Determining village extent and layout utilizing geophysical survey and excavation at the Mississippian site of Cane River, North Carolina

Summary

Geophysical techniques can help to clarify the extent of a site and show spatial relationships between structures, therefore guiding research and excavation strategies. When monuments and larger structural elements are absent, feature density can be a reliable proxy for occupation areas and village boundaries. Utilizing a combination of magnetometry and ground-penetrating radar survey at the Cane River site in North Carolina, we were able to locate borrow pits, storage pits, structures, and hearth features that are not readily detected using traditional archaeological methods. Subsequent coring and excavations over these geophysical anomalies provided evidence for continuity in village layout and allowed us to sample a variety of feature types, illuminating temporal and spatial patterns in community activities. This research has implications for understanding regional variability in Mississippian community social practices throughout the Appalachian Summit of North Carolina.

SAA 2015 abstracts made available in tDAR courtesy of the Society for American Archaeology and Center for Digital Antiquity Collaborative Program to improve digital data in archaeology. If you are the author of this presentation you may upload your paper, poster, presentation, or associated data (up to 3 files/30MB) for free. Please visit http://www.tdar.org/SAA2015 for instructions and more information.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

File Information