appliqués et même accessoires à l’archéologie allant de la protection de l’environnement à la médecine légale, par exemple. Cependant, les défis sont nombreux et cette recherche collaborative nécessite de la détermination et un esprit d’ouverture, à la fois de la part des archéologues et de la Nation huronne-wendat. Le projet d’aire protégée de la Nation huronne-wendat dans la région de Ya’nienhonhndeh (lac à Moïse) est présenté afin d’illustrer comment ce type de collaboration  et les questions éthiques fondamentales qui sont soulevées par l’usage de l’archéologie sont traités par la Nation huronne-wendat de manière contemporaine.
02:10 PM: Isotope Analyses to Explore Canid and Human Diets at Five Huron-Wendat Village Sites
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Bonnie Glencross - Wilfrid Laurier University
  • Taylor Smith - McMaster University
  • Gary Warrick - Wilfrid Laurier University
  • Tracy Prowse - McMaster University

Stable isotope analysis of bone collagen in 48 dogs (Canis familaris) was conducted to investigate geographic and temporal variation in diet at five Huron-Wendat sites (A.D. 1250-1650) in southern Ontario, Canada. The dog isotope values were compared to published human isotope values to better understand convergence of food and dietary behaviour between the two with the goal of developing an animal isotopic dietary proxy. Analyses reveal that the human dietary staple maize is clearly present in the diet of dogs, and that δ13Ccol values for dogs and humans correspond well at each village through time suggesting that dogs can serve as proxies for contemporary human maize consumption. δ15Ncol values show dogs feeding on high level sources of protein however, when compared with humans are more variable and should be established for each archaeological context separately.
03:00 PM: Examining Huron-Wendat History through Ceramic Communities of Practice
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Alicia Hawkins - Laurentian University
  • Louis Lesage - Nation Huronne-Wendat
  • Amy St. John - Western University
  • Gregory Braun - University of Toronto
  • Mélanie Vincent - Nation Huronne-Wendat

In 2016 the Huron-Wendat Nation initiated a community-based research project to examine pottery vessels from the Ontario and Quebec. The goal of this project was to try to see beyond decorative motifs and tools, to try to better understand the ways in which Huron-Wendat potters undertook the practice of pottery making. We approach this from a technological perspective that includes chemical analysis of clays in used pots; determination of recipes for clays used in pots; and reconstruction of the gestures and actions used to produce pottery. Through this we aim to better understand how pottery production varies, or does not, over space. In this paper we present our current interpretations based on the three interconnected analyses in the context of Huron-Wendat understandings of their history in present day Ontario and Quebec.
03:30 PM: Pottery clay sourcing of pots identified as Huron-Wendat from Ontario and Quebec
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Alicia Hawkins - Laurentian University
  • Joseph Petrus - Laurentian University

Pottery decoration has long been used as a criterion for identification of “foreign” components in

pottery assemblages. Sherds identified as Huron-Wendat have been found on sites in northern Ontario

and Quebec, as well as in the St. Lawrence valley. But were these pots made locally or do they represent

pots transferred from Huronia in the course of trade or other activities? Previous attempts to source

Iroquoian pottery have not been met with great success owing to the heterogeneity of pottery and the

difficulty of separating clay from temper. Laser Ablation Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass

Spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) can isolate the locations within sherds for analysis so as to avoid inclusions.

In this paper we present the results of LA-ICP-MS analysis of sherds from Ontario and Quebec to address

the question of whether pots with Huron-Wendat decoration were made with the same clays as pottery

with more local decoration.
04:00 PM: Recipes of clay and stone: petrographic insights on Ancestral Wendat ceramic traditions
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Gregory Braun - University of Toronto

One way of investigating the relationships between the ancestral Huron-Wendat communities of Ontario and Quebec is through an examination of their technological practices. In this paper, petrography is used to reconstruct the clay-temper ‘recipes’ used to make pottery at a number of sites in Huronia and the St. Lawrence region. Part of a larger project, these data are used to situate ancestral Huron-Wendat potters within a shared community of practice, and explore their choices in pottery-making that are informed both by technical traditions and by the affordances of their respective landscapes.

04:30 PM: Using micro computed tomography to explore Huron-Wendat ceramic manufacture
Presentation format:
Author(s):
  • Amy St. John - The University of Western Ontario

Micro computed tomography (CT) analysis offers a new perspective on ceramic manufacture through access to interior features related to technological practices. High resolution, three dimensional, micro CT images reveal different ways of forming vessels, identifying characteristic tendencies in motor habits and learned behaviours that are grounded in specific communities of practice. This micro CT study makes up one small part of a larger project initiated by the Huron-Wendat Nation (HWN). This project asks, in part, how archaeological ceramic data can be analysed and interpreted in light of HWN knowledge systems. To explore this, I have scanned high-collared rim sherds from 74 ceramic vessels from archaeological sites in an area encompassing the north shore of Lake Ontario and Huronia, the St. Lawrence Valley, and the Canadian Shield north of these areas, focusing on archaeological materials from the 16th and 17th centuries. Through micro CT scanning the interior features of pots are made visible and can be connected to the social dimensions of potting.