The archaeological site known as the Kuypers Site is situated on the south bank of the Assiniboine River at Headingley.The University of Manitoba and University of Winnipeg conducted a joint archaeological field school in May and June of 2002 at the Kuypers Site.Two previous excavations and several surface collections have been conducted at the site in the past.In 1972,the University of Winnipeg conducted an archaeological field school at the site and in 1980 Brandon University and the University of Winnipeg conducted a joint field school at this site.
The Kuypers Site is believed to be an area that was sporadically but repeatedly occupied by bison hunters for thousands of years prior to the arrival of European explorers and settlers.The shores of the Assiniboine River would have provided shelter,bison and plant food for people in the past and their activities here are well represented by the recovered stone tools and bison bones that have been butchered and
processed,and small pieces of Aboriginal pottery.
Based on the types of artifacts found at the site and the rather thin distribution of these artifacts over such a large area (1km 2),in addition to the fact that the artifacts are typical of a number of time periods,it is evident that this site was used on multiple occasions,although probably not intensively. A series of scroll bars visible on the ground,on aerial photographs and topographically,indicate that the site was formed by the lateral migration of a meander of the Assiniboine River during episodic flooding .These scroll bars present interesting features in relation to the pattern of artifact distri-bution across the site.
The oldest signs of site occupation is represented by Oxbow projectile points,scrapers and other types of stone cutting tools,and these are all located on the oldest point bar (the scroll bar which is the furthest from the river).A more recent Aboriginal occupation (ca.1000 AD)was weakly represented by three pieces of Aboriginal pottery, which were located on the most recent point bar.The archaeological investigation of the Kuypers Site has intrigued geologists who are investigating the changing course of the Assiniboine River.The discovery of occupations buried within specific scroll bars and the excavation of datable bone and wood material from the site can contribute to a better understanding of the development of the river.The Manitoba Geological Survey of the Manitoba Department of Industry, Trade and Mines sent a portion of a bison bone that was recovered during the archaeological excavations for radio-carbon dating.The bone provided a date of 3610 ±75 years Before Present (BP).
An additional radiocarbon date of 3950 ±120 years Before Present (BP)was obtained for the site from bone specimen that was collected during the 1980 excavations (Morlan et al 2000:164).In addition,the projectile point styles suggested that the site was Middle Precontact (ca1000 BP -
4000 BP).
One of the more interesting features was a lens of burnt bone located in two adjacent excavation units in one of the forested areas of the site.The 15 cm-thick lens of calcined bone (calcined -heated to such high temperatures that the bone turns white)was composed of thousands of small pieces of charred bone fragments that covered an area of approximately 0.5m2.This feature is believed to be the remains of bone processing where the de-fleshed bone was smashed and boiled for the removal of the marrow and fat.The marrow and fat from the bone are high in nutritional content and were a particularly important part of the diet of bison hunters.This type of bone processing feature is typical of bison hunters and is referred to as a “bone-boiling pit.” These features have been found at other archaeological sites where bison hunting was
known to have occurred. Close to two thousand artifacts were recovered by the 2003-field school and probably double that number were previously found at the earlier excavations.
