Abstract

The first voyage of Martin Frobisher to the Eastern Arctic (1576) aimed at the discovery of the Northwest Passage but as it was customary the expedition brought back minerals to show that a new land had been discovered. Following the assaying of the ore the expedition had taken, one assayer was convinced it contained gold and silver. The lure of a gain was so strong that two other voyages were undertaken in 1577-1578 in order to mine supposedly precious -metal bearing ores. As the Frobisher expeditions left traces on Kodlunarn Island an archaeological research programme was planned in order to, investigate the technology used to extract the minerals, their assaying, and the logistics of provisioning an Arctic expedition in Elizabethan time. In addition to the above aims, another component of our programme studies the impact of the Frobisher voyages on the southeastern Baffin Inuit. This paper discusses the research which has taken place at the Frobisher base camp since 1990 and presents the result of the analysis carried out on the recovered material. The excavation, albeit very limited, shows that the Kodlunarri Island site provides a unique time capsule which has potential for documenting that aspect of the Elizabethan voyages of exploration which is left out from the official accounts.