Expert to discuss ancient Canadian people's migration
Jack Ives (right) and Bruce Starlight, Tsuut'ina Gunaha Institute, examining Promontory moccasins. Photo courtesy of Jack Ives.
By Magdalena Rost
Jack Ives, the Landrex Distinguished Professor of Anthropology at the University of Alberta, has traced the migration of ancient sub-arctic Canadian peoples all the way to the Southwestern United States, shedding new light on the origins of Navajo and Apache peoples.
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On Saturday, Jan. 24 at 7 p.m. in Room 270 of the Hale Sciences Building, Ives will discuss his groundbreaking discoveries in a free talk, open to the public, titled "The Ninth Clan—Exploring Apachean Origins in the Promontory Caves, Utah."
His unique findings center primarily on the Promontory Caves just outside Salt Lake City. There, he discovered thousands of well-preserved artifacts highly indicative of the presence of Navajo and Apache ancestors in the United States dating back to before well-known sites like Colorado's Mesa Verde and New Mexico's Chaco Canyon were abandoned, around the 13th century.
These findings add credence to early Navajo oral traditions, previously assumed to be tall tales, which state that their ancestors interacted with the ancient inhabitants of these sites.
The Promontory Caves in Utah were discovered in the 1930s, but Ives' renewal of the excavations and study of the caves, beginning in 2011, shed light on fascinating aspects not considered significant by earlier excavators.
Ives focused on the site's large quantity of moccasin-type footwear made from bison leather in the style of ancient Canadian people, unusual in the southwestern United States.
Other clues to the distinct character of these people include a distinctive sinew-backed bow technology that originated with Athabaskan-speaking Canadians, and the remains of animal bones telling of the peoples' inclination to hunt rather than gather.
As Ives and his team made more discoveries, it became clear that these likely ancestors of today's Apache and Navajo people were part of a large migration across the American West.
The emerging picture of North American prehistory made available through Ives' research is helping to clarify roots of the people of North America, especially those in the Southwest.
Ives is CU-Boulder’s 2014-2015 Department of Anthropology Distinguished Lecturer in Archaeology.
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Magdalena Rost, a student majoring in classics and English, is an intern for Colorado Arts & Sciences Magazine.
January 2015