American Archaeology | Fall 2017 | Vol. 21 No. 3 by American Archaeology Magazine

DEBATING SERPENT MOUND

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PILGRIM COLONY FOUND

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FRONTIER MISSISSIPPIANS

american archaeology FALL 2017

a quarterly publication of The Archaeological Conservancy

$3.95 US/$5.95 CAN

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Vol. 21 No. 3

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american archaeology fall 2017

a quarterly publication of The Archaeological Conservancy

Vol. 21 No. 3

COVER FEATURE

24 AN INSTRUMENT FOR THE AGES BY GAYLE KECK People have been playing ocarinas for millennia.

12 THE SERPENT MOUND DEBATE BY DAVID MALAKOFF Who built this amazing effigy mound and when did they do it?

18 LIFE ON THE FRONTIER BY LINDA VACCARIELLO Carter Robinson Mound and Village is yielding information about life on the Mississippian frontier.

31 FINDING THE PILGRIMS bruce t. martin

BY RACHAEL MOELLER GORMAN Archaeologists believe they have located the Plymouth Colony, which was established in 1620.

37 SURVIVING IN A CHANGING WORLD BY BETH HOWARD Archaeologists are learning how the Catawba tribe overcame warfare, enslavement, and disease in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

45 NEW ACQUISITION

WHERE BEAUTIFUL POTTERY WAS PRODUCED The Conservancy obtains part of a site known for remarkable ceramics.

46 NEW ACQUISITION

A LONG AND WINDING ROAD

The Danbury site’s path to preservation had many twists and turns.

charlotte smith

48 NEW ACQUISITION

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LAY OF THE LAND LETTERS EVENTS IN THE NEWS

• Aztec Golden Wolf • Ancient Canoe Discovered • Paleo-Indian Experimentation

THE CONSERVANCY EXPANDS EBBERT SPRING

Having obtained another five-acre parcel, the Conservancy can now protect the entire site.

50 FIELD NOTES

52 REVIEWS

54 EXPEDITIONS

COVER: This four-hole ocarina depicts an unknown animal. It was found in Guanacaste, Costa Rica, and is now in the collections of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology at Harvard University. CREDIT: (c) President and Fellows of Harvard College, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. PM# 17-3-20/C8064

View more images from our feature articles online at www.archaeologicalconservancy.org american archaeology

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liz lopez photography

Lay of the Land The Benefits Of Preservation he Serpent Mound in southern Ohio was first brought to national attention in 1848 by journalist Ephraim Squier and physician Edwin Davis. (See “The Serpent Mound Debate,” page 12.) In 1885, Harvard archaeologist Frederic Ward Putnam visited the mound only to find plowing and development threatening to destroy it. With the help of some wealthy Boston women, it was purchased and preserved, the first case of a privately-funded preservation project in the United States. In 1887-89, Putnam excavated the mound but failed to find diagnostic or dateable artifacts. He later identified it as belonging to the Adena culture (circa 500 B.C. to A.D. 100) because two

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Adena mounds were nearby.That interpretation stuck until the 1990s, when the Ohio Historic Society conducted new research on the serpent. They recovered some charcoal that was radiocarbon dated to A.D. 900, placing it in the era of the Fort Ancient culture. A research project in 2011 led by William Romain got new radiocarbon dates with a mid-point of 321 B.C., right in the middle of the Adena era. And so the controversy continues, with both sides hoping for new evidence to support their theories. But it continues only because, in 1886, Putnam, with the help of the wealthy Boston women, saved this National Historic Landmark from near certain destruction by purchasing and

Mark Michel, President

preserving it. A century later, the Conservancy started the first systematic program to save what remained of the great mounds of Ohio with the purchase of the Hopewell Mounds. Over the next thirty-five years, the Conservancy has acquired, through gift or purchase, many more Ohio mounds, and they are being permanently preserved so that archaeologists can return with new research techniques to unlock their many mysteries.

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Letters The Benefits Of NAGPRA Like all writings dealing with repatriation, your article “The Fates Of Very Ancient Remains” (Summer 2017) assumed the loss of valuable historical knowledge is due to the actions of Native Americans. I am a Navajo, trained in anthropology, and I have worked in the museum world in the Southwest for thirty-five years. In the summer of 1973, as a young intern in training at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History Museum, I encountered abuse of burial remains first hand. One morning I opened one of the many rows of drawers that reached from floor to ceiling, and to my surprise discovered they held human burial remains. In another room were rows of tables with recently excavated remains. I was shocked and appalled. Although trained in science, I am a Native American first. As a Native American, it is my duty to preserve and perpetuate the traditional ways of my people. NAGPRA is the best thing that has happened to us. We don’t see its intent as a loss of our historical knowledge. We have other ways of recalling history that has served us well from time immemorial. We are not the culprits in this game, but victims who have been abused by “science” for many years. Justice has finally come. Harry Walters Red Valley, Arizona

American Archaeology welcomes your letters. Write to us at 1717 Girard Blvd. NE, Albuquerque, NM 87106, or send us e-mail at tacmag@nm.net. We reserve the right to edit and publish letters in the magazine’s Letters department as space permits. Please include your name, address, and telephone number with all correspondence, including e-mail messages.

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Editor’s Corner “These instruments are so prevalent, but we know so little about them,” observed José Cuellar, professor emeritus of Latino studies at San Francisco State University. Cuellar was referring to clay ocarinas, which are said to be the most common musical instruments used by pre-Columbian societies in Mesoamerica. (See “An Instrument For The Ages,” page 24.) Unlike most instruments, ocarinas have no standard type. In fact, their myriad shapes and sizes all but defy categorization.There are various animals—birds, monkeys, alligators, armadillos, frogs, fish, lizards, chickens, a dog atop a cow, a half-anteater, half-pig—and those are the ones known to zoologists.There is also an equally wide array of human-like figures. These simple wind instruments, some of which are thousands of years old, are capable of producing a range of sounds. It’s thought that their music served as an accompaniment to activities profound and prosaic, from warfare, funerals, and communions with the spirits to children’s amusement. Cuellar, who also goes by the name Dr. Loco, is an accomplished musician who heads the Rockin’ Jalapeño Band. A few years ago he put down his saxophone to become a Hrdy Fellow at Harvard’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, where he researched their extensive collection of ocarinas. In this case, researching them also meant playing them, much to the chagrin of some of the museum’s conservators who cared for these ancient, fragile instruments. While playing them, Cuellar did his own communing with the spirits. Had he damaged one, he would have taken it as a sign they disapproved of his endeavor. But the spirits, it appears, were pleased.

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WELCOME TO THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL CONSERVANCY!

he Archaeological Conservancy is the only national nonprofit organization that identifies, acquires, and preserves the most significant archaeological sites in the United States. Since its beginning in 1980, the Conservancy has preserved more than 510 sites across the nation, ranging in age from the earliest habitation sites in North America to a 19th-century frontier army post. We are building a national system of archaeological preserves to ensure the survival of our irreplaceable cultural heritage. Why Save Archaeological Sites? The ancient people of North America left virtually no written records of their cultures. Clues that might someday solve the mysteries of prehistoric America are still missing, and when a ruin is destroyed by looters, or leveled for a shopping center, precious information is lost. By permanently preserving endangered ruins, we make sure they will be here for future generations to study and enjoy. How We Raise Funds: Funds for the Conservancy come from membership dues, individual contributions, corporations, and foundations. Gifts and bequests of money, land, and securities are fully tax deductible under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Planned giving provides donors with substantial tax deductions and a variety of beneficiary possibilities. For more information, call Mark Michel at (505) 266-1540. The Role of the Magazine: American Archaeology is the only popular magazine devoted to presenting the rich diversity of archaeology in the Americas. The purpose of the magazine is to help readers appreciate and understand the archaeological wonders available to them, and to raise their awareness of the destruction of our cultural heritage. By sharing new discoveries, research, and activities in an enjoyable and informative way, we hope we can make learning about ancient America as exciting as it is essential. How to Say Hello: By mail: The Archaeological Conservancy, 1717 Girard Boulevard NE, Albuquerque, NM 87106; by phone: (505) 266-1540; by e-mail: mbawaya@ americanarchaeology.com; or visit our Web site: www.americanarchaeology.org You can also follow us on Facebook.

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1717 Girard Boulevard NE Albuquerque, NM 87106 • (505) 266-1540 www.americanarchaeology.org

Board of Directors Gordon Wilson, New Mexico CHAIRMAN Cecil F. Antone, Arizona • Carol Condie, New Mexico Janet Creighton, Washington • W. James Judge, Colorado Jay T. Last, California • Bill Lipe, Idaho Leslie Masson, Massachusetts • Dorinda Oliver, New York Rosamond Stanton, Montana • Bill Thompson, Texas • Jim Walker, New Mexico Conservancy Staff Mark Michel, President • Tione Joseph, Business Manager Lorna Wolf, Membership Director • Sarah Shuler, Special Projects Director Dawn Kaufmann, Web Developer • Kyrstin Beck, Administrative Assistant Crista Taylor, Administrative Assistant • Shelley Smith, Administrative Assistant Regional Offices and Directors Jim Walker, Senior Vice President, Southwestern Region (505) 266-1540 1717 Girard Boulevard NE • Albuquerque, New Mexico 87106 Tamara Jager Stewart, Projects Coordinator Paul Gardner, Vice President, Midwestern Region (614) 267-1100 3620 N. High St. #307 • Columbus, Ohio 43214 Jessica Crawford, Regional Director, Southeastern Region (662) 326-6465 315 Locust St. • P.O. Box 270 • Marks, Mississippi 38646 Cory Wilkins, Regional Director, Western Region (530) 592-9797 4445 San Gabriel Drive • Reno, Nevada 89502 Andy Stout, Regional Director, Eastern Region (301) 682-6359 22 S. Market St. #2A • Frederick, Maryland 21701 Kelley Berliner, Field Representative

american archaeology® PUBLISHER: Mark Michel EDITOR: Michael Bawaya (505) 266-9668, mbawaya@americanarchaeology.com ASSISTANT EDITOR: Tamara Jager Stewart ART DIRECTOR: Vicki Marie Singer, vicki.marie@comcast.net Editorial Advisory Board Larry Baker, Salmon Ruins Museum • Nicholas Bellantoni, Connecticut Jennifer Bengtson, Southeast Missouri University • Mark Boatwright, Bureau of Land Management Jonathan Burns, AXIS Research, Inc. • Michael Clem, Virginia DNR Glen Doran, Florida State University • Linn Gassaway, California Matt Hill, Iowa State University • Chris Judge, University of South Carolina-Lancaster Sue Miller, Idaho State University • Laura Murphy, Muckleshoot Tribal Archaeologist Carole Nash, James Madison University • Teresa Paglione, Natural Resources Conservation Service Paul Patton, Ohio University • Bonnie Pitblado, University of Oklahoma Christopher Rodning, Tulane University • Steve Simms, Utah State University Michael Strezewski, University of Southern Indiana • Stan Wilmoth, Montana State Archaeologist National Advertising Office Marcia Ulibarri, Advertising Representative 1717 Girard Boulevard NE, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87106; (505) 504-4264, mulibarri@earthlink.net American Archaeology (issn 1093-8400) is published quarterly by The Archaeological Conservancy, 1717 Girard Boulevard NE, Albuquerque, NM 87106. Title registered U.S. Pat. and TM Office, © 2017 by TAC. Printed in the United States. Periodicals postage paid Albuquerque, NM, and additional mailing offices. Single copies are $3.95. A one-year membership to the Conservancy is $30 and includes receipt of American Archaeology. Of the member’s dues, $6 is designated for a one-year magazine subscription. READERS: For new memberships, renewals, or change of address, write to The Archaeological Conservancy, 1717 Girard Boulevard NE, Albuquerque, NM 87106, or call (505) 2661540. For changes of address, include old and new addresses. Articles are published for educational purposes and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Conservancy, its editorial board, or American Archaeology. Article proposals and artwork should be addressed to the editor. No responsibility assumed for unsolicited material. All articles receive expert review. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to American Archaeology, The Archaeological Conservancy, 1717 Girard Boulevard NE, Albuquerque, NM 87106; (505) 266-1540. All rights reserved.

American Archaeology does not accept advertising from dealers in archaeological artifacts or antiquities.

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Events MuseuM exhibits • tours • Festivals • Meetings • education • conFerences

penn museum

christopher dorantes

v NEW EXHIBITS

Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology

Santa Fe, N.M.—The exhibit “Stepping Out: 10,000 Years of Walking in the West” features sandals dating back thousands of years that were found in dry caves in New Mexico and nearby regions. It includes Southwest and Plains moccasins, many beautifully beaded or quilled and exhibited for the first time in decades, as well as examples of contemporary native high fashion footwear. (505) 476-1269, www. miaclab.org (Through September 3, 2018)

Ute Indian Museum

Montrose, Colo.—The recently expanded Ute Indian Museum re-opened this summer with new exhibits featuring important artifacts, photographs, and contemporary video and audio that tell the story of the Ute people. These works focus on the Utes’ cultural survival, political self-determination, economic opportunity, and the continued celebration of the traditional Bear Dance. The stunning new building includes an outdoor patio and a traditional pine timber structure. (970) 249-3098, http://www.historycolorado.org/ museums/ute-indian-museum-renovation (Newly expanded museum)

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Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History Washington, D.C.—The new exhibit “Many Voices, One Nation” includes nearly 200 museum artifacts and about 100 loan objects that span 500 years and help illustrate how the many voices of the American people have contributed to and continue to shape the nation, from its beginnings to the present. Artifacts unearthed at the historic New Philadelphia site, an Archaeological Conservancy preserve, will be included in the display. (202) 633-1000, www.americanhistory.si.edu (New long-term exhibit hall)

sandra mcWorter

Museum of Indian Arts and Culture

University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pa.—The new exhibit “Moundbuilders: Ancient Architects of North America” explores 5,000 years of Native American moundbuilding traditions through photographs, archival excavation records, and more than sixty artifacts excavated at mound sites throughout the Eastern United States. Earthen mounds have played, and continue to play, important roles in the religious, social, and political lives of native people. Archaeologists have researched this tradition since the eighteenth century, discovering many thousands of mounds, from those at Cahokia, the massive pre-Columbian city outside St. Louis, to smaller mound sites such as Smith Creek in Mississippi, where Penn Museum is currently excavating. The exhibition explores the changing patterns of mound construction and use of mounds through time, beginning with the earliest known mounds, built by small groups of huntergatherers in the Lower Mississippi Valley as early as 3700 B.C. (215) 898-4000, www.penn.museum/exhibitions (Through December 30, 2017)

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University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich.— The special exhibit “Excavating Archaeology at the University of Michigan, 1817-2017” explores the history of archaeology and museums at the University of Michigan for the past 200 years, and looks forward to the future of archaeology and museums at Michigan in the coming century. The exhibition relies on carefully chosen objects, archival documents and images, and other illustrative materials to examine moments in the history of the University’s involvement in archaeology and the location of archaeology in the museum environment. (734) 764-9304, www.lsa.umich.edu/ kelsey/ (October 18, 2017 - May 27, 2018)

Pueblo Grande Museum Archaeological Park Phoenix, Ariz.—“Fragments: Broken Bowls Tell More Tales” explores the kinds of things archaeologists learn from small bits of broken pottery. Each sherd tells a story about the people who made and used it, allowing archaeologists to piece together larger stories about human lives and societies hundreds of years ago. (602) 495-0901, www.phoenix. gov/parks/arts-culturehistory/pueblo-grande/ (opens October 2017).

courtesy pueblo grande museum archaeological parK

Kelsey Museum of Archaeology

v CONFERENCES, LECTURES & FESTIVALS Southeastern Conference on Historic Sites Archaeology

September 15-16, The Spencer Shops, Salisburg, North Carolina. This year’s meeting at Spencer Shops, Southern Railway’s major steam locomotive repair facility in the early twentieth century, focuses on “the Archaeology of Transportation.” Whether by path, trail, paved road, on rails, over water, or through the air, transportation has played a vital role in the movement of people, their cultural practices, and their material goods. This theme will be explored in papers and poster presentations. (865) 974-1000, www.sechsa.org

Southeastern Archaeological Conference

November 8-11, Hyatt Regency Hotel, Tulsa, Okla. The conference includes paper and poster presentations, symposia, a reception at the Gilcrease Museum, field trips to Spiro Mound and other local sites, and dinner at the Tvlahassee Wvkokaye Ceremonial Grounds. The opening ceremony will feature drumming and dancing by Native American performers. A Native American art show will be held in conjunction with the conference. www.southeasternarchaeology.org

Plains Anthropological Conference

October 4-7, Bismarck, N.Dak. The seventy-fifth annual conference, which is hosted by the State Historical Society of North Dakota, features various presentations and poster sessions concerning anthropological research in the Great Plains. www.plainsanthropologicalsociety.org/meeting courtesy of the autry museum

South-Central Conference on Mesoamerica

October 13-15, Tulane University, New Orleans, La. This regional conference brings together scholars in the fields of archaeology, ethnography, and art history with students and the public to share information and interpretations about current Mesoamerican research. sccmconference@gmail.com, www.southcentralmeso.org

Jornada Mogollon Archaeological Conference October 13-14, El Paso Museum of Archaeology, El Paso, Tex. The conference will highlight papers and presentations related to the archaeology of the Mogollon region, including the Mogollon Rim, Mimbres, Jornada regions, and northern Chihuahua. (915) 755-4332, www.archaeology.elpasotexas.gov

Midwest Archaeological Conference

October 19-21, Indianapolis, Ind. The annual conference features presentations, symposia, lectures, a reception and tours to local sites. www.midwestarchaeology.org

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American Indian Arts Marketplace

November 11-12, The Autry Museum, Los Angeles, Calif. Enjoy a weekend of performances, juried arts competitions and marketplace, children’s activities, demonstrations, films, and traditional foods at the largest native arts fair in southern California. Featuring at least 200 Native American artists, the marketplace represents more than forty tribes from across the country. (323) 557-2000, https://theautry.org/events

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News IN THE

Sacrificial Wolf Burial Discovered In Downtown Mexico City Sixteenth-century Aztec offering was adorned with gold.

mirsa islas, courtesy proyecto templo mayor

his past spring Leonardo López Luján and his team uncovered a stunning, centuries-old sacrificial wolf adorned with elaborate gold jewelry while excavating the base of the Templo Mayor in Mexico City. While the stone box in which the wolf was buried had been partially disturbed by the installation of a sewer line in1900, the remarkable burial and offerings survived intact. “Curiously enough, the utility workers did not realize that the box contained thousands of objects dating back to the beginnings of the sixteenth century: sea shells and corals coming from the Atlantic Ocean, fish and bird bones, wooden scepters, copper bells, and more,” said López Luján, an archaeologist with Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History who is directing the excavation.“However, the most outstanding discovery is the skeleton of a juvenile Mexican wolf that had been sacrificed and buried inside this box. It was covered with ornaments and insignia related to the ideas of war, sacrifice, and death, all of them beautifully crafted with gold sheet.” Crew members Alejandra Aguirre and Antonio Marín discovered the offerings, which include twenty-two intact ornaments such as a nose ring and ring-shaped pectoral armor made of thin sheets of gold.“After thirty-nine years of excavations in this area, we had not found an assemblage of gold objects so beautifully crafted,” López Luján said. The eight-month-old wolf cub, said to be symbolically associated with the

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A conservator removes a layer of corals from gold pieces associated with the wolf’s skeleton.

deified warriors and the Aztec deity Huitzilopochtli, god of war and the sun, was buried facing west in a stone box on a layer of stone flint sacrificial knives between 1486 and 1502, during the rule of the fierce Aztec emperor Ahuítzotl. Canines also served as guides, leading fallen warriors across the river of the underworld. Since excavations began in 2007, 205 offerings have been discovered, only sixteen of which contained gold objects. The Aztec buried wolves, golden eagles, and roseate spoonbills attired as warriors at the base of their main pyramid, all with their heads oriented to the west in the direction of

the setting sun, representing companions of the Sun during the journey of fallen warriors to the underworld. “Right now we are digging just in front of the Huitzilopochtli’s chapel and inside of a cylindrical platform known as the Huei Cuauhxicalco,” explained López Luján. “The sixteenthcentury written sources mention that this was the burial place for the king’s ashes.” He added that analysis of the wolf’s rib bones will need to be conducted to determine if its heart was removed as part of the sacrifice in the same way captured warriors were ritually sacrificed on Aztec temple platforms. —Tamara Jager Stewart

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Researchers Create 3-D Model Of Sunken Seventeenth-Century City esearchers have created the first comprehensive map and 3-D models of the remains of submerged buildings in Port Royal, Jamaica, a seventeenth-century pirate haven that sank into the sea after a massive earthquake in 1692. Led by underwater archaeologist Jon Henderson of the University of Nottingham in England, an international team of researchers conducted a high-resolution sonar survey of the sunken city that began in July 2016. The survey revealed that about ninety-five percent of the submerged city, now about thirteen acres, lies buried under six to nine feet of silt and redeposited coral. It also revealed the lost remains of Fort James, one of Port Royal’s four forts, scattered on the sea floor. “You can see the extent of it for the first time,” Henderson said. They also created a 3-D digital model of the visible portion of Port Royal’s ruins. “You can see a tavern, a bottle shop, a residence, and parts of a fort… exactly how these sites appear on the seabed,” he said. The ruins were recorded by humans and robots. Production of precise 3-D models had been limited to areas where visibility is good. Henderson said the team pushed the boundaries of photogrammetry techniques in the murky waters around Port Royal and developed techniques to help visualize the underwater sites. He hopes that if people can see what’s there, they will care about the heritage so it can be protected. The catastrophic earthquake followed by quicksand and a tsunami destroyed the city and instantly killed about 2,000 of an estimated 6,000 to 8,000 residents. About thirty-three acres—two-thirds of the city—were buried beneath the waters of Kingston

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Jon henderson

The Jamaican city was a haven for pirates.

A diver records the submerged walls of Port Royal using stereo-photogrammetry.

Harbor. “Buildings sank straight down in the sand,” he said. Though it was destroyed by an eartquake rather than a volcano, the site is sometimes called the Pompeii of the New World. Henderson said that everthing the people were using and doing on a single day was sealed in situ in that moment of time. Known as the “Wickedest City on Earth,” Port Royal was famous for loose morals, pirates, bars, brothels, and bullion. After England captured Jamaica

from Spain in 1655, Port Royal became the English mercantile capital of the New World and grew rapidly into a wealthy center for trade and commerce for the entire West Indies. Today, it is a small quiet fishing village. The project was funded by an Ocean Explorers grant from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The survey will support a bid for UNESCO World Heritage status and help conserve the site for the future. —Paula Neely

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Prehistoric Canoe Discovered In Louisiana

brian Wright

The thirty-four-foot-long boat is largely intact.

Peter Fix, watercraft conservator at the Conservation Research Lab at Texas A&M University, watches as the canoe is lifted from a vat.

ne of the largest prehistoric canoes in North America was discovered in June by recreational boaters on the banks of the Red River near Shreveport, Louisiana. Radiocarbon dating indicates the thirty-four-foot-long, 2.5-foot-wide dugout canoe was built from a tree 600 to 700 years ago. “It’s a very rare find,” said Chip McGimsey, Louisiana state archaeologist. Though wood artifacts usually don’t preserve well, especially in Louisiana’s wet, humid climate, the canoe is missing only the top section of one side and part of the bow. McGimsey thinks it was built by the Caddo Indians, who lived along the river during that time. He estimated that it could have carried up to fifteen people without supplies, or four or five people with supplies. Researchers don’t know exactly where the canoe originated.“It washed

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into the area,” McGimsey said. Based on the damage to the wood, it appears to have been buried for a while away from insects and bacteria, then exposed, then reburied. He thinks the wood is cypress, which is rot resistant. It is also one of the only locally available trees that would have been tall enough and that has few branches, which would have been ideal for building a dugout canoe. Soon after it was discovered, the canoe was freed from the mud and hoisted up the riverbank on a wooden cradle with the help of about two dozen volunteers. It was sent to the Conservation Research Laboratory at Texas A&M University, where it will be conserved in one piece. McGimsey noted that other canoes previously discovered in Louisiana were found in pieces or were cut into sections for removal or conservation.

Donny Hamilton, director of the Conservation Research Laboratory, said the canoe is currently being “re-waterlogged” in a vat of water. After dirt and roots that are embedded in the surface are removed, it will be resubmerged in clean water. A soluble wax, Polyethylene Glycol (PEG), will be added gradually to the water for about two years until the water is between thirty and forty percent PEG. Then the canoe will be put in a freeze drier for about six months to slowly remove all the water to prevent it from warping or cracking. “It’s a big, spectacular, easily understood piece of the past,” McGimsey said. It’s also a window into the scale of Native American transportation, communication, and exchange during that time period. After conservation is completed, the canoe will be returned to Louisiana, where it will be exhibited. —Paula Neely

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Ancient Stone Tool Experimentation Variation in early American point production indicates cultural diversification.

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sebastian Wärmländer, stocKholm university

esearchers employing new methods to analyze PaleoIndian projectile points have found that, after centuries of using the same production techniques, some of the earliest Americans started experimenting with other methods. This experimentation suggests changing social interactions among Paleo-Indian groups toward the end of the Pleistocene when they were adapting to new environments and migrating to different areas. “The study developed from our interest in how 3-D laser scanning technology could be used to analyze new aspects of variation in ancient stone tools,” said Sabrina Sholts, curator of physical anthropology at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History (NMNH). In a previous study conducted in 2012, Sholts, fellow NMNH curator Dennis Stanford, and Sebastian Wärmländer of Stockholm University in Sweden, analyzed a collection of North American projectile points to compare bifacial asymmetry in ancient and replicate Clovis points. Clovis technology was used for several hundred years before a variety of other styles emerged. “We found evidence of a uniform Clovis knapping technique that was likely transmitted between expert knappers, based on a high degree of bifacial symmetry among the ancient projectile points,” Sholts said. “Questions about how this may have changed with different fluted point styles that followed Clovis after 12,900 years ago motivated this new study.” The team’s recent study, published July in the journal PLOS ONE, includes

The researchers made digital 3-D models of projectile points to examine their angles and contours.

a broad analysis of Clovis and four later projectile point styles from the Smithsonian and other museum collections. Together with co-author and NMNH research associate Joseph Gingerich, of Ohio University, they analyzed the points’ surface contours as they had done in the earlier study and also introduced a new method of analyzing digital models to assess the objects’ threedimensional asymmetry. Using another new technique developed by Wärmländer and co-author Stefan Schlager of the University of Freiburg in Germany, the researchers determined that the overall three-dimensional shapes of the points did not vary significantly. However, they did find increased variability in the surface contours among some of

the later styles of points, indicating a certain amount of experimentation. “These findings support the idea of increased experimentation and individual learning around 12,500 years ago, and demonstrate the usefulness of these methods for reconstructing human migration and interaction in early North America. By pinpointing the timing of this change in stone tool manufacture techniques, our research allows archaeologists to better hypothesize when regional territories and a broader diversification of culture began on this continent,” said Gingerich.“Our work proposes a new way to examine social interactions among huntergatherers by quantifying changes in technology.” —Tamara Jager Stewart

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Philadelphia Court Takes Control Of Historical Burials Numerous burials were exposed by a construction project.

claire gold

Philadelphia Orphan’s Court has claimed authority for hundreds of human remains dating to the 1700s that were unintentionally exhumed at a construction site in Philadelphia. Last November, construction workers uncovered bones from the former First Baptist Church cemetery, which was relocated in 1860. Hearing about the discovery, Rutgers University-Camden forensic archaeologist Kimberlee Moran and Anna Dhody, a forensic anthropologist and curator of the Mütter Museum and Director of the Mütter Research Institute at the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, contacted the developer. Moran and Dhody toured the site in January, and collected a small number of bones. They offered to monitor the operations, but the developer, PMC Properties, declined their offer. Historical documents indicated that all the burials had been moved to the Mt. Moriah Cemetery in 1860, so PMC didn’t expect to find remains when it broke ground. Upon uncovering remains, PMC and the City of Philadelphia took the position that no preservation laws had been violated and that by virtue of owning the land, PMC also owned whatever was beneath the land, according to Mark Zecca a lawyer who is assisting the Philadelphia Archaeological Forum. In late February, more remains were found. When the construction workers started to uncover coffins, it became clear there were layers of burials, some of which were stacked three deep. Moran and Dhody assembled a team of professional and student volunteers and, with PMC’s consent, they

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Volunteer archaeologists excavate one of the coffins.

completed an excavation in March, believing they had recovered all of the remains. But in late June, PMC found more bones, and consequently they hired a cultural resource management firm to excavate the site. PMC then petitioned Philadelphia Orphan’s court, which has legal jurisdiction over these matters, to rule on the ownership of the remains. The court “issued a ruling taking complete control of the remains,” said Zecca, who filed a brief with the court arguing that the state’s historic burial ground law applied to this case. The excavations are continuing, and PMC has been transferring the remains to a facility in Burlington,

New Jersey, where Moran and Dhody’s team is conducting a thorough inventory. Once all the remains have been recovered, skeletal analysis will take place. Ultimately, all the remains will be reburied at Mt. Moriah Cemetery, as per the court’s order. “An outcome of this project will most likely be a review of legislation to ensure this sort of situation doesn’t happen again.” Dhody said.“The project has mobilized many groups, including the State Historic Preservation Office and the Philadelphia Archaeological Forum. The goal is to maintain that momentum and keep these issues in the public’s consciousness.” —Tamara Jager Stewart

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The Serpent Mound Debate Archaeologists disagree about who built this remarkable effigy mound, and when they did it. By David Malakoff 12

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nyone who has tried to catch a snake knows the reptiles are elusive. So it only seems appropriate that Serpent Mound, a twisting, quartermile long, three-foot-high earthwork in southern Ohio, has eluded archaeologists’ grasps for decades. Over the past 170 years, researchers have offered changing and conflicting views on the age of the iconic effigy, which has been designated a National Historic Landmark. Some believe that people of the Adena culture, who created countless elaborate earthen mounds in the central Ohio River Valley and adjacent lands, built the serpent about 2,300 years ago. But others assert that it’s

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less than half that age, and that it was produced by the Fort Ancient people, who also built earthworks in this region. Regardless of who is right, recent research has cast new light on one of North America’s most distinctive, mysterious, and disputed ancient sites. “The great Serpent Mound is a really special place,” said archaeologist Bradley Lepper of the nonprofit Ohio History Connection, which owns the site.“You can’t walk along those curves without wanting to know more about who built it, when they built it, and what

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they were thinking. It is just a fascinating effigy.” In the 1840s, journalist Ephraim Squier and physician Edwin Davis—both avid artifact collectors—embarked on a systematic effort to document and map ancient earthworks across the Eastern United States. In 1846, acting on a vague tip about a “work of defence” atop a heavily wooded cliff overlooking Brush Creek in Adams County, the two men were surprised to find the giant effigy. After careful mapping (a backbreaking task), its form became clear: an enormous

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An aerial photograph of Serpent Mound taken from a drone. The mound is a National Historic Landmark.

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egg-shaped head with a single eye, attached to a body with a half-dozen curves and a tightly coiled tail. It was, they later wrote, “probably the most extraordinary earthwork thus far discovered.” Scholarly speculation about the serpent’s origins began swirling. Squier and Davis wondered if it was somehow linked to Egyptian, Greek, Celtic, or even Chinese cultures, since the serpent and the “circle, egg, or globe has been a predominant symbol among many primitive nations.” In the 1880s, however, other investigators challenged that idea, suggesting the serpent was likely a homegrown invention, not a foreign import. It wasn’t until 1887, however, that Frederic Putnam of Harvard University’s Peabody Museum launched a systematic dig. For three field seasons, his team excavated the head and body of the serpent—which had already been damaged by erosion, vandalism, and farming activities—and also explored adjacent burial mounds, graves, and apparent occupation sites. They found no major artifacts in the serpent itself, but they did find numerous items within two stratigraphic layers of soil at surrounding sites; they suggested that prehistoric people had occupied the area during

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at least two periods, one older than the other. Putnam believed the serpent’s builders were associated with the older occupation. It wasn’t until the 1930s and ‘40s, however, that researchers began formally classifying and dating the artifacts that Putnam’s team had recovered. They determined that many of the items from the younger occupation were associated with the Fort Ancient culture, which lasted from about A.D. 1000 to 1650. Artifacts from the older occupation, including those from a large conical burial mound about 600 feet southeast of the serpent, were associated with the Adena culture, which existed in the upper Midwest from about 500 B.C. to A.D. 100. By the 1940s, the serpent’s close proximity to the conical Adena burial mound and many of the artifacts, together with the perception that the snake was a common Adena artistic motif, had persuaded a number of researchers that the Adena built the mound. By the time this idea became conventional wisdom, Serpent Mound, which Putnam had rebuilt in the 1890s, had become the centerpiece of a public park. Numerous visitors came to gawk at it and speculate about its origins and purpose. Then, a century after the Serpent was reconstructed,

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Jarrod Burks runs a ground-penetrating radar machine over the mound, looking for evidence of nineteenth-century excavation trenches and details of the Serpent’s construction.

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ashy layer he had described. Still, they did recover two small chunks of burned oak from deep within the mound, but above the foundational soil. Both pieces of charcoal were radiocarbon dated to approximately 900 years ago. “That pointed to a Fort Ancient age—not Adena,” Lepper said. The reexamination also turned up other hints that the serpent was about 900 years old, the researchers reported in a 1996 paper in the Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology. When Lepper and other Ohio History Connection archaeologists dug trenches to install some new waterlines, for example, they revealed fresh evidence, including stone and ceramic artifacts, of a relatively large Fort Ancient occupation just 300 feet south of the serpent. (Putnam had also described this occupation, which he believed to be a village.) And when the researchers examined the notion that the snake was a notable motif in Adena art or earthworks, they concluded it wasn’t:“Very few serpent motifs have been recovered from Adena” sites, they wrote. But by Fort Ancient times serpent motifs “bearing much artistic resemblance to Serpent Mound become widespread in the archaeological record.” Taken together, the authors wrote, the evidence suggested that “the conventional interpretation of Serpent

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Karen leone

two avocational archaeologists, Robert Fletcher and Terry Cameron, helped catalyze a new study that challenged the conclusion that the Adena built the mound. Fletcher and Cameron were interested in investigating the idea that the serpent might be a kind of seasonal timekeeper aligned with the movements of the sun, moon, or planets. But to test their ideas, they needed a highly accurate topographic map of the serpent, which didn’t exist. For help, they contacted Lepper and other professional archaeologists, who saw this as an opportunity for a broad new investigation of the serpent. Radiocarbon testing, which didn’t exist in Putnam’s day, allows archaeologists to date tiny samples of charcoal. Putnam had reported finding an ashy layer of soil at the base of the serpent, and Lepper and his colleagues assumed the ashy layer resulted from the burning of vegetation prior to the mound’s construction.“And we realized that if we could date that ash, we’d know when construction began,” said Lepper, who led the investigation. In 1991, the team began the first major excavation of the mound since Putnam’s work, taking soil cores and reopening what they believed to be one of the original excavations. They were disappointed, however, to find no trace of the

A team of volunteers and archaeologists from Ohio Valley Archaeology, Inc. investigates the lost coil detected in the magnetic survey.

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american museum of natural history anthropology catalog # 20/1366

These copper serpent pendants were recovered from Madisonville, a Fort Ancient site in southwest Ohio. Bradley Lepper and his colleagues argue that this is evidence of a connection between the Fort Ancient people and Serpent Mound.

Mound as Adena rests on a somewhat tenuous foundation.”

wenty years later, however, the Adena scenario received more support. In 2011, a multidisciplinary team from a number of organizations began another investigation called the Serpent Mound Project. They employed LiDAR to create a fine-grained map of the serpent’s surface, magnetic sensors to search for buried features such as old trenches and hearths, and coring machines that removed eighteen soil samples out of different parts and depths of the mound.The results, published in 2014 in the Journal of Archaeological Science, included some surprises. Near the serpent’s head, for instance, the magnetic sensors detected soil that had formed a previously unknown curve on the east side of the serpent’s neck.“We call it the stealth, or lost, coil,” said Jarrod Burks of the consulting firm Ohio Valley Archaeology, which led the magnetic mapping effort.“It doesn’t seem to fit with the head we see today, and it looks like it was erased before the current design was built.” The bigger news, however, was the radiocarbon dates that the team got from charcoal and other organic material in four soil samples that appeared to come from the ancient surface on which the serpent was built.They produced dates ranging from 639 to 303 B.C., with a midpoint at 321 B.C.“That puts construction squarely in the Adena period” about 2,300 years ago, said archaeologist William Romain, who directed the project. But that doesn’t mean the 900-year-old dates reported in the 1996 study are wrong, according to Romain. Instead,

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those dates suggest the serpent has a long and complicated history, likely marked by multiple periods of use, abandonment, repair, and modification. One plausible scenario, he said, is that the Adena built the serpent, later people modified it (erasing the coil for instance), and Fort Ancient people undertook major repairs of the eroded coils, introducing charcoal from their time period into the structure. “Based on all the lines of evidence, that’s one of the best options,” Romain said. This year, he and his allies doubled down on that view in a paper scheduled for publication in the Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology that suggests exactly which of the serpent’s coils might have been eroded and then repaired long after it was built. The study also challenges the idea that a lack of serpent imagery at Adena sites suggests the mound was a Fort Ancient product.“There are many reasons why people or creatures may or may not be represented in prehistoric imagery,” the authors wrote. “We do not find images of Buddha, Muhammad, or Jesus made during their lifetimes; but that does not mean they were not important.” The bottom line, said Romain,“is that you can’t give the [Fort Ancient] date an edge based on iconography.”

epper, for one, isn’t convinced by this argument. One potential problem with the Serpent Mound Project’s conclusions, he said, is that the researchers can’t be sure their 2,300-year-old radiocarbon dates come from the surface on which the mound was originally built. That’s because, if Putnam was right, the builders scraped away all the topsoil

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american museum of natural history anthropology catalog # 20/1366

The previously unknown lost coil is seen in this image of the magnetic survey data.

Lost Coil prior to construction. So the archaeologists might have dated older soil that sits below that surface, skewing the analysis. “All you can really say for sure is that it was built sometime after about 300 B.C., but it doesn’t tell you how long after,” said Lepper. “All the old topsoil that would tell you may be gone.” Lepper and his colleagues argue that Serpent Mound bears a close resemblance to Fort Ancient-era carvings, jewelry, and pictographs involving snakes, especially images from Picture Cave, a Mississippian site in eastern Missouri, that appear to tell an origin story involving a snake. (The Fort Ancient adopted Mississippian iconography and beliefs, according to Lepper.) “We believe the imagery in Picture Cave and Serpent Mound are telling the same epic story,” they wrote in a paper they hope to publish in a peer-reviewed journal. Lepper and his colleagues also ask why the effigy is so different from the many other earthworks that have been credited to the Adena, few of which appear to depict animals. “If Serpent Mound was created by the Adena culture, then it existed in a splendid isolation that persisted for nearly a thousand years before anything else like it appeared,” they wrote. “If, on the other hand, it was created by the Fort Ancient culture, then it has a clear cultural context.” At the same time, Lepper conceded that the radiocarbon dates that loom large in his argument for the Fort Ancient could be a problem. The 900-year-old charcoal could have been transported to the mound long after it was built—possibly by nature, or perhaps by Fort Ancient repair crews, or the workers who centuries later rebuilt and maintained the

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serpent. The Fort Ancient charcoal “is a strong piece of evidence,” he said,“but not a definitive piece.” It may be that the only way to resolve this debate is by collecting more and better data. “Both sides have strong and weak points,” said David Pollack, the director of the Kentucky Archaeological Survey. “I think the verdict is still out. There are a lot of questions.” It’s possible dating more charcoal samples might provide a resolution, or better yet, finding dateable artifacts that are within the mound itself or “clearly in a context related to the building of the mound,” he said. But, so far more than a century of digging has failed to uncover such diagnostic artifacts. The archaeologists agree that a relatively new dating technique called optically stimulated luminescence—which measures how long it has been since sand grains were exposed to sunlight—could be a powerful tool for dating both the foundational surface and the matrix of the mound. But conducting such studies will require more funding as well as the required permits to once again trench or core the mound. So it could be a lengthy wait. In the meantime, the researchers continue to try to come to grips with the serpent.“We know there’s a lot more to learn out there,” said Burks. “So much happened on that site—it was a very busy place over a very long period of time—and we’re still grappling with understanding it all. We’ve just got to keep trying.”

DAVID MALAKOFF is a deputy news editor at Science magazine in Washington, D.C. He is a frequent contributor to American Archaeology. 17

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charlotte smith

The investigation of a village in southwest Virginia is revealing details about life on the edge of the Mississippian world. By Linda Vaccariello A handful of researchers investigate the site in 2013.

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LIFE ON THE

FRONTIER

A FEW MILES EAST OF THE NARROW GAP in the Cumberland Mountains where Daniel Boone and his companions blazed a trail into Kentucky, Maureen Meyers is puzzling over another group of settlers. Her subjects are the Mississippian people who built the Carter Robinson Mound and Village in western Virginia and occupied it for 150 years. The Mississippian culture lasted from roughly A.D. 900 to 1500. The name comes from the Mississippi River Valley that was their stronghold, but these ancient people spread into other parts of the Southeastern U.S., too. The Carter Robinson inhabitants came from Mississippian enclaves in

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Tennessee, “This was their frontier,” said Meyers, an archaeologist at the University of Mississippi. “We know a lot about Mississippian culture, but not a lot about their interaction with others at the frontiers.” Meyers’ work at Carter Robinson focuses on the nature of life on the fringes of the Mississippian world. She wants to understand how the location influenced people’s activities. “Frontiers are important places to study because they are generally where people with different backgrounds interact, or that bridge other more densely settled areas,” said Barbara Mills, a University of Arizona archaeologist who is familiar

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Researchers excavate the middle structure of the three structures that were built on top of each other.

with frontier research. “They may be conduits for information and resources and places with a high degree of innovation. Understanding social processes that occur on the edges helps to bring other areas into sharper focus.” Meyers’ current project involves excavating part of the village where three structures were built sequentially, one on top of another. It is her fifth season at Carter Robinson mound and village over the course of twelve years. The mound was first identified in 1962 and was included in C.G. Holland’s Archeological Survey of Southwest Virginia. Published by the Smithsonian Institution in 1970, Holland’s work describes Carter Robinson as well as Ely Mound, a well-documented Mississippian site partially excavated by the Peabody Museum in 1877. (Ely Mound is now a preserve owned by The Archaeological Conservancy) Unlike Ely Mound—which sits on busy U.S. Route 58— Carter Robinson hasn’t drawn generations of curious visitors.The land was a field of clover when Holland saw it, and it had experienced only minor looting in 2006 when Meyers first approached the long-time owners of the secluded

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pasture. Granted permission to work here, she began her investigation the following year. In 2007, a remote sensing survey revealed anomalies that suggested the presence of as many as nine structures, including one on top of the mound, which is ten feet high and 120 feet in diameter. A series of shovel tests uncovered abundant artifacts, including ceramics, tool fragments, animal bones, stone flakes, and other lithic debris. Of the 117 test pits dug, 109 contained artifacts. Because the area at the foot of the mound on the east side was virtually artifact-free, she believes it was an open plaza. Initially there was some question if Carter Robinson might have been settled by the Radford people, a group indigenous to the area. But the evidence indicated it was built and occupied by the Mississippians. At slightly more than a half an acre, the village was far smaller than vast Mississippian settlements like Cahokia in Illinois or Moundville in Alabama. Nonetheless, the remote-sensing survey and the excavations showed that it conformed to the typical Mississippian layout: a mound facing a public plaza, surrounded by

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houses. And the houses were also constructed in the typical Mississippian fashion of weight-bearing poles arranged in the shape of a square, with twigs and other fibrous material woven between the poles to create exterior walls, which were then daubed with clay. Unlike some Mississippian settlements, there’s no evidence of a built-up embankment for defense—“No palisade,” Meyers said.“That tells me things were fairly friendly.”

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INDICATIONS ARE THAT CARTER ROBINSON’S residents settled here to take part in the Mississippians’ expanding trade network. They were interacting with people from regions that had resources they used in craft production, such as cannel coal (a soft coal used to make pendants) and freshwater shells for bead making. And they were 100 miles from salt deposits in what is now the town of Saltville, in southwest Virginia, so they could obtain that valuable commodity via trade. Positioned near the spot where a mountain gap creates a natural travel route, the area is “a trade funnel,” said Meyers.“They could go north, south, east, or west.” She has also found evidence of trade goods production at Carter Robinson. An excavation of a structure close to the mound uncovered cannel coal artifacts in various stages of completion. The construction technique (trench-set poles)

indicates this structure was built during the earliest period of occupation, A.D. 1250 to 1300.The researchers uncovered another structure from the middle period of occupation, 1300 to 1350, with large concentrations of shells and shell beads in various stages of completion, plus ceramic beads and tools, including eighty drills. The material was concentrated in two specific spots in the structure. “I think [the structure] is a production area,” Meyers said, and a well-organized one at that. “The initial work was being done in one part of the structure, then they moved to another part [to finish the beads.]”The types of ceramics found here—primarily bowls and storage vessels—as well as a large quantity of deer bones suggest that whoever was using the structure was cooking large cuts of meat, so it may have been used for feasting. Both the cannel coal and the shell-production structures were close to the mound. “At other Mississippian sites, we interpret proximity to the mound as reserved for those who have higher status,” she said. (In some Mississippian settlements, the structure on the mound is believed to be where the chief lived.) Because neither cannel coal nor shell beads are found in abundance in other houses, it suggests to Meyers that making and trading these items was restricted to certain people. This points to a system where elites were the ones

University of Mississippi graduate student Emily Warner (left) shows Maureen Meyers the remains of a log in a burned wall.

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A collection of chunky stones recovered from the site. Chunky was a popular Mississippian game in which the stones were rolled along the ground.

allowed to produce goods and interact with trading partners. She and her crew have found Radford artifacts at the site, which indicates that Carter Robinson’s residents were interacting with the Radford people, while the village’s architecture suggests they also maintained contact with Mississippians in Tennessee. For example, early houses in both places were built with posts set in a trench; then, when Tennessee Mississippian structures transitioned to posts set in individual holes, so did those at Carter Robinson. So, regardless of how much interaction they had with others, Meyers said, they didn’t lose their fundamental identity. Nonetheless, their lives were different in some ways. One hallmark of Mississippians—the thing that, according to scholars, accounts for their development as a complex, stable, dominant culture—was intensive maize cultivation in the Mississippi River’s fertile floodplains. But these frontier people living in the shadow of the Appalachian Mountains didn’t grow maize or other crops, Meyers said. She’s found a limited amount of shelled corn and, she noted wryly, “one bean.” The household detritus indicates their diet consisted of deer, snakes, fish, turtles, and nuts.

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THIS SUMMER MEYERS EXCAVATED AN AREA at the edge of the plaza, which is another place of importance. Waving off the sweat bees on a muggy Virginia morning, she stepped into the deepest of the excavation units, which she has labeled Block 3. She pointed out a dark circle marking a posthole that, she believes, was set in the east exterior wall of the first house built here in the early period of occupation—sometime around 1250. Then she pointed to another area where a student removed dirt from a large patch of orange clay. It’s burnt clay, and it’s sandwiched between fairly distinct layers of dirt, household debris, and more clay. Moving through the excavation site, pointing out postholes and more patches of clay, Meyers described what she believes happened on this spot: three structures were built here, one after the other, and each was occupied for forty to fifty years and then destroyed. She believes the first structure was burned and dirt was thrown on top. Then another structure was built on top of the first one, with postholes dug through the remains of the collapsed structure. A thick midden layer of household debris indicates a second occupation, followed by more burned clay and wood, more dirt,

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maureen meyers

These are some of the drilled objects found at the site, which consist primarily of shell beads. Four drills are seen in the upper left and right corners. More than seventy-five drills have been found.

and a midden layer that dates to the third occupation. Figuring out the sequence of what happened at Block 3 has taken a while. In 2008, Meyers and her team excavated what they believe to be the uppermost house, radiocarbon dating material to the village’s late period of occupation, 1350 to 1400. She has returned to reopen Block 3 and excavate the middle house, which coincides with the village’s middle occupation. Meyers has concluded that each structure was deliberately set on fire. She pointed to her evidence: a broad expanse of burned clay, bordered by sections of two partially unburned logs.“What I see here is the straight line of a wall [that collapsed],” she said. “That suggests to me that it was set on fire, it started to burn, then the wall was pushed in and the fire was extinguished by putting dirt on it before it burned completely.” A house destroyed in an accidental blaze, she said, would be “just be one burned mess.” Portions of five other structures excavated at Carter Robinson haven’t shown a similar destruction/reconstruction pattern; the burning and rebuilding at Block 3 “was very different,” Meyers said.“Something important was going on here.” There are few beads or tools to suggest goods were being made here. Compared to the other houses, there are not many projectile points, either. Her team has found a typical Mississippian assemblage of cooking and serving ceramics, along with animal bones. But so far, she has not been able to locate a hearth, which is, she noted, “very strange.” Pisgah-style sherds point to interaction with the Pisgah group, a contemporaneous Mississippian group located in western North Carolina. The pottery could mean that the residents of Block 3 had a trade relationship with the

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Pisgah that Carter Robinson’s other residents didn’t have. Or it might mean that the Pisgah ceramics were reserved for some kind of special activity, for which this house was the setting. If it was the home of elites, burning and rebuilding might represent the beginning of a new mound, because that’s a pattern that was followed at other Mississippian sites. If it was a place created for a special purpose, one possibility Meyers imagines is that it might have been the location of a hut where women were temporarily secluded during menstruation. To get a better understanding of what might have happened here, she’ll analyze the artifacts as well as other evidence. For example, she plans to examine the animal bones found at Block 3 and compare them to the bones uncovered at other houses, seeing if there are differences in the amount or kind of food that the occupants had access to. Barbara Mills said that frontiers are “rich in land but poor in labor,” noting that “labor recruitment through feasting and monumental building programs would have been important social processes for bringing people together.” Meyers hopes to be able to return to finish the excavation of Block 3.This is private land, and she is grateful to the family who has cooperated with her work. “It’s an amazing site,” she said, scanning the gentle peaks of the Appalachian Mountains.“It has been great fun, a privilege.And,” she added, “a head-scratcher.”

LINDA VACCARIELLO is the former executive editor of Cincinnati Magazine. Her article “The Mystery Of The Fort Ancient Transformation” appeared in the Summer 2016 issue of American Archaeology. 23

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People have been playing ocarinas for thousands of years. The purposes of these instruments appear to be as varied as their sizes and shapes. By Gayle Keck

Y This ocarina depicts a seated human figure with a headdress. It was recovered from Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula.

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ou might have had one when you were a kid.You might have encountered a magical one while playing a popular video game. You might even have an app on your iPhone or Android. Ocarinas captivate people today, just as they have for millennia. These clay wind instruments, technically classified as “globular aerophones,” have one or more chambers. Players blow into, or sometimes over, a mouthpiece,

An Instrument For The Ages

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This four-hole ocarina, which came from northwest Costa Rica, is shaped like a mythical animal.

placing their fingers on “tone-holes” to create different notes. Archaeologists excavating Mesoamerican sites have found ocarinas with numerous tone-holes. The most complex instruments have multiple mouthpieces and chambers, and are capable of producing simultaneous notes—sometimes even unusual wailing or buzzing sounds.The larger the resonating chamber, the lower the pitch; the size and thickness of the tone-holes can affect pitch as well.

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There’s speculation that ocarinas traveled to Europe in 1527 with Aztec musicians who visited the court of Spanish King Charles V. They got their name from Giuseppe Donati, a nineteenth-century Italian musician, who dubbed his instrument “ocarina,” or “little goose.” Many modern ones do resemble that shape, but ancient ocarinas were incredibly varied, both in size and design. They range from tiny birds and turtles to larger, complex figurines; others create

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photo by daniela triadan, courtesy of aguateca archaeological proJect

a mask-like effect when held up to the mouth. Still others have to be examined closely to discern that they’re musical instruments. Archaeologists have found ocarinas in Mexico, Central America, and parts of South America; some of these instruments are more than 4,500 years old. They turn up in middens, elite residences, and burial sites. In some instances, archaeologists believe they were used in ceremonies, dances, processions, or even in battle, while in others, it seems they were toys or home entertainment.There is even speculation that ocarinas were used to achieve trance-like states or to cure illness. An exhibition at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology at Harvard University, titled “Ocarinas of the Americas: Music Made in Clay,” showcases more than 100 ocarinas from the museum’s collection of roughly 1,500. In an unusual twist, the multimedia exhibit includes audio and video of anthropologist and musician José Cuellar playing the ancient instruments. Most ocarinas in the Peabody’s exhibit are from Costa Rica and Honduras. Cuellar was enthralled by their complexity and diversity. One Honduran ocarina “looked like little birds with their mouths open so you could feed them; you blow across it like a bottle top,” he said. With another, a diminutive tapir, the player appears to be kissing the animal when it’s played. His favorite was an inch-long turtle. “You blow into the tiny tail,” he explained, and “the tone comes out

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a little hole and goes straight up to the nose and resonates in the sinuses above your eyes. It’s meant to be meditative, not loud.” On the other end of the spectrum are larger, more complex figurines (often warriors) from Veracruz, Mexico. A number of the Peabody’s ocarinas were brought back in the late nineteenth century by George Byron Gordon, who led a museum expedition into the Ulua Valley in Honduras. His finds were mostly along the Ulua River banks, leading him to theorize that they were redeposited from flooded burial sites. Others were collected by Samuel Lothrop in the mid-twentieth century in Costa Rica and Nicargua. Gordon wrote of the instruments that that there is “a certain correspondence in construction, in the number of tones, and in the succession of intervals that indicates a tendency to conform to more or less definite standards. In the hands of modern musicians these instruments, played in unison, can be made to produce harmony....”

orman Hammond, senior fellow at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research at Cambridge University, explained his finds at Cuello, a Maya site in northern Belize, somewhat differently. “Most are threenote, small effigies,” he said. “The three notes tend to be spaced in a major third—like the first line of Three Blind Mice.” One ocarina, in the shape of “the most interesting little man,” was about two inches tall.“You blow into the top of his head,” said Hammond, “and the holes are in his feet.

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An assemblage of intact and reconstructed ocarinas recovered from Aguateca in Guatemala.

The more holes that are covered, the higher the note.” Most of the ocarinas he discovered were broken and discarded in the trash; the intact ones typically served as grave goods. At Cuello Hammond found “a grave-offering for a child, probably a girl of six to eight years old, clearly quite high status, buried in one of the major houses around the central compound—the member of a ruling family.” There was an unusually large number of goods in the 600 B.C. grave, including an ocarina, a precious blue jade bead (sourced from several hundred miles away), a marine shell pendant, and four pottery bowls, which Hammond surmised she had made herself. “The ocarina was a personal posession,” Hammond said, “in the form of a bird; you blew into its tail.” There were four tone-holes, producing five basic notes: do re mi fa so, “the first five notes of the tonic scale,” he explained. “What we have is Maya kids singing ‘do, a deer, a female deer,’ long before Julie Andrews ever did.” In a more serious vein, he observed, “This shows the tonal scale was just as present in the Americas, independently of it developing in the Old World in the historic period.” During field work at Lubaantun, in Belize, Hammond’s team found a dump with a large number of ocarina molds, as well as flawed, discarded instruments. (The molds and instruments are now in the British Museum and the Museum of Belize.) “That dump contained a sufficiently large quantity of molds,” he said,“that we could tell that they [the ocarinas]

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had been made nearby” in assembly-line fashion. Most ancient ocarinas were constructed by pressing clay into a flat mold to create a design, then the sound-chamber was shaped by hand and attached. A mouthpiece was fashioned, “perhaps around a reed,” Hammond hypothesized, and, once the clay had dried leather-hard, a pointed stick was used to poke the tone holes. Hammond said the designs of the ocarinas he uncovered “are incredibly varied.” They include ballgame players; a ritual boxer in a helmet and heavy glove; women with baskets of fruit or dogs in their laps; and portraits of ancient Maya people engaged in social situations and occupations. “What’s important about that,” he concluded, “is that Maya art is usually about kings, but these are about the common people.” “We have no evidence of how they were used,” Hammond said.“My suspicion is that they were actually toys.You don’t need a great deal of skill to play an ocarina, and there’s no particular reason to suppose that they were used in ceremonial occasions. We know they had proper instruments that they used on ceremonial occasions.”

rchaeologist Daniela Triadan of the University of Arizona tends to agree. She uncovered collections of Late Classic period (circa A.D. 600-850) figurine whistles—she prefers not to use the term ocarina—in five elite houses at Aguateca, a Maya site in Guatemala. “Every

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courtesy of peabody museum of archaeology & ethnology, harvard university. pm 977-4-20/25244

A Costa Rican ocarina featured in the Peabody Museum’s exhibit.

house we excavated had a set of them,” she said, adding that the houses were rapidly abandoned.“We actually found them where they were probably used or kept, which is very diferent from other sites. The correlation with rooms where women and children had activities was very strong, rooms associated with cooking and weaving.” The characters are small (three to four inches), but very detailed, and were discovered in groups ranging from eight to twenty-seven per house. Even more figurines were found in each home’s trash, ranging from nineteen to 186 per house.“Some are quite whimsical,”Triadan said, for example, a “comical, fat rodent, with big ears and a fat belly. Some are funny, like clowns or tricksters, but you also have these stereotypical roles, like a mighty warrior in a massive headdress,

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or a woman in highly ceremonial regalia. The characters themselves are not portraits. They’re kind of idealized, in their prime, all beautiful. Except for an old lady doing child rearing, they are all young.” Despite Triadan’s belief that women made the instruments, there are almost no domestic activites depicted. “If women were indeed making these figurines, then I find it very interesting that they’re not emphasizing their daily activities,” she observed. “They seem to be emphasizing their other roles” of a more public nature.What’s more,“individual children are absent in the canon, which I also find interesting.” Also missing are recognizible deities (aside from one “fat god”), which leads Triadan to conclude these figures were

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courtesy of peabody museum of archaeology & ethnology, harvard university. pm 977-4-20/25244

Breathing Life Into Ocarinas

José Cuellar plays an ocarina at the Peabody Museum.

not used for “official ritual done on a small scale.” Instead, she thinks the instruments were employed to create intimate theatrical scenes in houses. “They could have been used to enact tales for kids, like puppet theaters today. They all face outward—you play them so the other person sees it,” she explained. Because the characters are seen in ceremonial garb,Triadan theorized that they may have been designed as role models for children. Christina Halperin, an archaeologist at the Université de Montréal, believes ocarinas were informal household items used for many different purposes. “They could have been used as noise-makers by the general populace during largescale ceremonies, as part of household rituals, part of the telling and re-telling of folktales and mythic histories, and/or

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“EVERY TIME I WENT NEAR THEM, I thought, please don’t let me drop this precious little instrument,” José Cuellar said. “If I break one it’s because the spirits don’t want me to do this. It’s a sign.” Spirits are one thing; conservators are another. When Cuellar, an anthropologist, musician, and professor emeritus musician at San Francisco State University, accepted a Hrdy Fellowship with the Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, he set out to catalog, play, and record ancient instruments in the museum’s collection. That caused some concerns among museum staff. Plant-based instruments were immediately eliminated from consideration, because many had been treated with arsenic or other chemicals to deter pests. Clay ocarinas didn’t have that issue, but conservators were worried about their fragile nature and the effect that saliva and moist breath might have. It was always possible that there were toxic substances in the clay or coloration materials, too. “We tried a number of things,” Cuellar said, to avoid direct contact with the ocarinas. “At one point I even went around Cambridge looking for those kids’ wax lips that I could use.” They settled on covering the mouthpieces with paper for the initial trial of each instrument, but for a select number that were of greater interest, Cuellar placed his lips directly on the mouthpiece, and played the ocarinas wearing gloves with the fingertips removed. “It was not viable to really play them otherwise, so it was either I die, or my DNA gets left” on the ocarinas, he concluded. Cuellar examined more than 200 instruments in the collection, and recorded the sounds made by about 180. “At the beginning, I approached them as a scientist, systematically,” he said. “But then I found that approaching them like ancestor-spirits residing in these instruments gave me more confidence, knowing they’d teach me how to be.” The result? “I felt I was able to breathe life into them.” And the conservators could breathe a bit easier, too—not a single ocarina was broken. —Gayle Keck

as part of children’s play,”she wrote in an email sent from the field in Guatemala. Halperin agreed with Triadan that some figures could be seen as role models. In her book, Maya Figurines: Intersections Between State and Household, she wrote, “Arguably, imitations of state officials in the form of figurines were not just copies of particular personages or representational ideals of social categories but were also instrumental in molding how people thought about these identities and how these identities were performed.” Paul Healy discovered musical instruments at three Late Classic period elite burials—one man and two women— located in a temple pyramid’s substructure at Pacbitun, in Belize. “I argued that perhaps the instruments were being played and used as part of funerary processions and maybe

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This two-hole human figure was found in Honduras.

deposited in the grave with the individual being buried,” said Healy, professor emeritus at Trent University in Canada. “We know from Spanish ethno-historical accounts in the sixteenth-century Yucatán that the music was sad-sounding, doleful, and melancholy,” he added.“I’ve also seen references to ocarinas being used as whistles and bird calls, or as signals

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in warfare or hunting.The Spanish also commented that a lot of instruments—drums, flutes, whistles—were used by the Maya at the onset of a military attack.” The big question that intrigues most archaeologists is what these ancient instruments actually sounded like when played at the time. Dale Olsen, professor emeritus of ethnomusicology at Florida State University, studied more than 400 ancient ocarinas used by the Tairona civilization in Colombia, and others from the Moche and Nazca cultures in Peru. Most Tairona ocarinas he encountered had four toneholes. In that case,“you can have as many as sixteen different fingerings,” he explained. “But if you vary the air pressure, you can get many more tones.” Olsen worked with a shaman in Moche, Peru, who used an ocarina while performing ceremonies to cure illnesses. “It was a modern context of how ocarinas were used to contact spirits of the oceans and spirits of the mountains,” he said. “The shaman played the ocarina completely differently than I did, making notes slide up, creating an almost spooky feeling.” While we’ll never understand exactly how ancient ocarinas were meant to be played, José Cuellar, who recorded them for the Peabody museum, knows the ocarina’s sound still has a capitvating effect. “One can’t help but see how people respond to it; it touches them in a really interesting way,” he said. Across the years, these small, everyday objects continue to bring a bit of wonder to the common people.

A four-hole bird ocarina from central Costa Rica.

GAYLE KECK has written for National Geographic Traveler, AFAR and The Washington Post. Her article “Visiting California’s Historic Missions,” appeared in the Summer 2015 issue of American Archaeology. fall • 2017

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Finding The Pilgrims Archaeologists believe they have uncovered evidence of the Plymouth Colony that was established in 1620. Their findings suggest that there was more interaction between the Pilgrims and the Native Americans than previously thought.

By Rachael Moeller Gorman Photos by Bruce T. Martin People wander down the main street of Plimoth Plantation, a living history museum that attempts to replicate the original Plymouth Colony.

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a sticky day last June, archaeologist David Landon peered into a rectangular, three-foot-deep excavation unit on the edge of an old cemetery.“That layer they’re coming down on, despite being deeply buried, is very dark. It looks like topsoil,” Landon said. Two stocking-footed field school students gently scraped dirt into dustpans. “It’s very organic and rich.” Landon and Christa Beranek, both of the University of Massachusetts Boston’s Fiske Center For Archaeological Research, co-direct Project 400: The Plymouth Colony Archaeological Survey, an investigation to discover the location of the original 1620 Pilgrim settlement under downtown Plymouth, Massachusetts. Landon believes he’s looking at a trash pit from the seventeenth century that was probably located next to a house. The Pilgrims built their homes with wood and thatch, and all that’s left of them is a series of stains from decayed posts that have enriched and darkened the surrounding soil with organic matter.“We are mapping very subtle soil stains, variations in soil color and texture and artifacts that are present,” he said.“These are some of our main pieces of evidence.” This evidence is helping the archaeologists identify the perimeters of the Pilgrim settlement. Surprisingly, this is the first time anyone has come so far in identifying its location. The timing of the discovery is serendipitous, as the colony’s 400th anniversary, for which extensive activities are planned, is approaching.

early 1600s England, the only sanctioned way to worship God was through the Church of England. So when a group of religious people wanted to practice their faith in a simpler, less-structured way, calling for the creation of new churches separate from the Church of England, they were harassed and jailed. Some of these so-called Separatists fled to the Netherlands, where they stayed for more than a decade, until they decided it was time to establish their own colony in a new land where they could be independent. The group secured ships and a deal with investors that financed their voyage in return for goods like fish, furs, and timber.After several delays the Mayflower sailed for America on September 6, 1620, with 102 passengers.After first landing on Cape Cod in November and finding the area unsuitable for a village, a party of men eventually discovered an abandoned Native American settlement known as Patuxet (its Wampanoag residents had been decimated by an unknown European disease three years earlier) in what’s now Plymouth. It had a good harbor, cleared fields, and a hill that could provide defensive protection. The Mayflower landed there in December, and the English spent the first harsh winter on the boat while they began building their homes. Only fifty-two people survived the first year.They started building a fort and palisade walls, and in March 1621, they communicated with the Wampanoag.A man named Squanto, who had been kidnapped by English sailors and eventually returned home, taught the colonists how to grow corn. In

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the fall of 1621, as the story goes, the English colonists celebrated their first harvest, sharing the bounty with the Wampanoag in what we now call the first Thanksgiving. Over the next several years, more English settlers arrived in Plymouth, and the colony became quite successful. But physical evidence of that first Pilgrim settlement had never been found until Landon and Beranek’s investigation.“The written accounts are pretty detailed for the Plymouth Colony, but they also have huge holes in them, such as, there’s no actual map of the settlement or its layout… and a lot of this history is very mythologized,” said Landon. Henry Hornblower, who established a replica of the colony

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An aerial view of the excavations on Burial Hill. The grey structure with the black and brick doors is an 1830s burial vault that cuts through the site. Excavations in front of and behind the vault revealed a series of building postholes, trash pits, and many seventeenthcentury artifacts from the original settlement. Native American and English pottery was found in the trash pits, suggesting the use of Native pots in the English houses.

called Plimoth Plantation, and archaeologist James Deetz conducted digs from the 1940s - 1970s to learn about the Pilgrims’ daily lives.Their work informed the construction of historically-accurate homes at Plimoth Plantation. Deetz also conducted test digs in downtown Plymouth, but he uncovered little related to the seventeenth century and didn’t fully document his findings.

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had rained hard that morning in Plymouth, and the salty smell of the bay hung in the breeze. Landon thought the dig might be delayed, but at the last moment, the weather improved. Still, big drops of leftover rainwater fell from a tree arched over us and onto the map Landon was holding of Burial Hill, a cemetery dating back to the 1680s where the crew was excavating.“One of the amazing

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things about digging here is that even though parts of Plymouth look very undeveloped and parklike currently, it’s completely an anthropogenic environment,” he said.“Even a lot of the natural-looking areas are a creation, a human creation.” History has it that Plymouth Colony was topped with a fort on a hill and surrounded with a palisade wall that swept down towards Plymouth Bay. One of the most widely-accepted conjectures about the colony’s location is Burial Hill. A small white sign that sits near the top of the hill proclaims: “SITE OF THE FIRST FORT, BUILT IN 1621.” The archaeologists wanted to find those palisade walls and locate the remains of the original colony, and also, according to Landon, “add detail and nuance to our understanding of the profound cultural exchange that came from the regular contact between Native people and the English colonists.” In 2013, after surveying other sites around the town and finding no intact seventeenth-century features or early artifacts, the researchers started working on a sliver of Burial Hill on the southeastern corner near School Street Archaeology student Megan Sheehan displays colonial artifacts that had no marked graves. In the from excavations in Brewster Garden. 1700s and 1800s, houses, stables, warehouses, and two schools lined one of the streets, and “RB” surrounding a dagger and a heart. This is the maker’s they were torn down in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The mark of English pipe maker Richard Berryman, and it could archaeologists searched for the foundations of the back walls have belonged to one of the pilgrims. The researchers also of those buildings, hoping the section of the hill behind found evidence of structures here. “These people were so these walls would be undisturbed. materially poor that there’s not a lot of their trash scattered They began surveying the hill with ground-penetrating everywhere. So if you’re finding seventeenth-century artiradar (GPR), which provided a good outline of the buried facts, you are on top of a site,” said Landon.Though the excaremains of those walls. They incorporated this data into a vation area containing the pipe heel also had Wampanoag geographic information system, and they also added historic artifacts, the concentration of European artifacts suggested and modern maps and aerial photos of this area. In 2014, the area was located inside the colony, and the Wampanoag the researchers began excavating. The crew uncovered an workshop, which contained only Native artifacts, outside. undisturbed Wampanoag stone tool workshop in 2015 with “So we have found the inside and the outside [of the palidozens of flakes that resulted from the production of points. sade wall]. We haven’t found the actual wall yet.” In another area south of the stone tool workshop, the In 2016, the team opened seven excavation units, three researchers discovered a pit, above which, in disturbed of which were next to the area where the pipe heel was disdeposits, were primarily European seventeenth-century arti- covered.They found postholes and trenches, a hole with tiny facts, including the heel of a smoking pipe with the initials fish bones, and a pit with a partial calf skeleton in it. These

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features, and the stratigraphic layer above them, all contained Native and European ceramics dating to the 1600s, which led them to conclude that the calf and fish bones and the associated features were of the same age. The researchers also discovered over 200 European and Native lithic artifacts, and a large trash pit that contained more European and Wampanoag artifacts. One of the postholes they found was reinforced with stones and may have been part of a Pilgrim house. Beranek imagines a British woman sweeping debris out of her home, which is then trampled, forming a trash pit. This year the researchers uncovered a treasure trove of tin-glazed pottery, pipe stems, and bowl fragments, Native pottery, trade beads, and a buckle (“A great find, as it connects us to an individual person who wore this as part of their clothing,” said Landon), in addition to several more postholes and other features.

addition to determining the location of the original colony, the archaeologists are trying to evaluate the impact the settlement had on the surrounding landscape, so they’re also excavating an area outside the colony in what is now called Brewster Gardens, a park that surrounds a spring-fed stream called Town Brook that likely served the Pilgrims. “In Brewster Gardens we are in an exploratory phase,” said Beranek. “It’s all exciting, because it’s all very

new—what kind of potential does this area have?” “So [Brewster Gardens], at the turn of the twentieth century, contained an electrical generating plant,” Landon said. “And the whole rest of the area along the Town Brook was very industrialized.”Town Brook runs into Plymouth Bay. Originally, the section near the bay was a tidal estuary, and Native people farmed along its banks. Historical accounts mention wharves and docks in the seventeenth century, and later, the stream’s water power was tapped for industrial uses. In anticipation of the 300th anniversary in 1920, the industrial buildings were demolished, the land filled, and the park created. “They intentionally buried earlier stuff, so that potentially means it’s preserved underneath areas that were filled,” he said.“We’d be really interested to go down and find original shorelines, small wharves, areas where they were dumping to make land early on.” In addition, Town Brook is right behind Leyden Street, which historical accounts say could have once been the main street of Plymouth Colony. Landon thinks part of the palisade wall runs between the Town Brook and Leyden Street. This summer the researchers discovered a buried post that might be part of an early wharf. And as at Burial Hill, they’ve uncovered lots of Native ceramics and lithics that they’re starting to analyze. Landon and Beranek are struck by the ubiquity of Native artifacts intermingled with English

David Landon (right, with white cap) oversees the mapping of the deep soil levels in Brewster Gardens. The seventeenth-century surfaces were covered with fill in the early twentieth century.

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Archaeology students wash artifacts in the Plimoth Plantation lab while visitors observe their work. Artifact processing in an open lab allows visitors to see some of the seventeenth-century artifacts right after they have been excavated.

artifacts. “I think we are starting to get a very different idea of the material interaction between the Native people and the colonists,” said Landon. The many pieces of Native pottery and lithics in seventeenth-century contexts with English artifacts suggest there could have been a greater connection between the two cultures than previously thought. “We think it’s a sign of Native pottery actually being used in English houses,” he said. They are trying to determine how much Native material culture was in the 1620 colony, as the quantity indicates the extent of interaction between the two peoples. Deetz, the foremost archaeological scholar on the Plymouth colony, found Native artifacts during his excavations, but he assumed they were the vestiges of Patuxet, the Native American settlement on top of which the colony was built. “That’s actually been the accepted wisdom in Plymouth Colony archaeology,” said Landon. “As soon as you do that, you write off the possibility of seeing the presence of Native people at all.” The artifacts Deetz recovered are curated at Plimoth Plantation, and Landon and Beranek’s team has been reanalyzing them. Previous Plymouth archaeology has traditionally focused on the transplant of English culture onto the New World. Landon and Beranek are focused on the convergence of the English and Wampanoag cultures. “Were there other tools

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and technologies that shaped the Native and English interactions beyond our stereotyped version of the story? What does it mean if Native pots are adopted into English cooking?” Landon wondered. “We are told the story of corn, but what other Native plants made their way into daily use in the English houses, and what does this say about Native and English cultural knowledge and understanding of the landscape? These are the types of questions we are trying to investigate.” According to the Fiske Center’s web site, the archaeological investigations are “designed to help create a scholarly legacy for the 400th anniversary, teach students and teachers the archaeology and history of Plymouth and its place in the seventeenth-century Atlantic World, and engage the public in a meaningful consideration of the period and its impact on both Colonial and Native communities. By the end of five weeks of long days of hard work, during which the weather changed from cold and wet to hot and muggy, the crew had recovered enough data for a year’s worth of analysis. Backfilling the excavation units at the end of the dig “is kind of heart-breaking,” said Landon. But believing that they’re slowly correcting the archaeological record makes the wait until next year’s field school a little easier.

RACHAEL MOELLER GORMAN is an award-winning science writer based outside Boston, Massachusetts. fall • 2017

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SURVIVING In A Changing World By Beth Howard

carolyn arcabascio

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the Catawba tribe faced enslavement, disease, warfare, and European settlers occupying their homeland. Though their demise seemed obvious, they managed to survive. Archaeologists are learning how they did it.

A British soldier shakes hands with a Catawba warrior. A key to the Catawbas’ survival during the Colonial era was the military and economic alliance with the colony of South Carolina. Catawba warriors protected the colony from attacks by natives allied with the French and Spanish and served with the English in their frontier wars. In return, South Carolina granted favored trading status to the Catawba and provided them with firearms, ammunition, and supplies that were critical to their survival.

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When a young Englishman named John Lawson traveled through the area in early 1701, he observed the chaos of collapsing native communities firsthand. But the Catawba stood out as stable and thriving, a testament to their resourcefulness and adaptability. The Catawba’s survival was put to the test over the next century and a half, Davis said, but they met the challenges with savvy economic and political strategies. “When we started the project our interest was in learning how the Catawba nation was able to survive in the face of a number of different pressures, and at a time when all the contemporary writers were writing them off, predicting they would be extinct in a decade or two,” he said.“And they’re still here. They’ve been living in essentially the same place since the Spanish entradas of the mid 1500s.” In fact the Catawba Indian Nation—the only federally recognized tribe in the state—currently resides within a few miles of the tribe’s historic homeland. The archaeologists are investigating a series of settlements that, according to historical documents, the Catawba occupied sequentially between 1750 and 1820. “Their land, their world, was changing under their feet. How did they manage that effectively?” asked Brett Riggs, who codirects the project.“We have been able to piece together from the archeological evidence and the documentary evidence that these folks very consciously changed their strategies through time.”

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n a picnic-perfect day in South Carolina’s Lancaster County last June, University of North Carolina (UNC) archaeologist Stephen Davis and his students meticulously scraped loose subsoil and dug, spoonful by spoonful, in search of clues to the lifeways of the Catawba tribe in the eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Based in the Catawba River Valley of South Carolina, just south of the North Carolina border, the Catawba came to prominence during the tumultuous centuries following the arrival of the English in the New World. In the century preceding the American Revolution, native peoples in the Piedmont of the Carolinas, a plateau region sandwiched between the Appalachian Mountains and the Coastal Plain, experienced seemingly insurmountable threats—the ravages of European diseases, intense conflict between tribes that was exacerbated by encroaching white settlers, and a large-scale slave trade. “They were being captured, enslaved, and then shipped out of Charleston to the Caribbean to work on sugar plantations,” said Davis, explaining that Indians escaped more easily than Africans because they knew the land so well, so the Native Americans were sent to the Caribbean where the land was unfamiliar and escaping was more difficult.“It has been estimated that, prior to 1715, there were more Indian slaves being exported out of Charleston than there were Africans being imported.”

Brett Riggs excavates the bottom of a large cabin cellar at the Bowers site.

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that were easier to defend against warring tribes, and they located these settlements near major trading routes, which increased their access to firearms. Archaeological surveys have revealed the locations of a cluster of towns known as Weyane, Sucah, Nassaw, Charraw Town, and Weyapee within a two-mile radius. This settlement strategy may account for the nation’s reported ability to quickly galvanize its warriors to repel enemies. UNC researchers excavated the towns of Weyapee and Nassaw near present-day Fort Mill, South Carolina, in 2007 and 2008. At Weyapee they uncovered mid-1700s brass, iron,

vin steponaitis

The evidence suggests that the tribe survived in part by joining forces with the remnants of other decimated tribes. “As all native groups in the Piedmont are declining, they need to seek security, so the Catawba bring smaller groups from other tribes in under their aegis and continually repopulate their country,” said Riggs, who was formerly at UNC but now teaches at Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, North Carolina.“We have accounts from the 1740s that twenty different languages are being spoken within the Catawba orbit.” As part of what the archaeologists refer to as their “coalescent strategy,” the Catawba created dense settlements

Steve Davis stands on a ladder to photograph an excavated cabin chimney base at New Town while students in the foreground use trowels to clean an intact hearth found beneath another collapsed stick-and-clay chimney.

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heather lapham

Steve Davis uses a total station to map archaeological contexts.

he tribe’s military power reached its zenith at the start of the French and Indian War of 1754, but when Catawba warriors returned from Quebec in 1759 infected with smallpox, the disease spread and the nation was reduced to a few hundred people. The disaster led to a major turning point as the Catawba abandoned

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lead, glass, and ceramic artifacts. They also found a corncobfilled smudge pit (smudging the interior of a pottery vessel with charred corn cobs was a way to waterproof it), and other storage pits that contained numerous pottery fragments, indicative of a rich pottery tradition. At Nassaw, archaeologists uncovered storage pits filled with refuse, cob-filled smudge pits, soil borrow pits, and postholes delineating structures. In all, the researchers recovered some 47,000 artifacts including glass beads, English kaolin pipe fragments, gun parts, and a great many potsherds. The distribution of artifacts within a circular pattern across the village site suggests that Nassaw was surrounded by a palisade the Catawba likely erected to defend themselves. The Catawba also defended themselves by forging a critical military alliance with the colony of South Carolina. Although native peoples, including the Catawba, took up arms against the colony during an uprising known as the Yamassee War of 1715, devastating losses led the tribe to back down. Under the subsequent peace agreement with South Carolina, the Catawba agreed to police forces hostile to the colony’s interests, according to historical accounts. The partnership allowed the Catawba to become a military juggernaut.They fought against French-and-Spanishallied groups that posed a threat to South Carolina, and they joined in raids against other tribes. In exchange, the colony ensured the Catawba were well-armed and even supplied them with cows and corn when they suffered famine due to crop failures. When Scottish settlers encroached on traditional Catawba hunting territory in the mid 1700s, the Catawba used their alliance with South Carolina to obtain payment for the intrusions and stolen horses.

A variety of in situ artifacts found near the base of a half-excavated cellar pit at Old Town that was filled in during the last decades of the 1700s.

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These personal ornaments, which were discovered at Old Town, were manufactured primarily by Europeans. The Catawba obtained them by purchase or exchange. The smaller triangular nose bangles (lower right) were part of a native fashion wave that swept eastern North America in the 1770s.

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brass tinkler cones

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their settlements and regrouped under the protection of the English at Pine Tree Hill. The decline in their ranks probably diminished the importance of the Catawba to the British. And subsequently, surrounded by Scots-Irish settlers, the Catawba allied themselves with the colonists against the British Crown during the American Revolution, boasting the highest per capita rate of service of any native community and earning them the title Patriot Indians. The archaeological record reflects the Catawba’s role as combatants. At Nassaw, UNC archaeologists recovered numerous gun parts and sword fragments as well as an

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silver nose bangles

iron short sword known as a dirk. “This was a personal side weapon that Scottish Highlanders carried,” Riggs said. “They were not issued by the military, and it’s the sort of thing that would not be bought and sold. But here it is in this Catawba pit outside Fort Mill, right at the time that the Catawba are serving with the British and with Highland troops in Canada. It may well have been recovered on the field or in camp and brought back to South Carolina. This speaks immediately to that relationship and also to the way these things get transformed, because the hilt had been broken off of it and some Catawba had hammered a lower part

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discarded refuse, including pottery, as well as Europeanmade manufactured goods and subsistence remains. Although only a few years had passed from the time the Catawba left Nassaw to when they returned to settle at Old Town, the materials recovered from the sites differed dramatically, particularly the ceramics. Instead of traditional wares like those found at Nassaw, Old Town vessels resemble English ceramics, which is likely a result of the tribe’s exposure to such objects at Pine Tree Hill and the Catawba’s awareness of a market for their earthenwares. The surfaces of the vessels—plates, bowls, cups, and milk pans—are burnished, and some display hand-painted designs. Some are

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of the edge so it could be handled, wrapped, and reused.” In 1760, shortly after taking refuge with the English in Pine Tree Hill, the Catawba signed a treaty preserving 225 square miles of their territory, allowing them to return to their homeland. They established a settlement called Old Town that consisted of clusters of households; but instead of the post-in-ground-style structures seen at Nassaw, the Catawba built log houses, similar to those of their white neighbors. UNC researchers excavated five houses in 2003 and 2009, revealing deep sub-floor cellar pits, clay processing pits filled with unfired potter’s clay, a cob-filled smudge pit, and a large basin. The cellar pits contained deposits of

Before the smallpox epidemic of 1759, Catawba settlements were located near the modern town of Fort Mill. After the Catawba returned to their ancestral homeland in the early 1760s, they reestablished their settlements several miles downriver.

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steve davis

fashioned from pale clays, reminiscent of English ceramics that were also recovered at Old Town. The rims of the pale clay ceramics occasionally are tinged with a red or orange pigment made from sealing wax likely purchased during their time at Pine Tree Hill. “When they come back, they are completely transformed. They are building European-style houses and producing ceramics for European markets, for American, and African American markets,” Riggs said.“Within a span of just a few years, they recreate their ceramic tradition. Beforehand, they produced wares that are part of the Lamar ceramic tradition, which has been in place in that part of the valley by 1760 for a good 300 to 350 years.When they return, they are producing hand-built copies of Staffordshire slipwares.” The Old Town pottery is so different from the Catawba’s earlier ceramics, according to Davis, that without supporting documentary evidence, one could easily conclude they were the handiwork of different people. The new ceramics represent the beginnings of what is generally thought of as the Catawba pottery style and mark a transition to a new economy, one dominated by the women of the nation. “What this tells us is that Catawba potters— these are mostly women—were extremely nimble in terms of their craft,” Davis said.“They could essentially do whatever they chose to do. What became their choice—probably for economic survival—was to begin mass-producing pottery for sale rather than just for personal use.” Firearms still figured prominently in the life of the Catawba in their new settlements, but the artifacts—gun parts, ammunition, and bullet molds—show the nation’s move to more sophisticated weaponry. Instead of primitive muskets, the archaeologists found parts of colonial-made

rifles, which were more accurate and expensive. Increasing ownership of horses is reflected in an abundance of riding tack.The researchers also found four coins dating to 1769 in one of the cellars that indicate more frequent contact with Europeans, including their Scots-Irish neighbors. Davis and Riggs believe such rapid changes in the lives of the Catawba suggest they had come to accept the permanence of European settlements and, in an effort to get along with their neighbors, the Catawba embraced some of their lifeways.

xplorations of later settlements suggest other ways that the Catawba sought to adapt to their changing circumstances and downplay differences with their white neighbors. Between 2003 and 2005, UNC archaeologists located seven discrete concentrations of artifacts and architectural remains at a site known as New Town, which the Catawba occupied from approximately 1790-1820. These correspond well to a description from Calvin Jones, a visitor to the village in 1815, who wrote of a grouping of “6 or 8 houses facing an oblong square.” The UNC team also discovered raised chimney hearths at two of the cabins, confirming Jones’ observation that two

These reconstructed pans, bowl, and jar were recovered from storage pits at Ayers Town, where the Catawba lived in the late eighteenth century.

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steve davis

Young members of the Catawba Indian Nation help UNC graduate students Mary Beth Fitts and Mark Plane (far right) wash artifact-laden pit fill from Nassaw, which the Catawba occupied in the mid-eighteenth century.

of the dwellings, like those of white settlers, had raised wood floors. One of the cabins belonged to “General” New River, the nation’s leader, and his wife, Sally, an important Catawba matriarch who died around 1820. “A large portion of New Town was unplowed, so things were just below the surface,” Riggs said. “The base of Sally New River’s stick-and-clay chimneys were there and when we began to uncover them, we found the hearths intact. On one of those hearths was a broken Catawba-made milk pan that we were able to reassemble and put it in the hands of descendants of Sally New River.”The researchers, he added, were “honored” to do this. UNC archaeologists recovered some 86,000 artifacts, including 60,000 Catawba pottery fragments, from New Town, most of which imitate European vessels. Firearm components were much less prevalent than at older settlements, suggesting that warfare had come to play a less important role in the nation’s life. On the other hand, riding and draft hardware was especially prominent at New Town, indicating the Catawba’s increasing reliance on horses. By this time, historical accounts show that the Catawba were often on the road, traveling to plantations and towns throughout South Carolina and selling pottery along the way. Other records reveal that the tribe had turned to yet another way to support itself—leasing its land to white farmers. A surviving nineteenth-century ledger recording leases

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and payments shows that by the 1810s, most Catawba lands were being farmed or managed by whites. Indeed, a settler from this time noted that the tribe had stopped farming and turned to hunting and gathering. Food remains discovered at New Town—deer, pig, and fish bones, peach pits and corn— bear out these accounts. In 1840, at the height of Indian removal, the Catawba were pressured to give up their remaining land and the leaseholders were able to acquire the title to their lands after the Treaty of Nation Ford. They nevertheless gained a small tract of less desirable land that the current Catawba Nation, about 2,800 people, calls home today. The reservation sits on the opposite side of the river from the Catawba’s most significant archaeological sites, which are largely in private hands.While some are protected by conservation easements, many are under siege from rapid development emanating from the Charlotte metropolitan area. Some sites have already been destroyed by the construction of roads, golf courses, and housing complexes. Taken together, the excavations and the written record provide a rich picture of life for the Catawba at a time when any new evidence of its history may soon be lost. Said Riggs, “I feel like we stepped in there just in time.”

BETH HOWARD is an independent writer based in Charlotte, North Carolina. fall • 2017

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new acquisitions

Where Beautiful Pottery Was Produced

The Conservancy obtains part of a site known for remarkable ceramics.

Jessica craWford

ocated in the northeastern corner of Arkansas, Chickasawba is a large site believed to have originally consisted of three mounds arranged around a plaza area, and three other, smaller mounds, located on the southern half of the site. Today, the site is dominated by Mound A, which is approximately twenty-feet tall. The other mounds are barely visible as a consequence of years of farming. Chickasawba is named for a Chief Chickasawba who, according to historical accounts, lived in a cabin on one of the mounds in the early 1800s.The site, however, long predates its namesake. The archaeological evidence suggests that Chickasawba was continuously occupied from the Late Archaic (circa 3000-1500 B . C .) through the Protohistoric periods. Researchers have found several burned houses and other evidence that indicate there was a significant occupation during the later portion of the Mississippian and early Proto-historic periods around A.D. 1550. Chickasawba and other mound sites in the region were part of a chiefdom society. These villages were allied in groups or provinces that were ruled by hereditary chiefs. Some archaeologists believe that Chickasawba was part of the province of Pacaha, which was described in the chronicles of Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto, who passed through the area in 1541. Villages associated with Pacaha are identified by beautiful pottery that archaeologists refer to as the Nodena phase, and Chickasawba has yielded some of the finest Nodena pottery. Looters have exploited the site since

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After a rain, historic and prehistoric pottery, as well as stone tools from various time periods, washed into piles on the site’s surface.

the late 1800s. Charles McNutt, professor emeritus at the University of Memphis, and Terry Childs, a native of Blytheville who grew up near the site, have documented the looting that has taken place since the early 1900s. The majority of the site, including Mound A, is owned by a local family. The

Conservancy has recently purchased the southern portion of Chickasawba from the Hughes family, another local landowner.We will protect this site that still has much to tell us about some of the most powerful chiefdoms of prehistory and the effect European contact had upon them. —Jessica Crawford

CONSERVANCY

Plan of Action Site: Chickasawba Culture: Late Archaic-Proto-historic Status: The site is threatened by agricultural land leveling and looting. Acquisition: The Conservancy needs to raise $55,000. How You Can Help: Please send contributions to The Archaeological Conservancy, attn.: Chickasawba, 1717 Girard Blvd. NE, Albuquerque, NM 87106.

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A Long And Winding Road

gregory spatz

The Danbury site’s path to preservation had many twists and turns.

An aerial view of the Danbury site. The new preserve is the open field to the right of the houses.

oday the western basin of Lake Erie is dominated by the cities of Windsor, Detroit, and Toledo, and a myriad of small cities and towns mostly serving the vacation trade. Prehistorically, American Indians utilized the rich resources of the western basin to support sizable populations of fishers, foragers, and farmers. The archaeological sites that document their activities were once nearly ubiquitous along the shore, but today they have largely disappeared beneath modern sprawl. The Danbury site, the Conservancy’s newest Ohio preserve, had many brushes with destruction before a compromise yielded both new vacation homes and a permanent archaeological preserve. Danbury was first recorded by amateur archaeologists in 1977, but

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the site received no professional attention until 1999, when cultural resource management archaeologists carried out an initial survey in advance of planned development. Unfortunately, the owners of the property disregarded the recommendations of the archaeologists, and in 2003 began earth moving without further archaeological work. Road construction soon unearthed several concentrations of midden soils, pit features, and human remains, and amateur archaeologists were given access to the site. Soon these activities came to the attention of local American Indians and the professional archaeological community, including the Ohio State Historic Preservation Office and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. While the developers and the

regulatory agencies dealt with a markedly complicated situation, Brian Redmond agreed to conduct the Cleveland Museum of Natural History archaeological field school on the property. Redmond excavated from 2004 to 2007, recovering over fifty human burials, scores of pit features, and multiple postmold alignments marking prehistoric structures. Redmond’s excavations revealed that Danbury was occupied for at least four thousand years. While one burial produced a Late Archaic period radiocarbon date of 2600 B.C., the evidence indicates that the excavated portion of the site was primarily occupied during the Early Woodland (1200-800 B.C.), Late Woodland (A.D. 700-1200), and Late Prehistoric (A.D. 1200-1600) periods.

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brian redmond

The reassembled lightening whelk pendant found in the burial. Students and volunteers map exposed features.

During the Late Woodland period, the western basin region was populated primarily by fishers and foragers, with maize as a supplemental food. The primary archaeological sites are typically located along the lake and its tributary rivers and are thought to be warm-season occupations. The majority of the food remains they left behind consisted of waterfowl and fish bones. During the Late Prehistoric period, maize agriculture dominated the subsistence economy, and the settlement pattern shifted inland. Sizable villages were situated along the rivers, while lakeshore occupations such as Danbury seem to be used as short-term foraging camps. The Danbury excavations were salvage operations that emphasized the recovery of human remains and

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documented a great range of burial types. Following scientific analyses, all of the human remains and associated burial objects were reburied on the site by representatives of the Wyandotte Nation of Oklahoma. The burial practices included the simple interment of recently deceased individuals in single graves and mass burials of numerous de-fleshed bodies in a single pit. A practice seemingly unique to the western basin region involved burying one or more adult males, then re-opening the grave to remove parts of the skeleton — generally long bones. In some cases, the bones would be re-articulated with the skeleton — sometimes incorrectly — and in other cases removed, presumably to be reburied elsewhere. Often the disarticulated remains of additional individuals, usually subadults, would be added to the burial pit. One notable burial, dated to A.D. 880-1020, contained three adults, each accompanied by scores of whelk shell disk and Marginella shell beads. Two of the adults had portions of the same shell pendant, fashioned from a lightning whelk shell, placed with them. The third was accompanied by fragments of another pendant. While beads fashioned from whelk and Marginella snails were commonly traded across the Eastern Woodlands beginning in the Archaic period, ornaments

made from lightning whelk shells are rare from the Late Woodland period in Ohio. Lightning whelks live in the warm waters off the southern Atlantic and Gulf coasts. The evidence of long distance trade between that region and Lake Erie is a surprise for this period. Even more surprising than the whelk ornaments was the identification of microscopic fragments of fibers consistent with cotton identified through electron microscopy of the dental plaque of four adults. Cotton was grown during the ninth century in the Southwest, but it is difficult to explain how cotton reached Ohio at that time. Equally difficult to explain is how it came to be in the mouths of the individuals, as cotton is not a fiber that is processed using the teeth. During the years that Redmond’s important work was being carried out in the western portion of the site, the development of the eastern portion was derailed when the real estate crash in 2008 lead to the bankruptcy of the would-be developer. Through a complex process that spanned another ten years, a compromise was reached whereby five acres in the eastern portion of the site was donated to the Conservancy for permanent preservation, while the remainder was developed. Today the Danbury site remains a weedy field surrounded by new construction, safely awaiting careful study at some future date. —Paul Gardner

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The Conservancy Expands Ebbert Spring

andy stout

Having obtained another five-acre parcel, the Conservancy can now protect the entire site.

It’s thought that the springhouse could have once served as a private fort.

n 2010 the Conservancy negotiated an agreement with a real estate developer to acquire a 3.4-acre parcel of land in the center of a large industrial development in Antrim Township in south-central Pennsylvania. The parcel contained a portion of Ebbert Spring, a multi-component site with artifacts spanning from the Paleo-Indian period to the nineteenth century. The site is centered around a spring that produces approximately 700 gallons of water per minute and now serves

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the surrounding community. The Conservancy is set to acquire an additional five acres of the site, known as the Bonnell parcel. In addition to including the heart of the prehistoric component of the site, the Bonnell parcel also contains an eighteenth-century farmhouse and associated outbuildings. Ebbert Spring was first excavated by a chapter of the Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology in 2003. Over the course of the next ten years they recovered tens of thousands of historic items

and prehistoric lithic, ceramic, and bone artifacts at the site; as well as various intact features such as postmolds, hearths, and refuse pits predominantly from the Middle and Late Woodland periods. The prehistoric component of the site helped redefine thinking about how prehistoric people utilized this portion of the Great Appalachian Valley. Most Native American habitation areas in the region have been found near tributaries of the Potomac River, but

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andy stout

Ebbert Spring is one of several documented sites in the valley located next to springs. In addition to the site’s prehistoric significance, the historic buildings represent the only standing structures built by the Allison family, who came to the area from Ireland in the eighteenth century. John Allison served in the Revolutionary War and founded the nearby town of Greencastle. Historical documents indicate that his father, William Allison Sr. (who helped build the house at Ebbert Spring), agreed to build a private fort in the area to defend against attack. The exact location of the fort, known as Ft. Allison, has never been verified, though it’s possible that it’s the fortified springhouse at the site. This fieldstone and brick springhouse appears to have been used as a French and Indian War fortification. Excavators discovered postmold features of a palisade around the structure along with gunflints, a spur, and other period artifacts. The springhouse was constructed directly above the spring so that water passes through a channel built into the floor, providing a constant flow of fresh water to the structure’s occupants. The fact that the springhouse is found in the front yard of the family commissioned to build the fort also supports the idea that it’s Ft. Allison, but more research is needed before a definitive determination can be made. All of the artifacts, notes, and maps from these excavations were collected by Conservancy staff and

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The Allison-Ebbert house, built circa 1756, is seen in the distance.

donated to the Allison-Antrim Museum in Greencaslte so that they will be available for future researchers. Al Bonnell, who had owned this parcel until his passing in 2016, had devoted his life to restoring the house and to studying the history of the property. He wanted the entire site to be preserved, and his wishes are being honored by his son, Terry. Working closely with the Bonnell family, the Conservancy’s Eastern regional staff negotiated a bargain sale to charity to acquire the site.The staff also organized

a powerful coalition of conservation allies involving local, regional, and state agencies. Funding for the property was obtained from Antrim Township together with a matching grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. Additional funding was also obtained from the Elfrieda Frank Foundation. The Conservancy’s partners in this project include Antrim Township, the AllisonAntrim Museum, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, Shippensburg University, the Conococheague Institute, and the GreencastleAntrim School District. An interpretive trail featuring a series of kiosks will be installed at the site to tell the story of people at this location from 10000 B.C. to the present. The Allison-Antrim Museum has agreed to lease and care for all of the structures on the property.The eight-plus-acre site is expected to open to the public as the Ebbert Spring Archaeological Preserve and Heritage Park in August of 2019. —Andy Stout

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C O N S E R VA N C Y

field notes

lisa thompson

The Drone Aerial Photography Project

The Aspen crew watches as their drone flies over Manzanares Pueblo.

SOUTHWEST—Aspen CRM Solutions, a Santa Fe-based cultural resource management consultant company, used drones to create aerial maps of several Conservancy preserves in New Mexico’s Northern Rio Grande Valley this year. This process begins with the researchers establishing targets placed at various points within the sites. Then the drone is set to fly a preprogrammed grid to take overlapping high-resolution photographs that are used to create

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richly-colored aerial maps of the sites that show incredibly detailed terrain, features, and boundaries. As the drone flies, it also collects location information that, combined with the photos, can be used to create digital models that show even slight elevation changes, or to generate contour lines for topographic maps. The data can also be used to make digital 3-D representations of the sites that can help researchers visualize and interpret the landscape. “We’re psyched to be able to get

this excellent, high resolution data for some of our Southwest region sites. The maps are useful for monitoring site conditions, for research, and in some cases for helping better define site and property boundaries,” said Tamara Jager Stewart, the Conservancy’s Southwest Projects Coordinator. Thus far Aspen has produced aerial maps of four preserves—Arroyo Hondo, San Marcos, Lodestar, and Manzanares—and plans to do several more in the future.

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Jessica craWford

Cavanaugh Mound Stabilized SOUTHEAST—In 2005, the Conservancy acquired Cavanaugh Mound, which is located in a residential area of Fort Smith, Arkansas. A massive earthwork standing approximately thirty-feet high, Cavanaugh is the tallest mound in the Conservancy’s Southeast region. But over the years this late Mississippian mound has suffered the ravages of weather and humans. A 1940 Works Progress Administration report mentioned that a historic cemetery sat on top of the mound and that tunnels had been dug into the mound’s east and south sides. Accounts also state that the owners at that time were also carrying out “explorations” of the mound. In the 1960s, a visitor to the mound noted that a large portion of its southeastern quarter had been removed. Archaeologists with the Arkansas Archaeological Survey visited the site in 1972 and reported that the

The east side of Cavanaugh Mound is bordered by a mobile home park.

east face of the mound had been cut away by heavy equipment. Extensive erosion has resulted from the removal of the mound’s east face and from the tunnels. Over the years the tunnels have been blocked and then reopened and explored by locals.When the Conservancy acquired Cavanaugh, with the help of the Arkansas Archeological Survey, access to the

tunnels was closed off and the erosion was monitored. This August, after consulting with the Arkansas Archeological Survey and other interested parties, the Conservancy cleared brush and small trees from the mound’s exposed face, covered it with sterile fill, and placed a ground cover over the fill to stop further erosion.

binghamton university community archaeology program

Field School At Queen Esther’s Town Preserve EAST—This summer marked the first professional excavations undertaken on the Queen Esther’s Town site, which is located along the Susquehanna River in north-central Pennsylvania. The site, which contains the remains of an eighteenth-century Native American village, was acquired and established as an archaeological preserve by the Conservancy in 2016. Queen Esther was a prominent woman of French and Native descent who oversaw a community of Delaware Indians. Historic documents state that the town consisted of seventy houses and lands used to graze cattle. These were destroyed in September 1778 during U.S. Army General John Sullivan’s campaign against Britishallied Native American villages. After the acquisition of the ninetytwo-acre parcel, the Conservancy was approached by Binghamton University archaeologists Siobhan Hart and Nina M. Versaggi about the possibility of

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Binghamton University students excavate the site.

conducting their annual field school on the property.The five-week field school, which took place this past summer, consisted of geophysical survey, metal detecting, and excavation of test units. Magnetometer testing showed possible rectilinear features and test excavations produced numerous metal

artifacts, Native American pottery, stone flakes, glass, and brick. The anomalies found during the magnetometer testing coupled with the artifacts in the plow zone suggest a strong possibility of intact features. Binghamton University plans to continue their investigations in the future.

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Reviews Recognizing People in the Prehistoric Southwest By Jill E. Neitzel, et.al. (University of Utah Press, 2017; 288 pgs., illus., $30 paper; www.UofUPress.com)

A Grand Adventure: The Lives of Helge and Anne Stine Ingstad and Their Discovery of a Viking Settlement in North America By Benedicte Ingstad (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2017; 472 pgs., illus., $40 cloth; www.mqup.ca)

In 1960, Helge and Anne Stine Ingstad discovered the remains of a Viking settlement at L’Anse aux Meadows on the northern shore of Newfoundland. Helge was a Norwegian lawyer turned explorer, and Anne was a professional archaeologist. They spent eight years uncovering the Viking settlement, which may be the Vinland of Leif Erikson as told in the Norse sagas. Having worked on similar sites in Iceland and Greenland, they were well qualified to explore a Norse site that dated to A.D. 1000. Initially greeted with deep skepticism, their systematic explorations turned up indisputable evidence of European contact, 492 years before Columbus. This memoir is by their daughter, a professor emerita of medical anthropology at the University of Oslo, who accompanied her parents on many of their far-flung explorations. Making use of their personal papers and photographs, she has produced an exciting tale. This is a fascinating memoir of a determined family that changed the history of the Americas.

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While most archaeological studies focus on architecture and material remains, this volume focuses on the appearance, speech, and associated identity messages of the various prehistoric people of the Southwest from A.D. 900 to 1450. Each individual and group of people could be recognized by a district appearance made up of morphological and cultural attributes. The morphological attributes includes stature, robustness, facial features, skull shape, and skin color. Cultural attributes include clothes, ornaments, hairstyles, and facial decoration. The authors primarily use data recovered by archaeological research—depictions of people on ceramics and wall murals, plus jewelry, textiles, and skeletal remains—to piece together a picture of the various groups and individuals. Because there was no written language, the chapter on speech is based on historical data. The groups studied include the Mogollon/Mimbres, Salado, Ancestral Pueblo, Hohokam, Sinagua, and Mountain Mogollon. In the chapter on physical appearance, author Ann L.W. Stoddert finds much variation in the six groups using skeletal data from 180 archaeological sites. She analyzes variations in stature, weight, head shape, and facial features, characteristics that vary with genetic pools and environment. For example males from the Chaco Canyon great houses were on average almost two inches taller than other males in the Southwest, including males from the small houses in Chaco Canyon. Men were two to four-and-one-half inches taller than women. Other chapters look at the various cultural attributes as well as language. Language in the Southwest is extremely diverse with six distinct language families encompassing more than twenty different languages, none of which is mutually understandable. Lead author Jill Neitzel, an archaeologist at the University of Delaware, and her fellow authors have produced this groundbreaking study that develops distinct identities for the prehistoric people of the Southwest. Richly illustrated and written for the general public, it is an essential addition to the study of the people of the prehistoric Southwest.

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Land of Water, City of the Dead: Religion and Cahokia’s Emergence By Sarah E. Baires (University of Alabama Press, 2017; 208 pgs., illus., $55 cloth or ebook; www.uapress.ua.edu)

Located twelve miles east of St. Louis in the American Bottom, Cahokia was the largest American city north of Mexico. With a peak population of 20,000 or more, it was the center of the Mississippian culture that dominated the greater Mississippi Valley from about A.D. 1000 to 1400. Around A.D. 800 approximately 1,000 people were living around Cahokia in small villages, farming the rich bottomlands. Then in A.D. 1050, something big happened. The population exploded and every aspect of life got more complex. In downtown Cahokia they built a series of elaborate mounds around a grand central plaza dominated by the 100-foot tall Monk’s Mound. The city quickly grew to cover 4,000 acres with dozens of mounds and thousands of homes. In this new study, Sarah Baires, an archaeologist at Eastern Connecticut State University who received her doctorate from the University of Illinois, argues that the moving force behind Cahokia’s sudden rise was a new and novel religion that attracted immigrants from near and far. She contends that Cahokia was a planned city built for economic and political purposes as well as a spiritual place relating to ancestors, gods, and “the cosmos through the land.” Much of the evidence in this book comes from recent excavations conducted by Baires and her associates at the University of Illinois on the newly discovered Rattlesnake Causeway and associated ridge-top mortuary mounds located along the site axes. Reexamination of previously excavated mounds, particularly the Wilson Mound, excavated in 1954, complements the new research. These mounds were built for burials and are characterized by a pointed, or ridged, top, not unlike the hip roofs of Cahokia houses. As such they are unfit as platforms for elite residences, unlike most Mississippian mounds. They are unique to greater Cahokia and make up seventeen of the approximately 200 mounds in the area. Baires argues that the new Cahokia religion centers on a built landscape that encompasses massive earth structures as well as water-filled barrow pits in the wet environment of the flood plain. The elaborate mortuary mounds are where the people brought their dead, their pottery and projectile points, and their ways of being. Baires makes a good case for her theory of Cahokia. She looks at the great city and its religion in a different way that will aid future studies while promoting new perspectives.

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Dry Creek: Archaeology and Paleoecology of a Late Pleistocene Alaskan Hunting Camp By W. Roger Powers, R. Dale Guthrie, and John F. Hoffecker. Edited by Ted Goebel (Texas A & M University Press, 2017; 344 pgs., illus., $50 cloth; www.tamupress.com)

The Dry Creek paleo-archaeology site located in the Nenana River Valley of central Alaska is one of the most important sites on Beringia, the land bridge between Siberia and Alaska that was open during the last Ice Age. From 1973 to 1977, Roger Powers, professor of anthropology at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks, initiated a full-scale excavation of the site. At the time geomorphologists understood that the Bering Strait Land Bridge persisted from 40,000 to 10,000 years ago, but no evidence had yet been found, despite extensive searches, to prove that humans had moved from Siberia into Alaska across the bridge. At Dry Creek Powers discovered human remains that were radiocarbon dated to 12,970 years ago, the first evidence of humans in Alaska before the flooding of Beringia. In 1983, Powers submitted a complete, detailed report of the dig to the Department of the Interior. Plans were well along for a book, but by then Powers had turned his attention to other sites, and he died in 2003 without publishing the book. Years later, two of his students decided to finish the project. The result is a first rate book detailing the four years of excavations at Dry Creek along with numerous photographs, maps, and illustrations. They also put the Dry Creek project in context of all the first American discoveries made since. It is a valuable addition to the literature on the peopling of the America and an important chapter in the history of that archaeological research. —Mark Michel

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The Archaeological Conservancy

vicKi marie singer

Expeditions

Chichén Itzá, in southern Mexico, was occupied until thirteenth century.

Maya of Yucatán and Calakmul When: February 15 – 25, 2018 Where: Mexico How Much: $2,995 per person ($325 single supplement)

The amazing Maya culture flourished for centuries in the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico. We’ll visit some of their most splendid sites including Dzibilchaltún, Balankanche Cave, Mayapán,

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and Chichén Itzá. We’ll also drive deep into the forest to visit Calakmul, which has been undergoing significant excavations in recent years. Calakmul is believed to be the largest of all the Maya cities. More than 100 stelae and 6,500 structures have been discovered so far. During the Late Classic period it dominated the entire southern Yucatán. Accompanying us will be John Henderson, one of the nation’s leading Maya scholars.

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Guatemala Highlands and Copán When: March 29 – April 8, 2018 Where: Guatemala and Honduras How Much: $2,995 per person ($325 single supplement)

the archaeological conservancy

Rain forests, snow-capped volcanoes, and magnificent lakes make up the ancient Maya landscape in the highlands of Guatemala. On our tour you’ll experience a complete spectrum of history ranging from ancient Maya ruins to modern-day Maya cities. Our travels will take us from beautiful Lake Atitlán to the Honduran rainforest where we will visit Copán, considered the crown jewel of the southern Maya cities. John Henderson from Cornell University will accompany us on the tour.

This stele depicts 18 Rabbit, one of Copán’s greatest rulers.

Veracruz

Jim WalKer

When: January 11 – 21, 2018 Where: Mexico How Much: $2,995 ($325 single supplement)

Join us in Mexico’s oldest port city, Veracruz, for an exciting look at the Olmec, Totonac, Huastec, Maya, Aztec, and Spanish cultures that have dominated the region for thousands of years. Nestled in a tropical paradise, lost cities, unique architecture, and archaeological sites that defy current cultural classification await our arrival. At Zempoala, a Totonac site dating to A.D. 1000, we’ll view a cluster of pyramids and unusual stone structures. Then we’ll visit El Tajín, the famous Totonac capital occupied between A.D. 500 and 1200. Containing seventeen ballcourts and a number of pyramids and other structures, the early constructions feature distinctive Teotihuacán-style influences that include frets, scrolls, and images of Quetzalcoatl. We’ll also tour the immense city of Cantona, which prospered after the collapse of Teotihuacán. We’ll visit Tres Zapotes, where the discovery of the first great Olmec head sculpture in 1869 set off speculation about lost tribes from Africa. Our trip ends in Villahermosa with a tour of Parque La Venta, with its incredible outdoor collection of stone sculptures. John Henderson, a leading scholar of Mesoamerican cultures, will lead the tour.

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The Olmec are known for their colossal stone heads.

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Patrons of Preservation The Archaeological Conservancy would like to thank the following individuals, foundations, and corporations for their generous support during the period of May through July 2017. Their generosity, along with the generosity of the Conservancy’s other members, makes our work possible. Life Member Gifts of $1,000 or more Thomas C. Babcock, New York Nina Bowen, Utah Donald Chase, Utah Thomas M. Doerk, Colorado Patricia G. Foschi, New Mexico William V. Fulkrod, New Mexico John W. Gage, Illinois Gretchen Hall, New Jersey Ginger C. Harrison, Mississippi Robert Mark and Evelyn Billo, Arizona Jacqueline B. Mars, Virginia Juliet Mattila, New Mexico Carolyn and Gordon McGregor, California Mark D. Menefee and Stephanie K. Wade, Arizona Rosanna Miller and Elinor Hobart, Arizona Gary R. Mullen, Alabama Ann W. Odette and Thomas H. Umbreit, Maryland Margaret Ann Olson, Wisconsin Douglas L. Peterson, New York Leila D.J. Poullada, Minnesota James F. Rogers, California M. Ronne, Illinois James and Lois Rupke, Texas Conrad and Marcy Stahly, New Mexico Frank D. Stekel, Wisconsin Frances W. Stevenson, Oregon Robert L. Turner, III, Texas James B. Walker and Michael R. Palmer, New Mexico

Anasazi Circle Gifts of $2,500 or more John and Anne Abendroth, California Rosemary Armbruster, Missouri William Busta and Joan Tomkins, Ohio Charles and Louise Cochran, Texas Carol J. Condie, New Mexico Carol Demcak, California Bob Hogan and Jane Imboden, Florida Jeanine J. Keating, Florida Jay Last, California Jeffrey M. Mitchem, Arkansas Betty Perkins, New Mexico William F. Pickard, Missouri Gavine Pitner, North Carolina Joy Robinson, California Theodore P. Shannon, Illinois Bert and Colleen Spencer, Texas Susan and Glyn Thickett, Arizona William E. Thompson, Texas Gordon and Judy Wilson, New Mexico Foundation/Corporate Gifts Albuquerque Archaeological Society, New Mexico Harry L. Willett Foundation, Colorado Haskell Fund, Ohio Summer Hill Foundation, Connecticut

Making a Lasting Legacy Established in 2002, the Living Spirit Circle has become an essential component of the Conservancy’s continued success in identifying and preserving America’s most endangered archaeological resources. Formed to recognize those members who have provided for the Conservancy in their estate plans or through charitable gift annuities, the Living Spirit Circle consists of a dedicated and generous group of individuals. Nancy Volkman, a long-time Conservancy supporter and member of the Living Spirit Circle, left her estate to the

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Conservancy in 2013. Her wish was to acquire archaeological sites in memory of her parents. Volkman’s generosity allowed the Conservancy to purchase Foxwood Farms in South Carolina and Mound Spring in Nevada. In the years ahead, the forces that destroy archaeological sites will only multiply. Development, sprawl, and looting will all increase with each passing year. Nancy Volkman’s foresight and commitment to preservation will help ensure that America’s precious archaeological resources will have a future. By joining the Conservancy’s Living Spirit Circle today, you can support our nation’s cultural heritage for years to come.

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MAKE YOUR MARK IN TIME. Some Conservancy members think the only way to help save archaeological sites is through membership dues. While dues are a constant lifeline, there are many ways you can support the Conservancy’s work, both today and well into the future. And by supporting the Conservancy, you not only safeguard our past for your children and grandchildren, you also may save some money.

richard boisvert

Nevers site, new hampshire

Began as a Conservancy Preserve in 1999

Whatever kind of gift you give, you can be sure we’ll use it to preserve places like the Nevers site and our other 510 sites across the United States.

Place stock in the Conservancy.

Give a charitable gift annuity.

Leave a lasting legacy.

Evaluate your investments. Some members choose to make a difference by donating stock. Such gifts offer a charitable deduction for the full value instead of paying capital gains tax.

Depending on your circumstances, you may be able to make a gift of cash and securities today that lets you receive extensive tax benefits as well as an income for as long as you live.

Many people consider protecting our cultural heritage by remembering the Conservancy in their will. While providing us with a dependable source of income, bequests may qualify you for an estate tax deduction.

Yes, I’m interested in making a planned-giving donation to The Archaeological Conservancy and saving money on my taxes. Please send more information on: Gifts of stock

Charitable gift annuities

Bequests

The Archaeological Conservancy Attn: Planned Giving 1717 Girard Blvd. NE Albuquerque, NM 87106

Name: ______________________________________________________________________ Street Address: _______________________________________________________________ City: _______________________________________ State: ______ Zip:_______________ Phone: (

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) ___________________________

Or call: (505) 266-1540

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American Archaeology | Fall 2017 | Vol. 21 No. 3

Articles inside

SURVIVING IN A CHANGING WORLD

EVENTS

LIFE ON THE FRONTIER

AN INSTRUMENT FOR THE AGES

FINDING THE PILGRIMS

LETTERS

LAY OF THE LAND

THE SERPENT MOUND DEBATE