The glass beads from 48PA2706 used for this study were collected after the 2006 Boulder Basin fire with a basic description of the site published by Eakin (2005) and the collection was recorded in February 2022 at the University of Wyoming Archaeologial Repository (UWAR) in Laramie.
Eakin (2005:80) describes the site as “multi-component surface site approximately 30 x 120 m in size, situated on a remote and inaccessible flat between the base of a 50°+ slope and the edge of a vertical canyon. Three distinct activity areas characterize the site: a lodge/artifact scatter, a chipped stone/metal-working area, and a probable dump“.
Materials from this site in the UWAR collections were recorded during fieldwork in 2004 and 2005. Revisit in 2019 relocated mapping pins at areas 1-3, which were recorded using high resolution GNSS mapping and these locational data used to incorporate item site-based proveniences into the GRSLE UTM database.
Compared to all other assemblages inlcuded in this study, 48PA2706 inlcudes a relatively large number of thermally altered beads (e.g., melted, fused, distorted, and discolored). While this damage may have been the result of the 2003 fire that exposed the site, the close spatial clustering of the modified specimens and the lack of such damage in the other fire-exposed bead assemblages suggests that at least some of this damage may have been hearth related.
Bead Photos
References
Eakin, D.H. 2005. Evidence for Shoshonean Bighorn Sheep Trapping and Early Historic Occupation in The Absaroka Mountains of Northwest Wyoming. In University of Wyoming/National Park Service Research Center 29th Annual Report, edited by H.J. Harlow, and M. Harlow, pp. 74-86. University of Wyoming Graphic Arts and Publications, Laramie.