Welcome back!  Our swamp archaeologists have been quite busy these past few weeks.  With what you might ask?  Well, last we visited our explorers of the muck, they had just set up camp at the North Plateau with a 2 x 3 m excavation unit.  We have not expanded that unit with other exploratory units, building up to a 4 x 4 m unit with several 1 x 1 m units to the side and one 1 x 2 m off to the east. 

You might be saying to yourself, gee, that sure is a lot of space to excavate.  It sure is, and there is a reason to the madness I assure you.  The large block excavation is a great attempt to follow the trench feature found within EU 4 by the 2010 field school.  Our hope, is that by following the feature, we might be able to decipher just what kind of structure it is, be it palisade or cabin.

As the days have passed, Dr. Sayers, Dr. Greene and myself have scratched out heads trying to figure out the enigma laid out before us.  We are certain that one trench represents one wall.  So, we could be looking at the outside wall of a structure, or perhaps we are on the inside.  We have been finding a scattering of lithic flakes, a piece of glass so small, someone thought it looked like an insect wing, quartz flakes and small bit of metal.  We have pressed on with our excavations and have been joined by a great number (at different times and weeks) of amazing volunteers.  Archaeology would not be possible if it were not for volunteers and I will be forever grateful for their help.

The site has been a very popular place all of a sudden.  We have had quite the visitation by a slew of media crews.  Reporters representing various media groups, including a documentary filmmaker, faced the mud and joined us on our site.  I won’t mention all of the groups just yet, instead I will wait to hear about their publications, but let me just say that I’m quite jazzed about the attention.  This site deserves to have its story told to the world, and that is exactly what we, as archaeologists, are attempting to do. 

Dr. Greene has left the excavation for the season.  Before he went on his way, we came up with a plan of attack, as to what to do on the North Plateau.  Dr. Sayers and I have been talking about the progressions of the excavations.  We’ve had quite the number of volunteers help us out on the Plateau, and we now have two students working on the block excavation.  All of our volunteers have returned to their lives outside of the swamp, and the Plateau is left with three (me and the students) with the occasional visit from Dr. Sayers.

While a few of our volunteers were still on the Plateau, an exciting find was made.  Our two volunteers were screening and found quite a bit of white fragments.  What could these fragments be?  I had a thought as to what they could be (one of two things I suppose) and Dr. Sayers confirmed, we found fragments of a clay tobacco pipe!  Parts of the bowl and even a piece of the stem (broken in length) turned up in our excavation.  In fact, more fragments are being found by the day, including today.

The more dirt we remove from the unit, the more perplexed Dr. Sayers and I are.  Until today that is.  We, the Plateau crew, removed another layer from some choice spots on the excavation block, and while we still have some questions, we believe we now see the grid pattern of several trenches indicating a cabin structure.

More will be done this week to expose that grid pattern so that we may be able to document the footprint as best we can.  We may excavate one of the trench features, in order to gain another glimpse inside.  This is the last week of intense excavations, so time is running short. 

In other news, today was filled with wildlife and documentary filmmakers.  The day began with deer, lizards and this guy:

I was walking to the North Plateau with one of the students when I heard something rustle in the leaves to my right.  I looked over expecting to see a lizard scamper by, but instead see the largest rattlesnake I, personally, have ever seen.  After a few moments of amazement at the beauty and seer size of this creature, I walked the student back to the Crest, where we informed everyone else as to the snakes presence and whereabouts.  The snake was sunning itself and was uninterested in us.  The students and I eventually traveled back to the North Plateau, but foraging a new path, around our large friend.  The rattler stayed in the same place for the majority of the day, and left somewhere around 2.  On our venture out of the swamp, we ran into a small box turtle, just hanging out on the path, who began moving faster than most rabbits as we passed him by.  I was greeted by a lizard once we were completely out of the swamp, as if to say “good job, the day is done.”

Above I mentioned some media was present at our site.  Well, it has just come to my attention that the GDSLS Archaeology Field School had a spot on UNC TV. Check it out here.

One last note, I donated my sunglasses to the swamp today.  I left them on the hood on the van, thinking I would remember them on our way home.  I did not and they are now a part of history for some future archaeologist to find.  Hope they like scratched up Ray Bans.

Well, that was quite the update.  Thanks for joining us again, and I hope to leave you one final log of the season in about a week or so.  Join us next time, when we’ll discuss our final findings and what they might mean, in other words I might actually talk about anthropology, oh my.

Welcome back and thanks for tuning in to the weekly adventures within the Great Dismal Swamp.

This week, Dr. Greene and myself began our North Plateau adventure by setting up a new grid system.  Dr. Sayers joined us in our discussion and advocated for the new grid.  Dr. Sayers and I carried the total station across the water and to our site.  I set up the total station while Dr. Greene began clearing a line of sight between the Crest and North Plateau.  Once complete, we shot in the new grid.  The previous excavations on the North Plateau followed the natural landscape and were not on the same grid as the Crest, thus the units are a bit askew within our new grid system.

After we successfully mapped the new grid, we began to clean out the back fill from EU 4 (excavated in 2010).  We reached the bottom of the original excavation and were overjoyed to witness that the features were still intact.  Two pot sherds (broken pot fragments) were still present within the floor, just as we had left them last year.  The features I just mentioned are a trench feature complex containing a posthole, within which the post sherds were located.  Once EU 4 was uncovered and fully exposed, we placed a new 2 x 3 m excavation unit over EU 4 and labeled it EU 8.  EU 8 contains EU 4, which is situated at an angle.

The plan of attack is to follow the trench feature, which presented itself within EU 4 last year.  Our hope is to discover just what this trench is and what its purpose was.  There is one posthole in association, and we aim to find more. 

Dr. Greene and myself began excavating EU 8 and quickly busted through the root cap.  Two students joined us on Friday and we set up a 1 x1 m unit (EU 9) just east of EU8 and a 1 x 2 m unit (EU10) just north of EU 8.

EU 9 successfully removed the root cap by the end of the day and EU 10 made decent dent within the root cap.  Dr. Greene and myself have EU 8 almost to the base of level I2 (an arbitrary level system, ie I1, I2, I3, I/II, II)

In order to keep work within EU 8 organized, Dr. Greene and I set up 1 x 1 m sections within the 2 x 3 , unit designated alphabetically (A-F).  Dr. Greene found a small Quartz flake in section C and I found a smaller Quartz flake in section F.

The dark soil stains in association with the trench feature are growing and a possible posthole is present in the NW corner. 

Exciting excavations are in store for our swamp dwellers next week and more expansions and deeper depths are to come.

What will be revealed through further excavation?  Will our own experience of community give us a glimpse into the past or are our own interpretations limited to our lived experience as archaeologists?  Will we find a footprint of a past structure and just how many Clif bars will we consume?

Join us again next week to find out!