Abstract

This paper presents the results of research on the Locarno Beach to Marpole transition within the Gulf of Georgia region of the Northwest Coast. The Marpole culture type has been implicated as the time period when the Northwest Coast ethnographic patterns of status inequality, co-operative housing, intensive salmon storage and resource ownership are thought to develop. This paper discusses these processes as they pertain to the archaeological record and challenges some key concepts relating to the rise of sociocultural complexity on the Northwest Coast.