Archaeologists have found the remains of an ancient camp on a remote high arctic island dating back more than 4,000 years.

They offer surprising new insights into the first people who lived near the present-day Canada-Greenland border and traveled to take advantage of the rich new ecosystem that was forming at the time.

A Paleo-Inuit archaeological site was found at Kitsissut, a rocky cluster of cliff-edge islands between Greenland and Ellesmere Island.

Just like a few thousand years ago, today you get there by boat at least 53 kilometers from the nearest coast in the harsh conditions of the high Arctic.

“It would have been a pretty unusual journey for them to reach this location by boat,” said Matthew Walls, lead author of the new study describing the findings. published Monday in the journal Antiquity.

Walls estimates that it would take 12 to 15 hours of hard paddling to reach Kitsissut by canoe or kayak — so long that the weather could easily turn from calm to stormy en route.

The archaeological site contains evidence that many people visited and stayed there more than once.

“It’s obviously a place where people come back long-term,” Walls said.

Max Friesen, an arctic archaeologist at the University of Toronto who collaborated with the other authors of the paper but was not involved in this research, said the findings suggest that the Paleo-Inuit had much more sophisticated navigation technology than previously thought.

He said small fragments of their boats have been found, suggesting they had canoe- or kayak-like vessels made of animal skins pulled over bone or wood frames. But not much more was known.

Friesen, who was Walls’ Ph.D. supervisor, said Paleo-Inuit were found throughout the high Arctic. If they had the skills and technology to travel to Kitsissut all the time, they could probably also do things like hunt seals or even whales far out in the ocean.

This means that they may have had greater options for the resources they could use and how they could affect ecosystems thousands of years ago.

“That has huge implications for the rest of the Arctic, doesn’t it?” Friesen said. “So it’s really exciting, really adding to what we know about transportation technology.”

What the ancient camp looks like

Walls collaborated with University of Greenland researchers Mari Kleist and Pauline Knudson and a team of local Inuit to map the archaeological site and exhibited artifacts between 2017 and 2019.

A series of ridges rise from the ocean over time, rising under the weight of now-melting glaciers. On the oldest, highest ridges, furthest from the modern coast, there are at least 18 tent rings—circular areas cleared of rock, with a ring of stones around them.

These stones may have held the edges of the tent, possibly a sealskin stretched over a driftwood frame.

There was usually a central hearth with the remains of burnt driftwood in the center and a row of stones that divided the tent into two “rooms” that could be used for different activities, such as working with animal skins or making stone tools.

A seabird bone found inside one of the tent rings has been sent off for radiocarbon dating. Based on that analysis, the researchers estimated the age of the site to be between 4,000 and 4,400 years old, the period when the first archaeological evidence of humans, known as the Paleo-Inuit, were found across the high Arctic.

Polynya pioneers of many species

Around this time, a rich ecosystem developed in Kitsissut, due to the formation of a rare channel of open water in the sea ice called the Pikialosorsuaq or North Water polynya. Walls said this is due to the unique wind, current and geographic conditions in the area.

“It’s a really important ecological hotspot,” Walls said. Open water allows for phytoplankton blooms that support the entire food chain.

The Kitsissuta cliffs are home to nesting colonies of seabirds and marine mammals, such as seals, that hunt in the surrounding waters, many of which would have moved there for the first time when the polynya opened.

Walls said this is important for the way people think about these Arctic ecosystems and their conservation.

“Indigenous communities are part of their long-term development, all the way back to their early formation,” he said, supporting the case for indigenous governance today.

Lesley Howse is the director of archeology at the Inuit Heritage Trust, an Inuit organization that, together with the Government of Nunavut, manages cultural heritage, including archaeological collections and education, allowing archaeological projects and requests to work with Inuit things.

Howse, who previously worked with Walls, Kleist and Knudsen but was not involved in this study, said archaeologists previously thought the Paleo-Inuit relied heavily on hunting animals on land.

She is not surprised by the evidence that they had such a high level of skill at sea, given the need to use whatever resources were available to survive in such a harsh environment.

“Water is essential to life in the north,” she said. “You have to depend and rely on whatever animals are there and adapt to the technologies you have. I think this (research) kind of brings that to light.”