Examining the Use-Lives of Archaic Cache Bifaces from the Riverside Site

Katherine Sterner & Robert Ahlrichs, Ph.D. Candidates, Anthropology, UW-Milwaukee

Abstract:
The Riverside Site is a Red Ochre affiliated burial and habitation site in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, excavated by the University of Michigan, the Milwaukee Public Museum, and the Oshkosh Public Museum. During the Late Archaic to Early Woodland transition, people throughout the Midwest buried their dead with red ochre and numerous exotic goods, including caches of blue gray chert bifaces. Bob Hruska’s 1961-1963 excavations at Riverside uncovered a total of 83 bipointed bifaces. In an effort to connect “ritual” burial furniture to anthropologically visible behaviors, a sample of the bifaces cached in five different burial features at the site were analyzed for traces of use-wear. This new data, in conjunction with reanalysis of Hruska’s original privately held records and pictures provides interesting insights into Terminal Late Archaic culture in the Western Great Lakes.