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Visiting the Past: Finding and Understanding Britain's Archaeology

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<< Other Photo Pages >> Birnirk National Historic Landmark - Artificial Mound in United States in Alaska

Submitted by AKFisher on Friday, 28 July 2023  Page Views: 3002

Multi-periodSite Name: Birnirk National Historic Landmark Alternative Name: Birnirk Site; Piġniq
Country: United States
NOTE: This site is 237.841 km away from the location you searched for.

Region: Alaska Type: Artificial Mound
Nearest Town: Utquigvik, AK (Barrow)
Latitude: 71.381370N  Longitude: 156.46403W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
2 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
3 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
1 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
4

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Birnirk National Historic Landmark
Birnirk National Historic Landmark submitted by AKFisher : Burial Mounds at the Birnirk Site in Alaska. Photo: National Park Service. (Vote or comment on this photo)
A series of around 20 mounds on beach ridges on the Chukchi Sea coast near Utqiagvik (Barrow), Alaska. The mounds reach up to 14-feet tall and are dimpled with the sunken remains of house ruins and cache pits. They were formed by the construction of new houses on top of the ruins of older structures over hundreds of years.

Piġniq (the local name) is Iñupiaq for ‘joint’ or ‘articulation’ and describes the lagoon landform of the archaeological district. The technology that developed at this site (and other Birnirk tradition sites) supported rapid population expansion across the arctic regions of North America and Greenland.

The population at the Birnirk site (Piġniq) was small, perhaps two or three houses during any one occupation. The houses at the site were square and about 12-feet wide. Driftwood and whalebones framed the walls and roofs, and the roofs were covered with sod. The entryways were below the level of the plank floor in order to trap heat in the home.

Since people lived at the Birnirk site (Piġniq) in ancient times, the decline in sea level left behind a series of ridges that were the former gravel shorelines. Recently, as sea level is on the rise, much of the archeology has eroded into the Elson Lagoon alongside the site.

During the Birnirk period, seals, fish, birds, caribou, and smaller land mammals were the primary animal resources. Whales were rarely captured. Artifacts found at Birnirk (Piġniq) were used for home life, hunting, fishing, and travel. A significant find at the Birnirk National Historic Landmark (Piġniq) is the remnants of a 1,000-year-old umiak. Some of the parts still have decorative ivory inlays and baleen lashing. Boats made from wood and animal parts are extremely rare in the archaeological record. Other items uncovered at the site include:

Toboggans for winter and summer travel
Stone lamps for light and heat
Ceramic container fragments
Engraving tools
Chipped stone tools
Ground slate tools
Carved bone tools
Harpoon parts
Remnants of sealskin floats attached to harpoon lines
Atlatl (throwing board) parts
Caribou antler arrow points
Bow and arrow parts
Fishing leisters
Bolas
Bird darts

Source: NPS website:
http://www.nps.gov/places/birnirk-site.htm<27> The Birnirk Archeological Tradition at Point Barrow

The Birnirk tradition is the earliest instance of modern Iñupiat culture in northern Alaska. This tradition lasted from about 1500 - 1000 years ago (500 AD to 900 AD). The Birnirk National Historic Landmark (Piġniq) is the type-site for this archeological tradition. Artifacts from a type-site serve as the prime example for particular archeological traditions (types and styles of tools). The collections from the Birnirk site (Piġniq) are used to compare and identify artifacts from other sites. The Birnirk archeological tradition is found from the Russian Far East to Alaska, and similar stone tools have been found in northern Canada.

The Birnirk tradition is considered the ancestor of the Thule archeological tradition, which continued to become today’s Northern Alaskan Iñupiat. The Thule archaeological tradition (from around 900 – 600 years ago) was more focused on whaling. Understanding the developments that took place during the Birnirk period helps researchers explain the common languages and cultures of Iñupiaq-speakers in northern Alaska and Canada.

Early Arctic Expeditions and Archeological Research

The first International Polar Year research program began in 1881. Army Lieutenant Patrick Henry Ray led the research station at Point Barrow. Ethnographic reports from this program, written by John Murdoch, were the first to describe the Birnirk site (Piġniq) to the western world.

Stefánsson Vilhájalmer was an early 20th century Canadian anthropologists, who led a one-day excavation of one of the mound features in 1912. He named the site Birnirk – a distortion of the Inupiat name Piġniq. Archeological excavation in the Arctic was difficult for Vilhajalmer, so after 1912, he began buying artifacts from local residents.

Archeological excavations at the site continued again in the 1930s and 1950s by researchers from Harvard University. Unfortunately, thorough study of the collections were never completed and reports of the research were brief (Wilbert Carter’s reports to the Office of Naval Research in the 1950s and 1960s).

Additional Information:
More National Historic Landmarks in Alaska

“The Stefansson-Anderson Arctic Expedition of the American Museum: Preliminary Ethnological Report”, by Vilhjalmer Stefansson. Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, Vol. 14, Part 1. New York, 1914.

“Archaeology of the Bering Sea Regions”, by Henry B. Collins. Proceedings of the Fifth Pacific Science Congress, Canada, 1933. Vol. IV, pp. 2825-2839. 1934.

“Eskimo Prehistory in the Vicinity of Point Barrow, Alaska”, by James A. Ford. Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, Vol. 47. New York, 1959.

Arctic Area, Indigenous Period. By Henry B. Collins, Mexico, 1954.

My Life with the Eskimo. By Vilhjalmer Stefansson. New York, 1913.

The Friendly Arctic. By Vilhjalmer Stefansson. New York, 1921.

“Harpoons and Darts in the Stefansson Collection”, by Clark Wissle. Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History. Vol. 14, Part 2. New York, 1916.

“Ancient boat bits estimated to be 1,000 years old”, by Mike Dunham. Anchorage Daily News. Page A3, December 13, 2012."

Note: Location data is approximate.

Note: Lots of mound photos incoming by kind permission of Dr Greg Little. Many thanks to AKFisher for the help in adding them.
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Birnirk National Historic Landmark
Birnirk National Historic Landmark submitted by AKFisher : From Wikipedia Mounds at the site with historical marker. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Do not use the above information on other web sites or publications without permission of the contributor.

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