This week I finally felt like it made sense to wear cargo pants and carry a trowel. We did a lot of work! I enjoyed plotting, drawing and recording the artifacts. Its not a complex process, but somehow, seeing artifacts in my notebook is quite different than seeing scattered flags in the field. I can begin to categorize and theorize about the artifacts and why they are there. It seems that we have entered the realm of "real" archeology.
Around 1600 we split into groups for subsurface surveying with shovels, buckets, screens and all. The class made some good finds like historic nails, ceramic, glass, and animal bones, which were collected in labeled bags. There seems to be more artifacts than we originally thought, even if they are only small fragments. I wasn't too excited about breaking out the shovels, only because it was so late in the day and I was out of food and water. I'll be better prepared next week!
Little did we know each subsurface survey would give us a glimpse into the future collections and the bane for catalogues around the world :) Beside this glimpse these subsurface surveys helped support the previously known knowledge about the history of the site (beautifully outlined by David P. and others). Many pieces of the glass and ceramic especially helped form a basis for which later research in the lab gave light to actual dates that could be correlated to the history of DSCQHR.
ReplyDeleteThis is the beauty of archaeology I think being able to unfold a story bit by bit. What's even more exciting is seeing new people just experiencing archaeology for the first time get excited over these "little" details, that are of course not so little and lead to a broader story.
So thank you Christy for this awesome post that aids others looking at our site a little insight into the early days that create a path to the next stage in an archaeological field class.