The best known Paleoindian archaeological site in the Maritime Provinces is at Debert, Nova Scotia. The first published reference to the site is attributed to the notorious private collector W. A. Dennis of Kentville, who had purchased a small collections of artifacts from the site from E. S. Eaton and reported the site to the editors of American Antiquity (Cotter 1962:456).
This note caught the attention of John Erskine (1964), who, along with geologist W. A. Takes, were granted permission to investigate the site, which was located on Department of National Defence property. Erskine notified his long-time advisor Douglas Byers, who in turn enlisted the support of the National Museum in the subsequent excavation of the site. In fact, Debert became the first modern professional archaeological excavation in the Nova Scotia, under the direction of George MacDonald (National Museum) and Douglas Byers (Peabody Foundation). MacDonald's 1968 report on the excavation became an immediate classic in Northeast archaeology. In 1989-1990, Stephen Davis (1991) identified two additional sites at Belmont (BiCu-6, 7), which is within a kilometre of Debert, and more recently the total site count has risen to six (Brewster et al. 1996:82).

The Debert site is located on a low relief surface, sloping south from the Cobequid Hills, at about 30 m above mean sea level. Below is a flat plain and the Debert River. The site has been described as a high altitude caribou hunting base camp (MacDonald 1968). Tuck (1984) suggests that several bands may have congregated at this site for a co-operative hunting enterprise. MacDonald (1968) identified 11 living areas at the site, each with two or more hearth features, some pits and artifact clusters. Firewood from the hearths has been identified as almost exclusively spruce. Structures erected at the site probably also had wooden frames, with hide coverings, and possibly moss for insulation (Tuck 1984).

The Paleoindian toolkit is known to us almost entirely from lithic artifacts. At Debert, MacDonald reported spear points, drills and perforators with large flakes (channel flakes) removed from their bases to facilitated hafting. The projectile point style is generally described as being eared and fluted (see Vignette 3.1). Other tool forms included gravers, bifacial knives, and side scrapers. Local raw materials were used to make hammerstones and anvils, while better quality raw materials were acquired elsewhere. The most common raw material was chalcedony, which probably originated along the north shore of the Minas Basin between Five Islands and Parrsboro (MacDonald 1968:61). It appears that the local toolmakers attempted to conserve the better raw materials through heat treating to improve flaking qualities and by using a bipolar core technique to produce small sharp flakes from small cobbles.

A second Paleoindian, believed to be contemporary with Debert, is the Vail site, which is located along the ancient Magalloway river system in northeastern Maine. It was excavated in 1980 by Richard Gramly (Buffalo Museum of Science). It is depicted as a single occupation warm season caribou hunting camp (Gramly 1982). It is located at a constricted part of the river valley that was ideal for intercepting migrating caribou. The range of artifacts recovered was similar to Debert, including Debert style eared fluted projectile points. The raw materials used were probably acquired from deposits in northwestern and north central Maine or northern New Hampshire (Gramly 1982). Further to the south, at the Michaud site, on the Androscoggin River, a more shallow based style of fluted projectile point was recorded (Spiess and Wilson 1987). According to Spiess and Wilson (1989), the lithic use and manufacturing patterns at Michaud suggest a long distance quarrying practice, rather than collection on annual visits to quarries or acquiring raw materials through trade.

In 1972, the Historic Sites and Monument Board designated Debert as a National Historic Site of Canada. The Province of Nova Scotia granted protection to the site in 1976, under the Historic Sites Protection Act. Following the discovery on the Belmont sites, the Confederacy of Mainland Mi'kmaq initiated a project called "Mi'kmawey Debert" to foster the protection and public interpretations of the sites. In October 2005, they hosted a special workshop at Debert to address the future of the Debert/Belmont sites. Canadian and American scholars and community elders took part in a roundtable discussion of common research issues, interdisciplinary cooperation, and cultural resource management concerns relating to the sites. It was the first time that members of the original Debert excavation team were able to share their perspectives on the sites with more resent researchers in a public forum. The short-term benefits from this workshop will be a new publication updating the research on the sites and an archaeological survey to assess previously untouched portions of the protected area.

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