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Did Tlingit Ancestors Eat Sea Otters? Addressing Intellectual Property and Cultural Heritage through Zooarchaeology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2020

Madonna L. Moss Open the ORCID record for Madonna L. Moss [Opens in a new window]
Madonna L. Moss*
Affiliation:
1218 Department of Anthropology, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR97403, USA
*
(mmoss@uoregon.edu, corresponding author)
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Abstract

The maritime fur trade caused the extirpation of sea otters from southeast Alaska. In the 1960s, sea otters were reintroduced, and their numbers have increased. Now, sea otters are competing with people for what have become commercially important invertebrates. After having been absent for more than a century, the reentry of this keystone species has unsettled people. Although some communities perceive sea otters as a threat to their livelihoods, others view their return as restoration of the marine ecosystem. The federal Marine Mammal Protection Act authorizes any Alaska Native to harvest sea otters for subsistence provided that the harvest is not wasteful. Some people are seeking to define “traditional” Tlingit use of sea otters as not only using their pelts but consuming them as food, but some Tlingit maintain they never ate sea otters. This project analyzes the largest precontact archaeological assemblage of sea otter bones in southeast Alaska, with the benefit of insights gained from observing a Tlingit hunter skin a sea otter to infer that Tlingit ancestors hunted sea otters primarily for pelts. The extent to which other Indigenous peoples of the North Pacific consumed sea otters as food deserves investigation, especially as sea otters recolonize their historic range.

El comercio marítimo de pieles causó la extirpación de nutrias de mar en el sureste de Alaska. En la década de los sesentas, las nutrias fueron reintroducidas y sus números incrementaron. Ahora las nutrias de mar compiten con los seres humanos por animales invertebrados, pues estas se han convertido en productos importante de comercio. Después de haber estado ausentes por más de un siglo, la reintroducción de esta especie ha causa inquietud entre la gente; mientras unas comunidades consideran a las nutrias una amenaza a su sustento, otras consideran su regreso un logro para la restauración del ecosistema marítimo. La ley federal de Protección de Mamíferos Marinos autoriza a cualquier persona nativa de Alaska a cosechar nutrias de mar para su sustento, siempre y cuando la cosecha no sea dispendiosa. Algunos buscan definir el uso “tradicional” de las nutrias de mar por los Tlingit para incluir no solo el uso de sus pieles, sino también su consumo como alimento; mientras otros Tlingit afirman que nunca han comido nutrias de mar. Este proyecto analiza el más grande conjunto de huesos de nutrias de mar en un sitio arqueológico del tiempo pre-contacto en el sureste de Alaska. El análisis incluye información obtenida observando a un cazador Tlingit despellejando a una nutria de mar para inferir que los ancestros Tlingit cazaban nutrias principlamente por sus pieles. El grado en que otras personas indígenas del Pacifico Norte consumían nutrias de mar como alimento merece investigación, especialmente ahora que las nutrias de mar recolonizan su rango histórico.

Keywords

sea otterEnhydra lutrisharbor sealPhoca vitulinazooarchaeologyhistorical ecologyconservationcultural heritageTlingitAlaska Nativenutria marinaEnhydra lutrisfoca comúnPhoca vitulinazooarqueologiaecología históricaconservaciónpatrimonio culturalTlingitNativos de Alaska
Type
Articles
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 85 , Issue 2 , April 2020 , pp. 202 - 221
Copyright
Copyright © 2020 by the Society for American Archaeology

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