Sunday, May 15, 2011

Any theories about artifacts?

Hey guys, now that we've been collecting artifacts from our site for a few weeks now does anyone have any ideas about what they tell us about our site? So far we've collected a lot of glass shards, brick, tile, nails and assorted odds and ends. Anyone have a guess beyond a Fransiscan trash heap?

5 comments:

  1. Obviously there were extraterrestrials involved.

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  2. More seriously, though, I don't think we've scratched the surface enough to take a stab developing theories.

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  3. It's never too early to start developing hypotheses. That's part of grounded theory, coming up with ideas and watching to see whether the data that surfaces is congruent with your working hypotheses or not, adjusting as necessary. That said, I'm honestly kind of stumped. It seems clear to me that the large amount of artifacts means the area was filled or leveled with rubble, but why or in what context is not so obvious.

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  4. The artifacts we find are consistently brick, ceramics, glass, nails, animal bones, and a few exciting items like beads. 20+ cm below the surface we are finding concrete, asphalt, and rock. Is it possible to date the layers? I bet our findings will match up with the use of this site by the mission and, as David pointed out, historical events like the 1909 earthquake and fires. Its curious that we haven't found much evidence of agriculture (but perhaps the nails were part of the orchard).

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