Conflict and Territoriality: An Archaeological Study of Ancestral Northern Coast Salish-Tla’amin Defensiveness in the Salish Sea Region of Southwestern British Columbia

Abstract

Coast Salish ethnohistory describes how various locations associated with settlements were used for defense within the Salish Sea region of southwestern British Columbia. During times of conflict, these linked places formed defensive networks that functioned to maximize defensibility at both the settlement and allied settlement scales. Examining the distribution of such defensive networks in time and space provides insights into the role of conflict in broader social contexts including territorial and tenurial claims expressed through territoriality. In this paper, we explore the relationship between defensive networks and expressions of territoriality among the ancestral Tla’amin-Northern Coast Salish. Combining visibility analysis with an index of site defensiveness, we find that Tla’amin defensive networks were in place from at least 900 years BP. This in turn suggests the longevity of territorial and tenurial claims expressed through defensive territoriality, as noted in the ethnohistoric record.

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