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Large canids (wolves, dogs, and coyote) and people form a close relationship in northern (subarctic and arctic) socioecological systems. Here, we document the antiquity of this bond and the multiple ways it manifested in interior Alaska, a region key to understanding the peopling of the Americas and early northern lifeways. We compile original and existing genomic, isotopic, and osteological canid data from archaeological, paleontological, and modern sites. Results show that in contrast to canids recovered in non-anthropic contexts, canids recovered in association with human occupations are markedly diverse. They include multiple species and intraspecific lineages, morphological variation, and diets ranging from terrestrial to marine. This variation is expressed along both geographic and temporal gradients, starting in the terminal Pleistocene with canids showing high marine dietary estimates. This paper provides evidence of the multiple ecological relationships between canids and people in the north—from predation, probable commensalism, and taming, to domestication—and of their early onset. 

Woolly mammoths in mainland Alaska overlapped with the region’s first people for at least a millennium. However, it is unclear how mammoths used the space shared with people. Here, we use detailed isotopic analyses of a female mammoth tusk found in a 14,000-year-old archaeological site to show that she moved ~1000 kilometers from northwestern Canada to inhabit an area with the highest density of early archaeological sites in interior Alaska until her death. DNA from the tusk and other local contemporaneous archaeological mammoth remains revealed that multiple mammoth herds congregated in this region. Early Alaskans seem to have structured their settlements partly based on mammoth prevalence and made use of mammoths for raw materials and likely food. 

Abstract The Northern Rocky Mountain Front (hereafter Northern Front) is a prominent geographic feature in archaeological models of human dispersal in the terminal Pleistocene and Early Holocene of North America. Testing those models has been arduous because of local geomorphological factors that tend to obliterate or otherwise limit access to archaeological finds of relevant age. In this paper, we present well-stratified archaeological and environmental records dating back to 14,000–13,000 cal yr BP from the site of Billy Big Spring (Blackfeet Indian Reservation, Montana), located on a glacial kettle, a type of landform that has been largely ignored by regional archaeological research to date. Findings from Billy Big Spring show the continuous use of the Northern Front foothills throughout the major climatic and environmental disturbances of the Early Holocene, and possibly the terminal Pleistocene as well. As such, Billy Big Spring contributes to refining several archaeological models of early settlement of the Northern Front, particularly those that posit differential use of foothills versus plains settings during the midst of the Holocene Thermal Maximum. The record at Billy Big Spring also suggests that kettles, regardless of physiographic setting, provide a yet unsuspected and unsampled potential for preserving high-quality and easily accessible early archaeological and paleoenvironmental records. 

Después de vivir miles de años en el sub-árctico, evidencia lingüística y genética sugiere que hace aproximadamente 1.000 años, los Atabascanos del Norte migraban al sur oeste de los Estados Unidos. Antropólogos han surgido que esta migración, y varias transiciones conductuales in situ asociadas, fueron causados por una erupción volcánica que diezmó manadas de caribú. Sin embargo, después de esta erupción, parece que populaciones regionales se aumentó al mismo tiempo que esta transición, un cambio demográfico que pudo haber llevado un aumento en la territorialidad, la demanda de recursos, y la especialización económica. Basándose en las síntesis existentes de las dinámicas culturales en la región, analices de materiales excavados, y los paisajes de Alaska y el Yukón, esta investigación muestra que la transición Atabascana representó un cambio hacia una especialización en la recolección de salmón y la caza del caribú. Este cambio estaba asociado con un aumento general en la amplitud de la dieta, indicando una transición conductual que está más coherente con un cambio demográfico gradual. Además, esta transición conductual ya hubiera comenzado antes que la erupción volcánica en 1150 cal BP, lo cual sugiere que la inmigración al suroeste era causada por presión demográfica y no la erupción volcánica. En suma, esta investigación elabora las dinámicas complejas de resiliencia y adaptación en grupos cazadores-recolectores y proporciona un modelo comprobable para explicar otras migraciones prehistóricas. 

The earliest Native Americans have often been portrayed as either megafaunal specialists or generalist foragers, but this debate cannot be resolved by studying the faunal record alone. Stable isotope analysis directly reveals the foods consumed by individuals. We present multi-tissue isotope analyses of two Ancient Beringian infants from the Upward Sun River site (USR), Alaska (~11,500 years ago). Models of fetal bone turnover combined with seasonally-sensitive taxa show that the carbon and nitrogen isotope composition of USR infant bone collagen reflects maternal diets over the summer. Using comparative faunal isotope data, we demonstrate that although terrestrial sources dominated maternal diets, salmon was also important, supported by carbon isotope analysis of essential amino acids and bone bioapatite. Tooth enamel samples indicate increased salmon use between spring and summer. Our results do not support either strictly megafaunal specialists or generalized foragers but indicate that Ancient Beringian diets were complex and seasonally structured.