Abstract

Recent research indicates a brief period of rapid expansion in the number of winter villages in the Namu vicinity on the central coast of British Columbia at around 2500 BP. This coincides with a period of decline and instability in the Namu salmon-fishing economy. This pattern of long-term winter-village settlement at Namu, followed by a short period of expansion in the number of villages, and subsequent renewed stability appears to have been governed by perceptions of the supernatural basis of resource availability and the demands of annual ceremonies to ensure resource renewal, rather than by the physical availability or productivity of resources in the region.