Possible evidence of domestic dog in a Paleoeskimo context. Arctic 32(3):263-265

• Main Author: Charles D. Arnold
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1979
• Subjects: Arctic; Point Hope; inuit; Sea ice; Alaska
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.541.8792; http://pubs.aina.ucalgary.ca/arctic/arctic32-3-263.pdf

Ethnographically-documented uses for domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) in northern societies include: drawing sleds, packing loads, locating breathing holes maintained by seals in the sea ice, holding muskoxen in their static defensive formation during the hunt, warning of camp intruders, and serving as a source of fur and food. Accordingly, domestic dogs played a significant role in the adaptive strategies of most historic Inuit and their archaeological predecessors, the Neoeskimo. Although the earlier Paleoeskimo cultures occupied the same environment and exploited many of the same resources as the historic Inuit, there is only sporadic evidence for domestic dogs in Paleoeskimo contexts. There appears to be little doubt that some of the Canidae remains from the Ipiutak site at Point Hope, Alaska, are those of domestic dog (Murie, 1948). However, the significance of the Point Hope finds is obscured since the Paleoeskimo Ipiutak culture, which appears early in the Christian Era (Rainey and Ralph, 1959), may have been a recipient of traits from Neoeskimo cultures which were