The BISC 2 Cargo (Part I)--Contributions and Questions from Ceramics Analysis: Late 18th Century Sequencing and Colonial Trade patterns

Summary

The BISC-2 site uniquely contains thousands of fragments of late 18th century English ceramics dating from the period of transition from stone-glazed salt ware to cream ware, including hundreds of examples of both of these manufactured types that share decorative patterning. The fact that this assemblage (arguably one of the largest of late 18th century ceramics located to date in North America) was created through a wrecking event that occurred quite literally as a single instance in time offers a unique opportunity to use both distribution and comparative form analysis to test and recalibrate current accepted sequencing for these ceramics in the Americas—which could have broader implications for informing North American and Atlantic historical archaeology of the late 18th century. This paper presents an initial analysis of these ceramics cast against our ongoing archival work aimed at identifying the specific vessel that came to grief as BISC-2.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Trade at The Border of Colonial Empires in late 18th Century North America: Historical, Methodological and Theoretical Insights from the Archeological Study of the "English China" (BISC-2) Shipwreck Site   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2013

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 684