Moravian Ethnic Diversity: An Archival and Faunal Analysis of Schoenbrunn and Gnadenhutten in Colonial Ohio

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Zooarchaeology, Faunal, and Foodways Studies" session, at the 2019 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The intention of this study is to investigate the agency of Native American people in colonial America through studying their interaction with the environment and with other ethnically diverse groups. Using both archival and faunal data from archaeological investigations, there is potential to address questions concerning ethnic identity within diet and human modification to faunal remains found within the two Moravian sites, Schoenbrunn and Gnadenhutten in Ohio. Faunal analyses of Moravian sites are surprisingly few and have been largely ignored as a means of exploring ethnic identity among newly converted Native Americans. A case study has been constructed around these two contemporary Moravian sites built in 1772 and briefly occupied. Historical and archival research from Moravian diaries, and other historic documents and studies were used to trace the diaspora of certain Native American groups that interacted with Moravians and explore the ethnogenesis of several diverse groups of Native American converts. 

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Zooarchaeology, Faunal, and Foodways Studies   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2019

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 484