Fishermen from Portugal, the Basque provinces of France and Spain, Northern France (perhaps Normandy) and West Country England are known to have frequented eastern Newfoundland during the first half of the 1600s, some as early as the first decade of the 16th century.

Archaeologists, after finding artifacts in one of the lower layers of the site, suspected they may have been made by the Beothuk.

An article about the discovery during the 1995 archaeological field season showing evidence that Ferryland had been occupied by the Beothuk.