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The Archaeology of Prince of Wales Island Before 1996

The discovery of Shuká Káa in On Your Knees Cave was not the first evidence that ancient people had inhabited Prince of Wales Island.

The island had attracted archaeological attention for decades before 1996, and the broader context of that earlier work helps situate the On Your Knees Cave discovery within the trajectory of Northwest Coast archaeology.

The archaeological record of the Alexander Archipelago and the adjacent coast of British Columbia documents human occupation extending back to the early Holocene at multiple sites.