It started last August with construction workers' haphazard discovery of a few discarded seashells, essentially ancient table scraps that often provide the first clues to long-ago societies.
Now, the artifacts and remains unearthed from the silty grounds of a state Transportation Department construction site on Port Angeles Harbor number in the hundreds.
Among the finds revealed publicly yesterday were hundreds of skeletal remains, along with pieces of shelter and tools for daily life in an ancient Klallam Indian village -- discoveries that some archaeologists now say make the site one of the most significant cultural finds ever in Western Washington, and potentially beyond.
"This site is remarkably intact, and it's enormous," said Lynn Larson, the archaeological dig's principal investigator and an archaeologist for 25 years. "I've never seen a site that big."
Among the artifacts to surface from the grounds of Tse-whit-zen -- a likely former winter village of the Klallam peoples of the upper Olympic Peninsula that carbon dating so far shows could be as old as 1,719 years -- are remnants of a longhouse and at least two other tribal houses crafted from cedar.
Discovery of such structures is significant, Larson said yesterday, because they may be among the oldest remnants of homes ever found in the Northwest.
Along with cedar posts and other parts of house foundations, fish hooks, combs, needles fashioned from bones, etched rocks and jewelry made from copper have emerged.
And the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe said yesterday that complete skeletal remains of more than 150 people buried within the 22-acre plot just west of Port Angeles, at the base of Ediz Hook, have been excavated and removed, with the partial remains from 200 other people also recovered.
"It's just overwhelming," Frances Charles, Lower Elwha tribal chairwoman, said yesterday of the breadth of new discoveries being made at the village of her ancestors.
"What's really good about it is, we're going back into the time of our culture and getting the chance to learn the history of our people that was lost."
But at the same time, Charles added, the uncovering of Tse-whit-zen is bittersweet. Not only has it disturbed graves of tribal ancestors, but excavation has found that several long-ago construction projects across the grounds have desecrated tribal remains.
Likewise, Charles said, it is now too late to preserve the relics, artifacts and remains at the original village site. The tribe had agreed with the Transportation Department to "mitigate" the site, rather than to preserve it, meaning everything unearthed will be removed.
"If I knew what we know today six months ago," Charles said yesterday, "we would have asked the state not to have the project there."
With the discovery last August of shell midden, as archaeologists call such collections of shellfish remains, construction workers building a massive graving dock for a Hood Canal Bridge refurbishing project got their first inklings of the land's historical significance.
The Transportation Department bought the 22-acre parcel from the Port of Port Angeles for $3.2 million, said Lloyd Brown, a department spokesman. The state agency wanted to use the site to construct the graving dock -- a sort of massive bathtub where new pontoons for the floating bridge could be built. The dock's basin could then be flooded with water, so that the pontoons could be floated south through Puget Sound to the bridge's construction site.
Before any digging occurred, the department surveyed the site's grounds -- core samples were taken and test pits dug -- but "we amazingly did not turn up any artifacts," Brown said.
Once the shell "ecofacts" were unearthed last summer, the graving dock project was halted, and archaeological consultants were brought in to survey the site and prepare a plan to mitigate any findings.
In March, the Lower Elwha tribe agreed with state and federal agencies on a "site-treatment plan," a historical preservation strategy to remove the artifacts found.
Since then, Larson Anthropological and Archaeological Services Ltd., a Gig Harbor-based archaeological firm, has been working with about 40 tribal members to excavate the site. Initial plans were to finish the field work this month, with the graving dock project to then continue.
Even with construction on the graving dock delayed for nearly a year, Brown said yesterday, the overall $271 million bridge project is expected to finish on time, by the end of 2007.
But now, with the remarkable discoveries being made at the former tribal village -- artifacts have been found over nearly the entire site -- the archaeological field work likely won't be concluded on schedule.
"We were supposed to be done by July 23, but it won't be," Larson said yesterday.
In the meantime, excavators working on the site are uncovering new finds that are helping tribal members better understand their culture, Charles said.
Cedar sticks pulled from the earth likely were used as "drying racks" for salmon and other fish. About 50 carved, fashioned and etched rocks provide insight into ceremonial traditions and funerary rites.
"One of them looks just like a doll," Charles said of the rocks. "Another one is shaped like the moon."
But perhaps most remarkable from an archaeological standpoint, Larson said, are the cedar posts and house remnants that speak to an ancient winter village where Klallam peoples likely returned season after season for generations.
"We just don't find any houses, particularly 1,700 years old," Larson said, cautioning that the age of the homes has yet to be scientifically dated with precision.
Evidence of hearths in the structure near sleeping benches -- rather than centrally located -- are unique to Klallam longhouses, she added.
Although carbon dating on some of the site's deepest soil samples put them at more than 1,700 years ago, Larson said, experts cannot yet say how old the houses are or how long the site was occupied. Additional tests are under way.
Still, archaeologists view the findings thus far as among the state's most important.
"In terms of the Olympic Peninsula, outside of the Ozette site, it's probably the most significant site yet to be discovered," Larson said.
Ozette, the site on the Pacific coast of an ancient Makah tribal village, was buried and preserved by a mudslide about 500 years ago. It yielded more than 60,000 artifacts after being discovered by beachcombers in 1970.
Likewise, the Tse-whit-zen site has been preserved by covering debris -- but in this case, it was artificial. In about 1915, the tribe was forced to leave the site, as a sawmill was constructed over it, Charles said. But the land below the mill was largely undisturbed, as the structure was built above ground on pilings and backfill covered much of the land, preserving the village below.
Still, construction projects on the site over the years, including the laying of utility and water lines, led to some grave desecrations. Remains of tribal members were even used as backfill, officials have said.
The tribe has since delicately removed remains of hundreds of ancestors, along with funerary objects accompanying them, and stored them at an undisclosed location. Tribal members are constructing traditional cedar boxes for each skeleton, with the tribe now planning to obtain land adjacent to the village site to reinter them, Charles said.
The tribe also is seeking funding for creation of an interpretive center and museum facilities for tribal artifacts.
Already, tribal members have been profoundly touched by the discovery of their lost history, Charles said. For young Klallam Indians, working on the excavation site has "helped them heal in a lot of ways," she said.
"It's let them understand who they are and their purposes for being here."
But the discoveries of desecrated graves -- and the removal of those intact -- has been trying on the tribe, too.
"What we hope will happen is that all the agencies out there will ask the questions first," Charles said. "Listen to the histories of tribes, so that nobody has to go through what we are going through today."