Past Events: 2006

March_2006_Notice.pdf

Recent excavations at the large prehistoric village site of Keatley Creek on the Canadian Plateau have revealed recurrent patterning of non-domestic, potentially ritual structures, and large scale feasting facilities at distinctive locations on the peripheries of the site. This patterning is very different from the well document domestic occupations of the core of the site. Both cross-cultural comparison, and the direct historic approach suggest that this patterning may be the result of secret society activities.   These locations at Keatley Creek were used for meeting houses and potlatching facilities by cultural institutions similar to the ethnographically well described secret societies of the central Northwest Coast. This pattern appears in the Plateau horizon (2400–1200 BP) and continues to the Protohistoric period (400–200 BP). The origin and development of these secret societies at Keatley Creek appears to be temporally associated with the development of large aggregated villages during the Classic Lillooet phase (2600–1100 BP) in the Mid-Fraser region and is likely related to parallel developments on the Northwest Coast.