104 SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 



Late in June Mr. Chambers was put ashore at the Eskimo village 

 of Gambell, at the northwestern end of St. Lawrence Island, where 

 he remained until the Northland returned for him in September. Exca- 

 vations were carried on at several old village sites in the vicinity of 

 Gambell which, in 1930, had yielded a remarkably clear picture, or 

 cross section, of prehistoric Eskimo culture from a very early period 

 down to the present time. 1 The material excavated by Mr. Chambers 

 adds to the completeness of the picture, furnishing additional links 

 between the several culture stages. 



The oldest evidence of human occupancy thus far found on the Is- 

 land was obtained at a small village site near Gambell which was dis- 

 covered almost by accident. This site, on the lower slope of the 

 Gambell cape or mountain, had been completely covered over by moss 

 and tundra and the Eskimos living at ( iambell, less than a mile away, 

 were not aware of its existence. Excavation has proved this to be a 

 pure site of the Old Bering Sea culture, a village which had been es- 

 tablished and abandoned during the period, many centuries ago, when 

 this rich old Arctic culture existed along the coasts of Siberia and 

 Alaska in the vicinity of Bering Strait. 



The material excavated from this site and from the next oldest 

 site, nearby, affords a basis for a reconstruction in outline of the life 

 and habits of the Eskimos of the Old Bering Sea period. They lived in 

 small houses, square or rectangular in outline, which were built partly 

 underground and entered by means of a long narrow passageway. The 

 floors were of stone slabs and the walls were made of small drift- 

 wood timbers laid horizontally one above the other and held in place 

 with bone and wooden stakes. The nature of the roof construction has 

 not been determined clearly but it seems likely that timbers were also 

 employed for this purpose. These earliest St. Lawrence Eskimos lived 

 bv hunting, very much as do those of the present day. The principal 

 animals captured were walrus, seals, and birds, and these supplied the 

 essential means of livelihood: blubber and meat for food ; oil tor heat, 

 light and cooking ; and skins for clothing, boat coverings, and other 

 purposes. Whaling occupied a much less prominent role in their lives 

 than it came to have among the later Eskimos. Many of the com- 

 mon implements in use at that time differed little or not at all from 

 those used centuries later. Their art, however, was unique, and it 

 is this feature which gives the Old Bering Sea culture its character- 

 istic stamp. 



1 Ancient culture of St. Lawrence Island, Alaska. Explorations and Field- 

 Work of the Smithsonian Institution in 1930, pp. 135-144. 



