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GREAT SALT LAKE — Everyday items recovered from Utah caves are providing insight into how native peoples lived more than a thousand years ago.
Archaeologists from Brigham Young University and the University of Alberta have spent years studying artifacts from two caves on the north shores of the Great Salt Lake. The main question researchers are focusing on is whether ancestors of the Navajo or Apache peoples stayed in Utah while migrating from Canada.
“The caves are significant because they have tremendous preservation conditions, so that all kinds of normally perishable artifacts — moccasins, mittens, complete arrows, feathers, quills and fur — have survived,” wrote John Ives of the University of Alberta in an email. “This very much broadens the range of material culture that we can look at and includes things like moccasins, which often purposefully signaled cultural identity.”
The majority of the 340 whole and partial moccasins recovered from the cave were made in a Canadian Subarctic style, which provides evidence to suggest ancestors of the Navajo or Apache peoples lived in the caves, according to Ives. He said the moccasins were made in a way that is “completely out of place in the eastern Great Basin.”
Ives said the Navajo and Apache peoples are closely related to Canada’s Dene, so scholars have long believed their ancestors came from Canada about 1,200 to 1,000 years ago. Based on artifacts found during this excavation, Ives said they believe the caves were inhabited by that group from about A.D. 1240 to 1290.
Courtesy of John Ives
Among the recovered artifacts are pieces of cane that researchers believe people living in the cave used as dice for gaming or gambling activities. The discovery of dice and other gaming objects suggest the cave’s inhabitants “frequently played a variety of games amongst themselves (for lower stakes), but perhaps with their neighbors (for higher stakes),” Ives said.
Joel Janetski, a BYU emeritus professor of anthropology working on the project, has come across evidence of gaming while researching various archaeological sites in Utah.
“They didn’t have any TV or Internet or anything to amuse themselves, so they would sit around and sing songs and play games of various kinds,” he said. “A lot of them had to do with these dice.”
The most abundant artifact found in the caves was animal bones, including many bones belonging to bison, according to Janetski. Researchers believe the cave’s inhabitants were proficient large-game hunters. Data derived from moccasin sizes show there was a large number of children and subadults present, suggesting the population was growing.
Courtesy of John Ives
Janetski said this project is unique because they have been able to work with modern Dene speakers. Janetski and Ives attended a workshop in Canada hosted by Dene speakers on the topic of language preservation, in addition to meeting with native groups at the caves and local museums.
“The native speakers are very, very interested in this,” he said. “I think they’re interested in their history just like we all are.”
Analyzing artifacts recovered from the caves during three years of field work is an ongoing project. Janetski estimated it will take another year or two to complete the work since they have thousands of items to examine.
“As archaeologists, we aren’t interested in making collections of things,” he said. “We’re interested in what those things can tell us about people’s lives."
