Digging Down To the Midden

Over the last two days at Burrell Orchard, we completed our shovel-testing and began work on three 2x2meter units near the edge of the old orchard.  Two of these units were placed adjacent to a 2x2 opened in 2008 that penetrated through the midden deposits and exposed a layer of yellow-brown clay.  This layer may represent a house floor similar to ones that have been recorded on Late Archaic sites in Illinois and Kentucky.   Or it could simply be subsoil backdirt from the digging of pits below the midden, but further work will tell.

As we removed the plow zone soils today, several interesting discoveries were made.  A nearly complete, stemmed lanceolate projectile point was found in the upper layers of the midden in Unit 490N 497.5E.  As shown below, this point is only missing its tip.  It is extremely well made and very thin.  Even the edges are still sharp!  It is made of a dark blue-black flint most likely from Coshocton County, Ohio.  This artifact was either a butchering knife or perhaps a spear point.

An even rarer artifact is a stone adze found in the upper midden layer in unit 498N 512E.  It is a complete, undamaged specimen of a wood-working tool that was carefully ground and polished from a very attractive variety of igneous rock called porphyry.  In the image below, the distinctive crystals of feldspar, called phenocrysts, can be distinctly seen.  This tool was most likely made from a glacial cobble found in French Creek or another local stream. The discovery of an undamaged tool like this seems unusual in a refuse context such as a midden.  Perhaps this particular stratum is more significant than we first assumed. 

Next door in the adjoining excavation unit, a hard day of plow zone excavation resulted in the complete exposure of the midden deposit.  At first glance, it looks something like an asphalt pavement--and is nearly as hard to dig--but on closer inspection dense concentrations of charcoal, burned soil, burned bone, flint flakes can be seen between the large chunks of fire-cracked rock.  Shown below is a view of the midden floor at the end of the day.  This floor has not seen the light of day for some four thousand years!  And much more undoubtedly lies beneath.

CMNH Field School Returns to the Field

After a one year hiatus, the CMNH field school program is back in business.  After five successful seasons at the Heckelman site, we have returned to Burrell Orchard, where we worked in 2008.  This site is one of the most unique archaeological localities in northern Ohio.  It contains a dense accumulation of midden (refuse) and other features that date to the Late Archaic period, about 4000 years ago.   In 2008 we located and sampled the midden deposits and found a number of cooking pits and smudge pits used for smoking deer hides.  This season we will continue to excavate more of the midden deposits near the old orchard, but also carry out a systematic shovel-test survey of the remainder of the site.   To read the report of our 2008 work, use this link.

Today we began our shovel-test survey.  Things started out slowly, because we had to clear survey transects in the tall weeds and grass that cover the field.  Luckily we had some willing grass cutters in Michelle N., Char S., and Marcia R.  Here you can see Char's mowing technique.

Four shovel-test units were laid out on the N490 transect. Each unit is 50cm by 50cm in size and is excavated into the midden deposits and ends at the artifact-free subsoil.  Each crew discovered flint flakes and fire-cracked rock (FCR) in almost every unit.   Below the 25cm-thick plow zone, we found the dark, organic midden deposits containing more flakes, FCR, bits of charcoal, and some burned bone.  Only a few pieces of historic material, such as window glass, were found, suggesting that this was not a heavily used area of the Burrell family farm. The most significant find of the day was the discovery of the base of the lanceolate projectile point shown below.

These long flint knives and spear points were used by the Late Archaic inhabitants of the site for hunting and butchering deer and other animals.  We often find only the broken bases of these points, which tells us that re-tooling--the discarding of broken point bases and re-hafting of new points--was a common occurrence at this Late Archaic base camp.   We will continue our shovel-testing tomorrow and in the coming weeks in order to get a better picture of what lies below the surface of this large settlement.

Reconstructing the Late Woodland Vessel

Back on July 5 of last year I reported the discovery of a Late Woodland pot in a small pit in the south area of our Heckelman site excavations.  In the late fall, much time was spent by Meghan M. and Jaime G. on the reconstruction.  Examining the sherds from this vessel in the field told us it belonged to the early Late Woodland, Green Creek phase of north-central Ohio.  This ID was based primarily on the very thin vessel walls and fine cordmarking on the exterior.  Several pots of similar form were found during the 2011 season in pits within Structure 2.  

After many hours of work, we realized that only part of the vessel was preserved.  I believe that the entire pot was deposited in a small pit--most likely within another house--some 1,400 years ago, but the effects of weathering left most of the vessel badly fractured and unable to be reconstructed.  Much of the rim was also missing, most likely due to plowing.   This image shows the vessel in all its crushed splendor.

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Persistent effort--and much masking tape--resulted in the reconstruction seen here.

The close-up below reveals the finely cordmarked surface, which was likely done with a cord-wrapped wooden paddle.  Note that the orientation of the cordmarks changes from vertical near the rim (upper portion) to oblique and overlapping on the body.  This form of surface treatment is typical of Middle to early Late Woodland pottery in southern Ohio and beyond.  It is more rare in northern Ohio but does reveal connections between Woodland peoples at Heckelman and middle Ohio Valley groups to the south. 

The lack of heavy carbon smudging from use in a fire suggests that this was not a cooking pot.  Its thin walls tell me that it may have instead been used for dry storage.

Finally, I used a bit of digital manipulation to project the reconstructed vessel profile onto the remains of the Late Woodland pot.  The result shown below exhibits the typical form of early Late Woodland vessels such as Newtown Cordmarked or Childers Cordmarked found in the middle Ohio River Valley.   Again, revealing clear stylistic connections with societies farther south, not only during the Hopewell era, but also during the subsequent early Late Woodland period.