A Post-Archaic Public Structure on the Middle St. Johns River, Florida? A First Look at the Evidence

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

One of the more vexing issues facing archaeologists working in the middle St. Johns River valley of northeast Florida is a general lack of architectural evidence for public or private structures. Evidence for landscape terraforming abounds in the form of earthen and shell mounds built for ceremonial or mortuary purposes. Yet, there is little discrete evidence in the form of patterned features or post holes that can be used to delineate how non-mounded spaces were used. With the goal of locating architectural evidence, the combined University of Oklahoma/University of Florida 2018 field school deployed multiple geophysics techniques amid Archaic, Woodland, and Mississippi Period shell and earthen mounds. One result of the survey was the delineation of magnetic anomalies arranged in an oval that measured 15 by 20 m. Test unit excavations along one side revealed a series of post holes and molds arranged in a linear array. At least two of the pits contained inclusions such as a whole ceramic cup and a box turtle carapace, and which date to the St. Johns Period. This poster explores the results of investigations compared to the known examples of historic and archaeological public structures in the region.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25331