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Comer's Midden is the find after which the Thule culture was named. The site was first excavated in 1916 by whaling Captain George Comer, ice master of the Crocker Land Expedition's relief team, and members of Knud Rasmussen's Second Danish Thule Expedition who were in the area charting the North Greenland coast.
The site shows signs of having been inhabited from the 14th to the 20th century although Holtved reports that the 17th and 18th centuries are poorly represented. It contains about 26 house ruins and several middens distributed over an area of about 120 m in width and stretching over 400 m inland with the midden Comer excavated located at its south end. The majority of the houses were more or less rounded, typically around 3m to 5m across and most likely residential. One house was rectangular 4.5m by 6m, with narrow platforms along two of the walls, was probably a 'qassi' or 'men's house' and was probably used as a workshop and for social gatherings.
Subsequent to the initial finds, additional artifacts pertain to the Dorset culture, as well as items of Norse origin. The vast majority of harpoon heads found are of the open socket type typical of the Thule culture.
References:Sigmaringen Castle was first mentioned in the year 1077 in the chronicles of Petershausen monastery. The oldest parts of the castle are concealed beneath the alterations made during the 17th and the 19th centuries. The secret of the earliest settlement built on this defendable rock will never be fully revealed: large-scale excavation work would be necessary, which the extensive land development renders impossible. Judging from the many Roman remains unearthed in the area around Sigmaringen, the 12th century keep known as the 'Roman Tower' could be traced back to a Roman predecessor.
The castle remains that have been preserved (gate, great hall and keep) date back to the Staufer period around 1200. The castle remains were integrated into subsequent buildings. The foundations of the castle buildings are to a large extent identical to the surrounding castle wall.
These remains give us a good idea of how the castle might have looked during the 12th century.