Talk:Dorset culture/Archive 1

Dorset Technology
The Civilization.ca page on Dorset culture indicates that they did use dogsleds, contradicting the author of this article. See Dorset Culture for details. However, the Cvilization.ca page on Thule culture says just the opposite. See Thule Culture. Without better evidence one way or the other, I edited out the mention of Dorset peoples not using dogsleds. Jacengp (talk) 17:16, 1 February 2008 (UTC)jacengp

untitled comments
Did they ALL die, or are there some descendants? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.70.144.72 (talk) 00:36, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

The information in this article is contradicted by the information in Thule people.

Here is the information from the Thule article, which I commented out:
 * In the early twentieth century, one group of anthropologists erroneously believed that the Sadlermiut, a modern Inuit group on Southampton Island, were the last remaining Dorset. But this belief was fueled by nostalgia, as the Sadlermiut were all but extinct in 1902 because of diseases carried by the whalers.


 * You can't really say "In the early twentieth century" since Dorset itself was only recognized in 1925 and generally accepted in the 1930s. Henry Collins was the first to suggest the Sadlermiut were relict Dorset, but I can't remember whether this was already in 1937 or some time later; certainly the idea was popular still in the mid and even late 20th century. It was hardly fueled by nostalgia alone but primarily by the classifying of the Thule culture as "neoeskimo" and the Dorset culture as "paleoeskimo" based primarily on the lithic technique (grinding vs. chipping). The Sadlermiut died out completely as a group; whether or not some individuals had previously left to join the neighboring Aivilingmiut is not known. The cause of death was an influenza epidemic. --Death Bredon (talk) 12:16, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

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Could someone please add the start and end dates of the Dorset Culture to the first paragraph of the article?Martin Rundkvist 06:25, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

The dates vary, one suggestion would be 700/500 BP - 1000/1500 AD, since so-called "Groswater Dorset" began in Labrador earlier than Dorset proper elsewhere (and since Dorset developed out of Pre-Dorset, a sharp boundary is difficult to draw); also the end came earlier in the west (possibliy influenced by the spread of the Thule culture) and latest again in Quebec/Labrador, where there may be some biological continuity.

The idea of the Sadlirmiut being Dorset is based primarily on the Sadlermiut use of chipped stone, but otherwise their material culture was typically Late Thule; in fact, even the shape of their chipped stone implements (harpoon head blades etc.) was typically Thule rather than Dorset. It should be remembered that stone technology is not genetically inherited; for instance, the North Alaskan Birnirk Culture from which Thule developed used chipped stone.--Death Bredon 20:10, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

"Primitive" Dorsets?
I have edited out the assertions that the Dorsets did not have "developed boat technology" or "toggled" (should be "toggling") harpoon heads. They most definitely had toggling harpoon heads; their numbers in museums run in the hundreds, if not thousands. Most Dorset toggling heads are characterized by bifurcate spurs, which later also appeared on "developed" Thule harpoon heads in the eastern Arctic (east of Boothia Peninsula), suggesting Dorset-Thule interaction (see, e.g., Moreau S. Maxwell: Prehistory of the Eastern Arctic, Academic Press 1985, ISBN 0-12-48120-8; for the proposed Thule bifurcate type ancestry see Henry Collins, Archaeology of St. Lawrence Island, Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections Vol. 96 No. 1, 1937). The old assertion that they did not have boats has also long been in doubt (see, e.g., William E. Taylor, Review and Assessment of the Dorset Problem, Anthropologica n.s. Vol. 1 No. 1&2, 1959). There are in fact good reasons for assuming that the eastern Thule people eventually copied their sea kayak from the Dorsets (see, e.g., http://greenlandpaddle.com//images/stories/dokumenter/the_kayak.kompressed.doc.). There is no consensus on the reason for the Dorset decline after the Thule expansion, nor was there necessarily any single reason. It is quite likely that at least part of the Dorset people adopted a Thule-like material culture and thus became archaeologically "invisible"; this applies particularly to Quebec/Labrador, where Dorset survived longest.

Also edited out "The Dorset may have adopted poorly to the newly harsh weather of the late first- and early second millennium CE". This period is actually considered to represent a warming trend that has been used in part to explain the Thule expansion (c. 900-1300 AD).

The assertion that "The Dorset would follow the ice and concentrated their settlements in the High Arctic during the Late and Terminal periods" is rubbish; as the map shows, the last Dorset areas lay specifically in the south, i.e., Quebec/Labrador. I have, however left this sentence for the writer to back up if s/he can.

The Dorset settlement had retreated to the "core area" before the Thule expansion, but it is questionable whether the Dorsets could be said to have been in a "massive decline". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Death Bredon (talk • contribs) 10:12, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

BTW, what happened to the previous discussions on this page? I remember making a comment about the Sadlermiut technology being basically developed Thule with only chipped stone resembling Dorset (the technique, but not the products!), but the discussion (talk page) has disappeared and the Sadlermiut are still "often thought to be Dorset". Have re-edited this part as well. The Sadlermiut-Dorset connection was first suggested by Henry Collins over 50 years ago and has haunted the popular literature ever since, but there are no real grounds for the assumption; besides tanged harpoon endblades, the Sadlermiut toolkit also included other typical late Thule implements such as Thule type V harpoon heads (or, to be precise, Mathiassen's type BIIC2) and loose lance points, as well as Birnirk-style tanged stone arrowpoints, but nothing clearly Dorset (see Mathiassen, Archaeology of the Central Eskimos, Report of the V Thule Expedition 1921-24 Vol. IV, 1927). And, for you sticklers, this is not OR; the evidence is there for anyone to see.--Death Bredon (talk) 09:21, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Your comment, dated 1 Dec 2007, was archived... see the top of the page for archives. I'm glad you have kept an eye on this page, as I do not have the expertise to comment on it (although I do know enough to know the Sadlermiut weren't "relict Dorset"). ناهد/(Nåhed) speak! 09:57, 10 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I want to point out that your comment regarding the Sadlermiut is unfounded. True, the 'irregularities' observed in their cultural traditions did spark the first assumptions that they had been the 'last' remnants of the Dorset culture, and Henry B. Collins was one of the first researchers to point it out (yet, Collins based his assumptions on far more than mere tools if you have ever bothered to read his research).  However, he is not the only one to have filled in the gap for the continuity between the Sadlermiut and the Dorset, and I would like to point out that recent human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) research has established a clear direct link between the two groups.  The gist of which is explained on the Sadlermiut article itself, with provided references for support.
 * And you may be surprised to know that the Sadlermiut are not the last people with a direct Dorset ancestry, as the same mtDNA research has demonstrated that the Aleut are descendants of the Dorset, meaning that they were not subjected to a population displacement 1000 years ago. Similar to the Sadlermiut, the Aleut were subsequently affected by Thule culture, and intermarriage has not been an unknown phenomenon since the Thule transition.  Hence why Sadlermiut mtDNA reveals nearly equal share of Dorset and Thule haplogroups; to add to the fact that 1000 years is more than ample time to begin adopting new tools, houses and methods unknown to their predecessors. - By this token, I should warn you not to misinterpret the sentence "They are often thought to have been the last remnants of the Dorset culture" as meaning that the Sadlermiut are inherently 100% Dorset in every single way possible; as they have long been known to combine elements from both societies, yet the qualities related to the Dorset would mean that the Sadlermiut are remnants of them (although no longer the last).


 * In the end, you can choose to ignore DNA evidence at your own discretion, but the major cultural differences separating the Sadlermiut from neighbouring Aivilingmiut were far more than just a few things. Houses, tools, habits, diet, transportation, language, sexual division in labour, tooth wear, skeletal pathology (e.g. distribution of vertebral osteophytosis), and other such things have played important roles in the distinction between the Sadlermiut and other mainland Inuit. - Io Katai (talk) 06:09, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 14:41, 1 May 2016 (UTC)