Dr. Ashley shows Mandy the site layout.
Dr. Ashley showing students examples of wooden utensils.
TIMUCUAN Voices Located on Big Talbot Island south of Amelia, a University of North Florida archaeology dig makes a discovery that gives voice to the indigenous people of Northeast Florida. BY MANDY HAYNES • PHOTOS BY SHERRY CARTER
D
r. Keith Ashley, University of North Florida (UNF) Archaeology Lab director and assistant professor, is giving a voice to the indigenous people who lived in Northeast Florida. Through his discoveries, he is telling their story, and he and his team are doing it one shovelful of dirt at a time. In November, Sherry Carter and I met with Dr. Ashley on Big Talbot Island at the site where he and his students have made an incredible discovery. After 23 years of searching for the precise location of the village of Sarabay, Dr. Ashley believes they have found it. The first excavations conducted by UNF on the southern end of Big Talbot Island began in 1998. I listened as Dr. Ashley explained how they came to the decision to look there, and I realized that I was hearing a genuine story about searching for lost treasure. From Spanish documents dated 1565 that 33 AMELIA ISLANDER MAGAZINE •
mention Sarabay, along with correspondence from 1602, a map from 1703, and discoveries of “Indian pottery” in the late 1960s, Keith Ashley, Buzz Thunen, and Vicki Rolland initiated a shovel test survey of the south end of Big Talbot Island. Conducting more than 550 shovel tests over a three-month period, they turned up indigenous San Pedro and San Marcos pottery, along with other clues that warranted a closer look. The three returned with several students to the site they named Armellino, and the UNF field school went to work digging four individual 1-meter by 2-meter units scattered across the area near the site of the original tests. It’s a time-consuming process. Every shovel of dirt is sifted through, studied, and recorded. Everything matters – even the color of the soil beneath the surface tells a tale. The fourth and continued on next page
JANUARY 2022
www.AmeliaIslander.com
