Human Dorset Remains from Igloolik, Canada

Abstract

Skeletal remains of four Dorset Palaeo-Eskimo individuals were found at Alarnerk (NhHd-1), Melville Peninsula, in 1954 by the joint Danish National Museum-University of Pennsylvania Expedition, which was excavating Dorset and pre-Dorset sites. These remains included one complete mandible, two fragmentary mandibles, and a cranial fragment. One of the mandibular fragments, found in a grave, was from a child approximately nine months old. The other remains were found in middens at the site. These remains add to the otherwise very sparse Dorset human material. Analysis of the dental morphology, as well as morphometric analysis of the complete mandible, shows Eskimoid characters and resemblance with later period Greenlandic human skeletal remains.