Spatial and Temporal Variability in Chert Exploitation on Santa Cruz Island, California

Abstract

Chert outcrops on eastern Santa Cruz Island were of vital importance to the inhabitants of the Santa Barbara Channel region because of their comparatively limited availablity elsewhere on the California Channel Islands. Temporally diagnostic artifacts and radiocarbon dates from associated shell middens suggest that chert quarries were exploited throughout the Holocene. The importance of these quarries has been well documented in regard to microlith production as part of the shell bead industry during the late Holocene. However, relatively little is known about local chert tool manufacture and exchange in earlier times. Systematic documentation of 26 known chert quarries, and sampling at associated shell middens on eastern Santa Cruz Island has resulted in the identification of significant spatial variability in chert exploitation through time. Whereas chert quarrying during the middle Holocene appears to have been opportunistic and dispersed throughout the landscape, comparable activities during the late Holocene became increasingly circumscribed as microlith production was intensified. These trends in chert procurement are interpreted in the context of temporal changes in subsistence, tool manufacture, and residential mobility on the northern Channel Islands, and have broad implications for spatial and temporal patterning in prehistoric lithic exploitation.

A Test of Ideal Free Distribution Predictions Using Targeted Survey and Excavation on California’s Northern Channel Islands

“…The Middle to Late Period Transition (MLT; 800-650 cal BP) has also been associated with important changes (Arnold 1991(Arnold , 1992a(Arnold , 1997(Arnold , 2001bArnold and Tissot 1993;Arnold et al 1997;Jazwa et al 2012;Jazwa and Perry 2013;Kennett 2005;Kennett and Conlee 2002;Perry and Jazwa 2010;Raab and Larson 1997). For example, the Callianax biplicata (purple olive) shell bead industry grew significantly, providing an important trade good (Arnold 1987(Arnold , 1990(Arnold , 1992a(Arnold , b, 2001aArnold and Munns 1994;Munns and Arnold 2002, pp.…”

Fishing, Subsistence Change, and Foraging Strategies on Western Santa Rosa Island, California

“…Skills limited to subsets of the population and managed by chiefs included the production of tomols and the manufacture and exchange of chert microblades/microdrills and shell beads made from Olivella biplicata shells. This provides evidence for craft specialization (Arnold 1992;Kennett 2005;King 1990;Perry and Jazwa 2010).…”

Multi-scalar foraging decisions in the Santa Barbara Channel, southern California

“…Research on Santa Cruz has focused on the eastern and western ends and the Central Valley (i.e. Arnold, 1990;Glassow, 2005;Glassow et al, 2008;Perry, 2005;Perry and Jazwa, 2010). Anacapa Island has been thoroughly surveyed, and most extant sites have been radiocarbon dated (Rick, 2006;Rozaire, 1978).…”

“…The species distribution maps were converted to resource maps for each of the four resource categories and at each 1000 year interval using the AHP values and productivity estimates. The distribution of lithic materials are based on published reports (Arnold, 1990;Erlandson, 2012;Erlandson et al, 1997Erlandson et al, , 2008aGlassow, 1991;Perry and Jazwa, 2010), while freshwater is modeled using standard hydrology tools in ESRI's ArcGIS software.…”