The Frozen Saqqaq Sites of Disko Bay, West Greenland - Qeqertasussuk and Qajaa (2400-900 BC)

Book excerpt: Qeqertasussuk and Qajaa are the only known sites of the Early Arctic Small Tool tradition in the Eastern Arctic, where all kinds of organic materials - wood, bone, baleen, hair, skin - are preserved in permafrozen culture layers. Together, the sites cover the entire Saqqaq era in Greenland (c. 2400-900 BC). Technological and contextual analyses of the excellently preserved archaeological materials from the frozen layers form the core of this publication. Bjarne Grønnow draws a new picture of a true Arctic pioneer society with a remarkably complex technology. The Saqqaq hunting tool kit, consisting of bows, darts, lances, harpoons, and throwing boards as well as kayak-like sea-going vessels, is described for the first time. A wide variety of hand tools and household utensils as well as lithic and organic refuse and animal bones were found on the intact floor of a midpassage dwelling at Qeqertasussuk. These materials provide entirely new information on the daily life and subsistence of the earliest hunting groups in Greenland. Comparative studies put the Saqqaq Culture into a broad cultural-historical perspective as one of the pioneer societies of the Eastern Arctic.