Field School Wrap-up - Block 1

Going back now to week 5 to see what had been happening at Block 1. Still much work being done there. At this stage physical artifacts are becoming rarer. The focus is primarily on soil signatures; mapping the stratigraphy (soil layers) and investigated possible post holes on the embankment. This is how the block looked early in week 5. Seen in this photo are two of our staff members; Craig (standing) and Scott.

Things that have changed since the last time we took a look at Block 1…

The trench at the left side of the image above has been added. This was done to get a better look at the soil layering of the embankment. We need to see things like this. Differences in soil coloring, texture and composition point to different episodes of construction. The layers we found show us that the embankment wasn’t built all at once but, rather, in multiple stages.

The angled wall behind Craig is where possible post holes are being evaluated. Each potential post hole has to be profiled to confirm its existence. Many suspected post holes didn’t pan out but enough did to support the conclusion that a log wall did, indeed, once stand at the top of the embankment.

Moving on to the final week…

As was done at Block 3, the ditch here was excavated to determine its original depth.

Soil stratigraphy in the ditch represents much the opposite of what it does on the embankment. Whereas layering on the embankment represents intentional construction episodes, layering in the ditch is the product of natural erosion. Noting how much soil has eroded into the ditch may be one way of estimating how much time has passed since the site was been abandoned.

Probably the most intriguing find of the whole field school is shown below.

What you see here is a second row of post holes found below the ones I talked about earlier. These show us that a wall of a different sort had been erected here during an earlier construction episode. Here is the same image again with the post holes highlighted in case they are difficult to see.

Two things stand out about these older post holes. First, they are smaller and spaced slightly further apart than the ones found in the younger layer. This suggests a different purpose for the older wall. It may have been what we would call a ‘screen wall,’ or a wall erected simply to obstruct the view of things happening within the enclosure. Sturdier logs placed closer together, as was the case in the later wall found in the upper layer, is more reminiscent of a fortified structure erected for defensive purposes. Overall, this suggests that the inhabitants of the enclosure may have come to experience a higher degree of conflict with neighboring groups as time passed.

Secondly, the posts for the screen wall were erected at an angle. We have no explanation for why this is. By all accounts this is the first time such a thing has been observed. This unique construction feature may be a mystery for a long time to come.

Here is a final shot of a portion of Block 1.

Excavation is now complete. All potential post holes have been evaluated and the walls exposed down to the layer of sterile soil. All that remains to be done here is to draw up the profile of the soil layers that are present. Work on Block 1 was completely wrapped up mid-way through the final week.

Field School Wrap-up - Block 6

Of all the blocks investigated, Block 6 yielded, perhaps, the greatest amount of physical artifacts found during the entire field school. Too bad we didn’t have more time to explore this area.

Work on this block wasn’t started until the fifth week. Here’s a shot of it early into the excavation.

As with Blocks 4 and 5, this started out as a 4m x 4m block composed of four 1m-square units. In the photo above, only 2 of those units had been worked on so far. That’s Sona in the background working on one of them. And Misty and Dr. Bob are picking away at the nearest unit. You can see the flags in their unit where they have marked several large pieces of pottery. They are gently scraping the dirt away to see if there is more that need to be documented. As they have reached their given target depth at this point, those pottery sherds were left in place for the time being while the other, untouched units were excavated down to the same depth. In addition, another unit was opened up on the southern side of the block.

This is how Block 6 looked at the start of the final week.

You can’t make it out clearly in that photo, but quite a bit of stuff was being uncovered. The pottery sherds that Misty had previously flagged turned out to be the start of a large concentration. This became more and more apparent as she slowly moved the dirt from around them to see how extensive the concentration actually was.

Here’s a view of what she was finding as she brushed off the soil.

And here’s a shot, taken the next day, after most of it had been exposed.

That is the way pottery will generally look when it is unearthed; flattened and broken. Intact pieces are rare. Each of those fragments has to be removed individually, cleaned, and catalogued. If the sherds haven’t become too degraded or damaged, they can be put back together in the lab (a process called “refitting”). A good deal of that has been done already. Maybe I can come back later and post a couple of photos of some of the pottery refits that have been completed.

While this pottery concentration was being dealt with, work progressed on the other units within the block. As the final week was nearing an end, another concentration of comparable size was discovered along the eastern wall of the block. So, as was the case with other blocks, the last couple of days were a scramble to extract as much of the last minute finds as we could. Here’s a shot of the Block 6 on our last morning as the crew was finishing up; a task that took them right up to the end of the final day.

Cemetery Project

Well, I obviously didn't get caught up with everything from field school last week. Had to leave town for a week to work on another project. I'll come back and talk about that a bit more after wrapping up field school (which I WILL get done this week).

In the meantime, here is a short video clip from Fox News in Indy that talks a little about what I was doing last week. Enjoy.

Field School Wrap-up - Block 4

Don’t really have much to say about Block 4. I didn’t spend all that much time in that area; just stopped by briefly from time to time as I passed through to other areas.

This block was opened up at the end of week 4. Here are a couple of shots of it mid-way through week 5.

There were a lot of potential post holes in this block as can be seen by the many red flags within the units. Each of these had to be drawn onto a map marking their locations before further excavation could continue. In the photo above Amy is taking measurements to plot the locations while Shelby records the data.

Some of those flags also mark pieces of pottery found at that level. Each of those needed to be documented as well. There was a great deal of pottery found throughout this block. That, along with the post holes that were later verified, suggests that a structure also stood here as well.

Since we were starting to be pushed for time, emphasis here was placed on excavating downward to the sterile subsoil within the existing units rather than expanding the block to cover a larger area. That way we could fully explore the things we had already flagged and document the rather complex soil patterns that had been found.

Here is a shot of Block 4 early on the final day of field school.

All that remains to be done is to document and excavate that little area left in the upper corner of the photo. Dr. Bob is seen evaluating the profile there. Once he was done with that, we started digging out that last little section.

However, that little corner still held some surprises. Unfortunately, I didn’t get any more photos of this Block. Wish I had.

As soon as they started digging out that last chunk, a large concentration of pottery was found. At least 2, large and fairly intact vessels were unearthed, along with many smaller fragments. Regrettably, they were quite fragile and broke during the excavation process. Not to worry though, they are being reconstructed back at the lab. And, in the process of cleaning and preparing the pieces, it was found that the vessels contained seeds of some sort. These will eventually be sent off to another facility to determine what kind of seeds they are. Apparently, these were storage vessels, either for seeds that would have been used for food preparation (ground into flour) or for seeds that would have been planted at a later date.

Excavating finds of this kind is tedious and time consuming work. We were actually unable to completely remove this pottery by the end of the final day. Some of the staff and students went back the following Monday, after the official end of field school, to complete the task. It took most of the day but they finally got Block 4 completed.

Field School Wrap-up - Block 2

Gonna move across the enclosure now and talk about Block 2.

Block 2 was located on the eastern side of the enclosure, not too far from the embankment. Also in this area were the remains of historical constructions. Nearby were pylons that may have been part of a building foundation or maybe even a pier (in the past the river had been dammed and water levels were much higher than they are today). Additionally, in close proximity to this block were a concrete structure and a junk pile with historic trash; broken glass, wire, etc.

Work had been underway here since the first week but I didn’t get any early photos. This is a picture, looking southward, of how the block appeared at the start of week 4.

Note the pile of rocks in the far corner. One possible explanation for its presence is that they are the remains of a collapsed wall associated with historic structures. Or, they may simply have been piled there after having been cleared from the nearby field. Yet another question we can’t answer.

Multiple post holes were found within this block. Their layout suggested that a rectangular structure once stood at this location. It was decided to expand the block northward to see if there was additional evidence of such a structure.

This is a look at Block 2 early in week 5.

And here’s a closer look at the northern expansion units.

In this photo you can see a clear distinction in soil colors running across the units in a relatively straight line. This supports the conclusion that a structure once stood here with the darker soil marking its position. Work is still being done to see how the positioning of the post holes correlate to the soil differentiations.

During week 6 the crew continued the northern expansion in both area and depth. It was found that the darker soil, though relatively shallow, persisted within a rectangular space. Fewer artifacts were found within this space compared to what lay outside it. In the final 2 days of excavation a good deal of pottery was unearthed in the northwestern corner of the block. As a whole, we are uncertain as to why it was there but one staff member remains adamant that it was associated with a burial, though no human remains were found.

In closing, here is a view of Block 2 as excavations there were nearing an end.

Field School Wrap-up ... Block 5

When I sat down to type up more about field school I realized that I would have to take a different approach with the remaining stuff. Trying to organize it by week just didn’t cut it any more because of everything that was going on. So, rather than posting one long (and confusing) entry covering everything, I’m going to post several smaller entries broken down by the blocks we were working on.

By the time we were done we had opened up a total of six blocks. I’ve already covered pretty much everything that needs to be said about Block 3 in the previous “Week 5” posting. This was the excavation across the northern edge of the ditch and embankment. Not to slight Block 3 (it did yield good and useful data) but exciting things were happening elsewhere and I want to move along and focus on them. I’ve already talked a lot about Block 1 since that is where I spent most of my time during the first half of field school, but there is still more to add. And I haven’t said anything yet about the other four blocks at all. So, basically, I’ve got 5 blocks to talk about plus a little something to wrap up the whole adventure with.

For the rest of this entry I’m going to talk about Block 5. This is the area I focused on during the last 2 weeks. This block was composed of four adjoining 1m x 1m units located inside the enclosure. This location was selected based upon the amount of artifacts unearthed here by the shovel test probe. In some regards, this block was disappointing. It didn’t yield the kinds of artifacts that the test probe suggested it might. However, it did yield 2 things that none of the other blocks presented.

Here’s a photo of the northwest corner of Block 5 in the last stages of excavation…

Here's a little closer look at one of the noteworthy finds.

What you see there is a series of parallel lines of darker soil. This part of the enclosure was once under cultivation. What those lines represent are what we call 'plow scars.' This block has been excavated down to the same depth as that reached by past plow shares. This is the boundary point between the subsoil and the topsoil which was turned over by plowing. We didn't see remants of past, historic activity like this in the other blocks.

And this is a view of the other important find from Block 5.

At this point I've already excavated to get a cross-sectional profile of the feature. What was first noticed was a semi-circular area of darker soil. You can still see the western portion of that. Mixed in with that darker soil was signs of ash and burnt soil. This suggested that we were possibly looking at a hearth or some kind of fire pit.

As I excavated the profile, more ash and burnt soil was uncovered. In addition there were 2 fire-cracked rocks (FCR). These are rocks that had, at one time, been heated to the point that they shattered. It is possible that these rocks had been used to border a hearth. But that begs the question, "what happened to the rest of the border?" If we had had additional time we could have expanded this block to uncover the northern half of this feature and see if there was more large FCR there. Unfortunately, we had to halt the excavation of Block 5 at this point. Maybe somebody can come back at a later date and explore this area some more.

Hiatus ending...

Geez, has it really been almost 2 months since I last posted?!

During that time away I've gone back to the old grind; back to working those dreadful graveyard hours again. Took a while to make that adjustment. Seems like each time I go through that transition it gets just that much harder to do. Hopefully though, this will be the last time I have to deal with that.

Still have much to write up concerning field school. The last week (week 6) proved to be quite intense. Lots of last minute finds of significance while trying to wrap things up according to our deadline. An exhausting week, but productive and enlightening as well.

Since then I've been working weekday mornings in the lab as a volunteer, helping to get everything catalogued. It looks like that part of the project will finally be wrapped up on Monday.

I'll be picking away at the keyboard this weekend to cover as many of the remaining field school highlights as I can. Need to get that out of the way 'cuz other things are coming up to talk about. These next 2 months are going to be hectic!

To start with, next week I'll be going on my first paid gig. Woo-hoo! It's only going to last for a week but, hey, ya gotta start somewhere right? This will be the initial phase of a cemetary relocation project near Indy. I'll come back with more details about that later.

After that, there will be 2 weeks during which I'll be participating at a dig near Evansville, along the Ohio River. And, overlapping with that will be a few weekends where I'll be helping out at another dig near Indy. Of course, in between I'll have to be back at the home place dealing with the regular job thing. Bummer. And I intend to continue helping out in the lab as well.

Anywho, big things coming up that'll have me on the go pretty much through the end of October. Looking forward to all of it.

Stay tuned!