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Ancient Harp Seal Hunters of Disko Bay: Subsistence and Settlement at the Saqqaq Culture Site Qeqertasussuk (2400-1400 BC), West Greenland. Morten Meldgaard. Copenhagen: Meddelelser om Gronland, 2004. 189 pp.
This is not the typical site-specific text that might be incorrectly inferred from its title. Rather, it is a study that reveals much about how many of the early inhabitants of West Greenland were able to not only survive but also actually thrive in one of the harshest environments on the face of the earth, a feat not equaled by the later-arriving Vikings. The excavation team was extremely fortunate to find this site "where the sea had exposed permafrozen midden deposits with extraordinary well preserved bones, wood, baleen and feathers" (p. 9), which enabled team members to accurately determine how available food resources varied on both a short-term and a long-term basis. Also available at or near the site were certain important paleoenvironmental indicators (e.g., the present and past...