Site Structure of the Orbit Inn: An Application of Ethnoarchaeology

One goal of ethnoarchaeology is to strengthen archaeological inferences about the past. A fifteenth-century hunter-gatherer, open site in Utah is used to examine ethnoarchaeological contributions toward determining the use of space, duration of occupation, assemblage composition, and sitefunction. Comparisons between macrorefuse and microrefuse patterning suggest that (1) the distribution of macrorefuse can help identify locations of ephemeral structures and household activity areas; (2) the distribution of microrefuse in this intermittently occupied open site is useful for assessing assemblage composition; (3) determining the characteristics of macroand microrefuse improves hypotheses about duration of occupation; and (4) interpretation of plant remains can be improved by considering site-formation processes. The study points to the needfor a closer linkage between ethnoarchaeology and the archaeology of the past.