QUINHAGAK, ALASKA—Recent excavations at the 500-year-old Yup’ik village of Araliq have uncovered a labret, worn by men through piercings in their jawbones or by women over the chin; and a ul’uaq, or woman’s cutting knife, with an ivory handle carved in the shape of Palrayak, a mythical sea monster. Weapons at the site, along with a layer of ash, are evidence of the period known in Yup’ik history as “anguyagpallratni,” or “the bow and arrow wars.” “There is a piece of armor that’s derived from Asian samurai armor where there’s these overlapping plates, except it’s made of antler sewn together," lead archaeologist Rick Knecht of the University of Aberdeen told Alaska Public Radio. “And here’s some more evidence of the ‘bow and arrow wars,’ this is one of the burned arrow points that we found in the ruins of the house. It was fired at somebody in anger. Roof sods and stuff absolutely riddled with those kinds of points. Seventy-five percent of all the arrow points in that house were found in the upper layer.” Knecht and his team are racing to excavate the village before it erodes into the Bering Sea.
