Abstract

Land development in southern Ontario causes the excavation of over 100 Indigenous sites per year. It is rare that sites are preserved when threatened by development, despite the "conservation ethic" that demands that archaeologists place site preservation before excavation. Site significance criteria guide archaeologists in making decisions on which sites will be "saved" through excavation. Indigenous peoples in Ontario have different site significance criteria and perspectives on site preservation. The Haudenosaunee (Six Nations) believe that archaeological excavation of ancestral sites should be a last resort, especially for any sites with the possibility for burials. If it is not possible to protect and preserve ancestral sites, the Haudenosaunee would like to be consulted because their site significance criteria give precedence to sites that are not always the largest, oldest, or densest. Consultation with the Haudenosaunee and other Indigenous communities in southern Ontario needs to become part of standard archaeological practice.