ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Nutr.
Sec. Nutritional Ecology and Anthropology
This article is part of the Research TopicPrehistory to Present: The Evolution of Human Diets and Nutritional EcologyView all articles
Dietary Change Revealed in Kitchen Refuse Pits from the Ancient Floors of Housepit 54, K'etxelknáz (Bridge River Site), British Columbia
Provisionally accepted
Anna Marie Prentiss1*
Ashley Hampton2
Jeannie Larmon3Megan Denis1Thomas A. Foor1Haley O'Brien1Nathan Goodale2Matthew J. Walsh4Alysha Edwards1Joshua Jack1Ethan Ryan3- 1University of Montana, Missoula, United States
- 2Hamilton College, Clinton, United States
- 3Historical Research Associates Inc, Missoula, United States
- 4Nationalmuseet, Copenhagen, Denmark
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Dietary change in traditional fishing and foraging societies has been examined from standpoints of resource accessibility, population demands, and social needs. Typically, scholars focus on singular models to explain diet choice including those from optimal foraging theory, socio-ecology, and political and historical ecology. It is far less common that we are able to evaluate multiple factors affecting shifting diets and associated cooking procedures within a singular archaeological context. In this paper, we draw data from the contents of deep pits filled with 2 kitchen refuse from the 15 stratified anthropogenic floors of Housepit 54, Bridge River Site (K'etxelknáz), British Columbia. We distinguish refuse pits from sequentially re-used cache pits drawing on sediment micromorphology, sediment geochemistry, and general pit contents. Then, focusing on the refuse-filled pits, we develop direct insight into kitchen activities by examining variation in faunal and floral remains and geochemical signatures. Multivariate analysis allows us to recognize patterns of co-associations between faunal remains. Botanical remains and geochemical signatures provide additional support for conclusions regarding food procurement and processing. Temporal change in kitchen regimes is compared to trends in regional climate, local population, and house-level social change to assess alternative explanatory models. Results implicate the effects of variation in choice of prey and associated processing and transport procedures as primarily related to population and climate-related foraging pressures.
Keywords: Dietary change, Pacific Northwest region, Salmon, Bridge River archaeological site, sediment geochemical research, sediment micromorphology research, ancient refuse pits
Received: 30 Sep 2025; Accepted: 28 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Prentiss, Hampton, Larmon, Denis, Foor, O'Brien, Goodale, Walsh, Edwards, Jack and Ryan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Anna Marie Prentiss
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