Burnt Residue from Archaeological Sites: Investigations of Bone as Fuel and Chemical Idenitification of Prey Species

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ABSTRACTARC 0540235This SGER proposal supports experimental chemical research into the issue of bone as a fuel source for early Paleo-Indian adaptations to Arctic environment. As part of a summer archaeological field school, the researchers will be excavating the Swan Point archaeological site in the interior of Alaska in order to shed light the environment and time period occupied by early people in North America. This award will support not only the summer's excavation activities but also the experimental chemical analyses of the bone materials extracted from the site as a mechanism for gaining a better understanding their properties and possible use as a fuel source by the early occupants of the site. The utilization of bone material as a fuel source for early inhabitants of the North American Arctic is a debated theory in archaeology and this project has the potential to provide new data that can shed light on this important theoretical debate.