SOUTHERN
LABRADOR INUIT RESEARCH
ST.
MICHAEL’S BAY ARCHAEOLOGY PROJECT
Dr. Marianne Stopp
A federal SSHRC-CURA grant administered through Memorial University of Newfoundland provided funding for expenses and crew wages. Parks Canada also recognized the value of studying Canada’s past in granting me development leave each summer. All analysis, writing, and public presentations are, however, completed as part of my volunteer commitment to southern Labrador.
Base camp at Triangle Harbour, The daily commute to work
St. Michael’s Bay, Labrador
THE
FIELDWORK
I completed the first archaeological survey of St. Michael’s Bay in 1992. Surprisingly few sites were found relative to the bay’s size and its more than 300 islands but these sites are somewhat unique and included a Groswater Palaeoeskimo camp, an historic Inuit burial site, and early Inuit sod houses.
For many years I have been studying Inuit occupation of the southern Labrador coast. Since 2009, I have directed excavations of several Inuit sod houses as part of a five-year, multi-disciplinary, multi-researcher project named “Understanding the Past to Build the Future.” Our web page can be viewed at: http://www.mun.ca/labmetis/
The links below provide a glimpse into the material culture we’ve been uncovering in St. Michael’s Bay at an Inuit site that dates from the mid-1600s to mid-1700s.
Summary
report of the 2009 excavations of Labrador Inuit sod houses in St. Michael’s
Bay
(co-authored with C. Jalbert)
Summary
report of the 2010 excavations of a Labrador Inuit sod house in St. Michael’s
Bay
(co-authored with K. Wolfe)
Summary report of the 2011 excavations of a
Labrador Inuit sod house in St. Michael’s Bay
Maps of 1764 published by Jacques-Nicolas Bellin
(1702-1774) of the southern Labrador coast. St. Michael’s Bay was
once also known as “Baye de Hapé” or “Baye de Haspé.”
J.-N.
Bellin, Le
petit atlas maritime, 1764 (Library and Archives Canada, Mikan 382207)
MATERIAL
CULTURE OF 17TH-18TH CENTURY SOUTHERN LABRADOR INUIT IN
ST. MICHAEL’S BAY
Ceramics Worked Bone Clothing
Ornamentation
PAPERS
ON LABRADOR INUIT HISTORY AND ARCHAEOLOGY BY M. STOPP
Mikak and Tutauk; Caubvick and Tooklavinia; Attuiock, Ickongoque, and Ickeuna
In the late eighteenth century a number of
Labrador Inuit were at different times taken to England. Their lives and journeys were unusually well
documented through writings and portraiture.
Presented here are the histories of Mikak and her son Tutauk, brought
to
The Story of Mikak -
paper prepared for Nunatsiavut Government
This paper formed the nomination application submitted to the federal government in 2007 to have Mikak considered as a person of historical significance. In 2009, the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada designated Mikak as a person of historical significance. Alongside Lydia Campbell, she is the second Labrador woman to be honoured in this way.
(co-authored with G. Mitchell)
Following the
publication of Eighteenth Century Labrador Inuit in England (Arctic,
2009), further Cartwright material was discovered in a British archive that
stands as a relevant sequel. Presented here are three letters written in 1773
by Catherine Cartwright, sister of Captain George Cartwright of Labrador fame. The letters describe and discuss the group of
five Inuit who came to England with the latter in the autumn of 1772. All of the Inuit party but one died of
smallpox at the outset of their return voyage to Labrador early the following
summer. A fourth letter, written a year later by an M. Stowe, a family
relation, contains information about George Cartwright’s return to Labrador
with only Caubvick. These letters contain new
information about the Inuit visit that is both first-hand and enriched with
personal observation and opinion. As microhistorical
data, the letters contribute to broader historical discussions of
Inuit-European relations, Inuit society, Inuit agency in the changing economics
of the late eighteenth century, and the perspectives of Europeans and their
fascination with indigenous peoples.
Reconsidering Inuit presence in southern Labrador - history and
archaeology
This paper reconsiders the century-old question of Inuit presence
south of Hamilton Inlet and the contention that it was a short-term presence
for the purpose of trading with Europeans. A summary of archival sources
largely unavailable in English in conjunction with known and new archaeological
evidence are the basis for a re-examination of the nature and extent
of Inuit presence in the southern region. A discussion of the Inuit hunting and
gathering way of life alongside the archival and archaeological evidence
suggests that there is reasonable evidence of winter and summer presence, of
family groups rather than trade parties, of extended habitation rather than
short-term trade forays, and of a way of life that incorporated European goods
but remained based on traditional seasonal foraging patterns. Incorporating new
archaeological data for the region between Blanc Sablon
and Sandwich Bay, this paper supports the Martijn and
Clermont (1980) that Inuit did inhabit the southern coast prior to the late
eighteenth century.
Long-term
coastal occupancy between Cape Charles and Trunmore
Bay
Presents the 1991 and 1992 results of the first archaeological
surveys of the southeastern coast of Labrador.
The
archaeology of George Cartwright’s Ranger
Lodge (ca. 1770), his first home in today’s Lodge Bay, Labrador
– a slide show
Southern
Labrador In a Time Before Memory – a slide show
M. Stopp's
2011 summer column "Field Notes" in The Northern Pen on matters
related to Labrador archaeology and Inuit (My
column always appeared amongst the obituaries of The Northern Pen!, perhaps to
remind us that archaeology is all about the long-ago.)