North America (Geographic Keyword)
3,026-3,050 (3,610 Records)
Not long ago, Pennsylvania potter, Jack Troy declared "if North America has a ‘pottery state’ it must be North Carolina, as there is probably no other state with such a highly developed pottery consciousness," – and he is right! North Carolina’s pottery heritage is unique in many ways: it is the most southern state with a well-developed earthenware tradition (ca. 1750s); it is the most northern state with an alkaline-glazed stoneware tradition, in addition to its salt-glaze; its early...
Slipware Philadelphia Style: Case Study from Recent Excavations at the Museum of the American Revolution Site (2016)
Slipware ceramics have been unearthed in large quantities at archaeological sites around Philadelphia, most recently, at the site of the future Museum of the American Revolution at the corner of 3rd and Chesnut Streets in Old City. What is known as the Philadelphia style was a mixing of two European traditions of slip decoration brought across the Atlantic with the earliest settlers: first English and then German. While many of the slip trailed designs appear similar, they vary in simple ways...
"Sloops of 30 Tuns are Carried Overland in This Place": Cart Roads, Trade, and Settlement in the Northern Delmarva Peninsula, C. 1670-1800. (2013)
Since 2008 numerous previously unknown early colonial homestead sites have been discovered in association with a network of cart roads established from the 1670’s to connect the Upper Chesapeake Bay with the lower Delaware River. The research, commissioned by the Delaware Department of Transportation as part of the U.S. Route 301 highway project, is drastically revising models of settlement in the region. The cart roads were used for both legal commerce and an extensive illicit trade, the...
Small Chinese Settlements in the southwest Pacific: a brief look at Chinese Bakeries and Households in the Southwest Pacific 1890-1930 (2013)
In addition to the spread of Chinese populations around the Pacific Rim in the nineteenth century, Chinese manufactured goods also were sold throughout the South Pacific. Fijian’s, Tongans, and Maoris purchased Chinese Ceramics and iron implements. The Chinese immigrants who lived on islands in the region also provided needed services. Bakeries and grocery stores and retail stores ran by Chinese owners carried goods manufactured in China. The end result was an archaeological signature that...
Small Waists and Tiny Feet: The Influence of Fashion on Deformed Skeletal Remains, Even in a Girl from the Wild West (2017)
Fashion depicts many aspects of a person's life; from socioeconomic status to personal taste. Emmie Baker Scott followed the trends of fashionable dress from childhood to her death in 1885. Her skeletal remains and clothing reveal her family's emphasis on emulating the upper class and the presentation of an ideal Victorian era female figure. Born to a doctor, his occupation would have brought wealth and social standing to the family. Emmie might have been scrutinized with increased pressure...
Smoke and Spirit: Exploring Bodily and Sensual Concerns at Early Harvard College (2018)
Identity, a central concept in contemporary historical archaeology theory, has been enlivened by recent scholarship that is mindful of bodily experience. Some scholars emphasize embodiment, others explore further sensory dimensions of historical identities embodied in human and material interactions, including emotion, memory, sensuality, and nostalgia, to explore the sensing body in the material world through sound, smell, touch, sexuality, and emotion. The intent in focusing on sensual...
Smoke is in the Air: Tobacco and Traditional Plant Use in 19th Century Plantation Life (2018)
At Ames Plantation in Western TN, excavations on the Fanny Dickins Slave House Site (1841-1853) have yielded a plethora of information about the everyday lives of the enslaved population. However, little is known about the smoking habits of these dynamic individuals. More can be revealed through employing multiple lines of evidence to generate nuanced understandings of choices surrounding the use of specific pipes and the varieties of plants smoked, such as tobacco and jimson weed. Conducting...
The Smoke of Industry Hovering as a Blessing Over the Village: The Study of a Landscape of Control in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. (2015)
The city of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, rapidly industrialized throughout the 1860s and 1870s. The close proximity to the region’s natural resources and major east coast markets placed Harrisburg at the forefront of the American industrial revolution in the late nineteenth century. The Harrisburg Nail Works represented one of the largest industrial complexes in the Harrisburg region during this time. The owners of the Harrisburg Nail Works designed a factory system that stressed surveillance and...
Smoking Hams and Pumping Hickory: The Armstrong-Rogers Site in New Castle County, Delaware (2016)
From the beginning, initial studies at the Armstrong-Rogers site left more questions than answers. Located within the floodplain of Drawyers Creek just north of Middletown, Delaware, survey and testing efforts uncovered the partial remains of a stone foundation and many eighteenth- and nineteenth-century artifacts. Was this the home built by the Armstrong family in the 1730s? An 1820s building occupied by James Rogers? Or something entirely different? The answer, in the end, is a little of all...
Smuggling and Distribution Routes of the Manila Galleon. The case of some XVI century Chinese porcelains and majolica in the Pacific coast of Mexico (2017)
In 2006 a survey was carried out in the north coast of Guerrero, Mexico that pointed to possible smuggling activities related to the route of the Manila Galleon. Several dozen shards of Chinese porcelain were recorded. Analysis of the Chinese porcelain determined that the collection was part of one depositional event and can be attributed to the late XVI century. In the collection are several common types such as phoenix plates, bowls and cups. Related to the porcelain was a ceramic type known...
So Many Disks, So Little Research: The Intersectionality of Modified Ceramic Sherds (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Scattered evidence across North America points to the use of a common piece of refuse and a common human desire: broken pottery and playing games. A small sherd can be transformed with minimal effort into a circular disk which can be used as game pieces, counters, or toys. They were used in indigenous sports, European colonist gambling, and as playthings...
Soap And Suds: Alcohol Consumption Among The Residents Of Soap Suds Row (2015)
A study of identity and agency among Victorian-era Army washer women was conducted through an analysis of alcohol-related containers collected from laundress quarters across three archaeological sites. Few field studies have considered the experiences of these women, yet material correlates from excavations at Fort Massachusetts, Fort Garland, and Fort Smith provided valuable evidence regarding the lives of laundresses who resided there, including evidence of alcohol consumption. Although women...
Social Bioarchaeology of Childhood Applied to the Analysis of an Excavated 19th Century Mennonite Cemetery (2013)
In 1852, a congregation of Anabaptist Mennonites from the Canton of Bern, Switzerland, immigrated to the United States to escape religious persecution, and settled in what is now Berne, Indiana. They established a new community, while retaining their religion, traditions, and heritage. The need for a cemetery was recognized, and the Old Berne Mennonite Cemetery served the community until 1896. The cemetery was recently excavated and relocated. This provided a unique opportunity to conduct an...
Social Defense: The Construction of Late Medieval Societal and Spatial Boundaries in Newcastle upon Tyne and York (2015)
In anthropology, the "body" is a culture-specific concept often defined as separate from the mind, and during the nineteenth century was used in the study of non-Western cultures to better understand "the other." This paper investigates the application of the "body" concept to late medieval urban landscapes by examining how social hierarchy was organized and defined within town walls. The northern British towns of Newcastle and York are used as case studies: both were founded as Roman garrisons...
Social Geography of Lowcountry Landscapes (2016)
The comparison of patterns of refuse disposal between populations has been a consistent theme in historical archaeology. The present study acknowledges the impact of the physical environment and social status in shaping how people created and used their built landscape. Triangulation of three kinds of data—spatial, archaeological, and historical—facilitates recognition of the differences or similarities between groups on Sapelo, Ossabaw, and St. Simon’s Islands in the Georgia Lowcountry. A...
Social Networks and Community Features: Identifying Neighborhoods in a World War II Japanese American Incarceration Center (2021)
This is an abstract from the "People and Space: Defining Communities and Neighborhoods with Social Network Analysis" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Socially defined neighborhoods develop through frequent face-to-face interactions among residents and their self-identification as neighbors. Archaeological evidence of neighborhoods is usually dependent on artifact frequencies, boundaries, or shared features. This paper explores how effectively...
Social Status and Inter-Household Interactions Amongst a 19th Enslaved Community (2013)
During the antebellum era, James Madison’s Montpelier was home to over one hundred enslaved African Americans. Within this broad community, distinctions in social status could have been apparent amongst the enslaved households, potentially creating a system of social hierarchy. At the same time, these households would have been connected to each other through a web of social interactions on a community wide basis. Utilizing crossmended ceramic vessels from five recently excavated enslaved...
A Socioeconomic Interpretation of 19th Century Archaeological Ceramics found at Contemporaneous, Culturally Diverse Sites on Ballast Point in San Diego, California (2016)
This research assesses the degree to which the type, form, and function of 19th century ceramics recovered from archaeological sites on Ballast Point reflect ethnic identities of their owners. A dualistic approach is employed to determine whether culture or economy played a greater role in influencing the acquisition of ceramic goods at these sites. Comparisons are drawn from contemporaneous deposits associated with a Chinese fishing camp (Trench 2), and a European American whaling operation...
Socioeconomic Status of a Self-Sufficient 19th Century Homestead (2016)
In the summer of 2011, Lindenwood University began excavating in the Femme Osage Creek Valley in St. Charles County, Missouri. Near to the Historic Nathaniel Boone Home, a hidden 19th century homestead site has been found with the remains of numerous buildings, as well as a two-lane drive. The property also includes a stone well, middens, and evidence of domesticated plants. One of the main hypotheses of this site is the possibility of the self-sufficiency of the homestead. This would not have...
The Sociopolitical Landscapes of Hacienda "El Progreso", 1887-1904: Historical Ecology of the Galápagos Islands (2015)
Hacienda El Progreso was one of the largest and most advanced companies of Ecuador during the late 19th century. It covered the southwestern highlands of San Cristobal Island in the Galápagos archipelago. Sugar cane, alcohol, and coffee were the main products exported. As a result, vast areas of the island were deforested to create agricultural parcels and grasslands. During its active years a series of cultural events modified the natural landscape and formed a unique political landscape....
Solutions for Stabilizing and Caring for Organic Archaeological Collections (2018)
Care of archaeological materials should begin in the field. Care and stabilizing of objects, if started in the field, will greatly increase the objects research and exhibit potential when it finally finds a home in a museum. How do you identify problems and then what do you do? Proper care and stabilization of objects can and should be a priority for all object users—excavators, lab analysts, museum staff, and researchers. In this paper, object care, conservation environments and stabilizing...
Solvitur Ambulando: Geophysical Surveys at Mission San Antonio de Padua, California (2018)
A Program of multimedia geopysical survey of the entire complex of Mission San Antonio is being conducted over a multiyear period. A great deal of information has been gleaned from non-destrucrtiuve, non-intrusive research allowing achaeologists to focus more clearly on specifiuc areas of interest and provide an inventory to help land managers to preserve as much of this-well preserved archaeological site as possible. The project highlights the benefil of the results of collaboration between...
"Some interest has been expressed in regard to the diet of the children": The Documentary and Archaeological Implications of Food at the Dorchester Industrial School for Girls. (2018)
The "flora" portion of past diets tends to be an aspect of archaeological assemblages that becomes partially inferred, rather than completely recreated. When they exist, documentary records such as purchase lists and recipes can suggest dietary preferences. Archaeologically recovered macrobotanical assemblages display a concrete portion of consumption practices, but within the constraints of showing a small percentage of plant material that only survives in certain preservation...
Some Thoughts on "Clovis": Where Were They From, Where Did They Go, Where Do They Fit in the Peopling of the Western Hemisphere (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This talk will present some opinions I have about Clovis - woven with facts to convince the skeptical. I will define what I mean by "Clovis", show what some others mean by "Clovis", and add some additional ways to think about "Clovis" in both synchronic and diachronic directions. I will present what I think about its origins and about where we might be finding...
Somewhere Between a Savannah River Broadspear and a Model 1855 Rifle: An Archeological Legacy and Recent Research at the Site of the Harpers Ferry Armory (2016)
Harpers Ferry is fortunate to have a rich history of nearly 60 years of professional archeological endeavors. Over half of that has been under the tenure of Regional Chief Archeologist Dr. Stephen Potter. His relentless enthusiasm and support, as well as encyclopedic knowledge, were pivotal in driving new research within the park. Recently, the focus has been on the Armory site. While the Armory is best known for its history of firearm technology, the archeological investigation revealed a...