Margaret Bay
UNL-048
Margaret Bay is a multi-component site located on the shoreline of Amaknak Island
within the current city of Unalaska, in the Fox Island group of the eastern Aleutians. The
site is deeply stratified with at least four occupation layers ranging in age from ca. 2,500
cal BP to 6,000 cal BP. Excavations at Margaret Bay were conducted by the Museum of
the Aleutians during the 1999 and 2000 field seasons, directed by Rick Knecht.
Approximately 72 square meters were excavated to sterile sub-soil and/or bedrock
exposing the remnants of multiple structures, hearth features, trash dumps (midden), and
numerous chipped stone and bone tools.
The Margaret Bay site sits upon a knoll approximately 18 meters above the current
shoreline of Unalaska Bay. Relative sea level during the middle Holocene, and coinciding
with the earliest occupations at Margaret Bay, may have been as much as two meters
higher than present. More than 10,000 cataloged lithic and bone artifacts were recovered
from 4 occupational layers, as well as hundreds of thousands of chipped stone debitage.
Notably, faunal remains recovered from a midden deposit (Level 4) at the site include
examples of ice-obligate species alongside the typical trio of Aleutian sea mammals
(Harbor Seal, Stellar’s Sea Lion, and Northern Fur Seal) suggesting that winter sea ice
may have extended further south to the vicinity of Unalaska Island ca. 4,500 years ago.
Winter occupation of Margaret Bay ca. 3,500 cal BP is suggested by the stone-lined
semi-subterranean dwelling (Structure 1) uncovered at the site. At nearby Amaknak
Bridge (UNL-050) all of the structures were constructed in this manner and a similar
structure was partially excavated in the basal layer of Chaluka (SAM-001) on Umnak
Island. In the Aleutians, stone-lined house construction dates to 4,000 – 2,500 cal BP,
with some dwellings, including Structure 1 at Margaret Bay, also exhibiting internal subfloor stone-lined hearths and trenches.
The archaeological record from Margaret Bay was key to the formulation of the Eastern
Aleutian Cultural Sequence by Rick Knecht and Rick Davis in 2001 and this sequence
continues to be the primary framework of cultural history for the region. Analysis of the
material from Margaret Bay has made a significant contribution to the understanding of
technological and social changes that took place in the Eastern Aleutians. In general, the
sequence at Margaret Bay agrees with that of contemporaneous occupations at Chaluka
(SAM-001) on Umnak Island. At Margaret Bay, the occupational sequence extends to
6,000 years ago and demonstrates the continuity between the Anangula and Aleutian
Traditions.