U n c ov e r i n g
the Chesapeake’s Deep Past
Al Luckenbach
An historically accurate reconstructed wigwam. The archaeologists have found evidence of wigwams dating back to 1000 b.c.
The Pig Point site has yielded 10,000 years of remarkable finds, including Maryland’s oldest structures. By Paula Neely
O
n a crisp, fall morning at Pig Point, Maryland, archaeologist Shawn Sharpe carefully scraped sandy soil away from a small quartz boulder on a bluff overlooking Jug Bay, where the Patuxent River and its Western Branch converge. “Someone grabbed it and brought it back here,” Sharpe said,
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as he kneeled beside the stone in a work area where prehistoric people made tools 7,000 years ago. “They knocked flakes off of it to make points, scrapers, and various tools,” Sharpe said, explaining that worn hammerstones and quartz flakes were discovered near the boulder
spring • 2012
