950 The Leading Edge August 2012 SPECIAL SECTION: A r c h a e o l o g y Multimethod geophysical investigations at an Inupiaq village site in Kobuk Valley, Alaska S ituated on the bank of the Kobuk River, the contact- period village site of Igliqtiqsiugvigruaq in northwest Alaska boasts a number of large, unexcavated house pits and storage pits visible as surface depressions. In 2010, an electromagnetic survey undertaken across most of this sprawling village revealed several features important to the archaeological interpretation of the site, including a likely area of intense, widespread burning and a possible dog yard location. Additional surveying, undertaken in 2011 with magnetic gradiometry and ground-penetrating radar, revealed the locations of hearths and other aspects of the internal structures of select dwellings and storage pits. hese noninvasive geophysical strategies were used to supplement and guide excavation and geochemical prospecting at the site. he geophysical surveys are discussed, contexualized with excavation results and oral history. he efforts described here demonstrate that a great deal of information can be gathered noninvasively when geophysical methods are properly situated as part of a holistic approach to archaeological site investigation, thereby reducing the need for extensive excavation. Certain limitations associated with surveying a densely forested site are also highlighted. Background he village site of Igliqtiqsiugvigruaq in Kobuk Valley Na- THOMAS M. URBAN, University of Oxford DOUGLAS D. ANDERSON and WANNI W. ANDERSON, Brown University tional Park, northwest Alaska (Figure 1), is a site of substan- tial scale (in comparison to similar sites in the region) exhibit- ing a number of unusually large house pits and oddly shaped storage pits. he site is on an elevated terrace bordered by the Kobuk River, and has been partially eroded at its eastern boundary by the river. he area is forested, exhibiting numer- ous young poplars (though these are mostly absent from the house pits) and other ground vegetation, including alders, willows, and various grasses. A tree-ring study conducted in 2010 suggests that these trees are not contemporaneous to the village and likely appeared well after it had been aban- doned, suggesting that the site was not as heavily forested in its historical use context (Anderson and Anderson, 2012). he village consists of at least 26 house pits (which have been designated alphabetically) as well as a number of small- er storage pits, some of which are large or unusually shaped for what is known of such features in the region. House pits, as the remnant features of Inupiaq houses are commonly known, are the remains of dwellings that were once dug into the Earth and then framed with timbers to support an earth- en structure. hese partially subterranean structures were entered through relatively long, subterranean entry tunnels accessed through smaller entry pits at the ground surface. In archaeological context, the remains of such dwellings and their associated access tunnels, with the internal structure having long since collapsed, mani- fest as visible areas of subsidence at the surface. Storage pits, external to house pits, were used primar- ily to store food items such as fish and meat. hese appear as smaller areas of subsidence. A topographic survey was undertaken to map the relief associated with house pits and storage pits at the site, though reso- lution of some of these features was limited by forest density (Figure 2). he site appears to be contact period as suggested by certain arti- facts that were recovered during our investigations, which we believed to be western trade goods. hough the exact chronology is still to be determined, the site is likely 18th century based on the known histo- ry of contact in the region and the types of artifacts found. As a fur- ther indication of its relatively re- cent age, the site still holds a promi- nent place in the oral history of a Figure 1. Igliqtiqsiugvigruaq is on the bank of the Kobuk River in Kobuk Valley National Park, Alaska. Downloaded 03 Sep 2012 to 134.82.59.119. Redistribution subject to SEG license or copyright; see Terms of Use at http://segdl.org/