ABSTRACT
During the period from 3500 to 2500 bp, Northwest Coast archaeological cultures begin to show clear relationships to later ethnographic cultures. These resemblances raise the question of whether all the traits associated with the later Northwest Coast societies—ascribed status, winter villages, dependence on stored salmon, in short, the Developed Northwest Coast Pattern—had been achieved. We begin this chapter by reviewing some of the models that have been put forward to explain the emergence of the Developed Northwest Coast Pattern. Once we have reviewed these, we will be in a position to compare the evidence from the archaeological record with these explanatory models. We will begin our survey of this stage in the Gulf of Georgia area, where the first culture of this stage, the Locarno Beach phase, was identified.
