On the Applicability of Environmental and Ethnographic Reference Frames : An Example from the High-latitude Seascapes of Norway and Tierra del Fuego

Abstract

Predictions about hunter-gatherer behavior are often derived from ethnographically documented cases and coupled with environmental data. Lewis Binford (2001) and Robert Kelly (1995) present large amounts of data, and are among the most significant works on this matter. Although their cases range from equator to high-latitudes, and from inland to coast, their predictive models are largely based on pedestrian hunter-gatherers with a terrestrial subsistence strategy. We explore if these reference frames are applicable also to boat-using marine foragers in the high-latitude seascapes of central Norway and southern Tierra del Fuego by taking one aspect of adaptive behavior into consideration: mobility. By comparing the archaeological record in the two regions with James Chatters? (1987) archaeological measures of mobility type, range, frequency and stability, we find that the mobility practiced by our marine foragers stands in contrast to the predictive models. The study leads us conclude that the combination of the use of boats for transport and hunting, highly marine subsistence strategy, and the location in high-latitude seascapes calls for a different frame of reference.