Mortar Analysis for Archaeological Stratigraphy: The Stadt Huys Block and Seven Hanover Square Collections, New York, NY

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Boxed but not Forgotten Redux or: How I Learned to Stop Digging and Love Old Collections" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Advancements in materials analysis offer new opportunities for studying architectural materials in archaeological collections. This paper will demonstrate the diagnostic capabilities of mortars recovered from the Stadt Huys Block and Seven Hanover Square excavations in Lower Manhattan in 1980. These sites represent some of the earliest and most continuous histories of development in New York City. Mortar samples from these collections can supplement information on building practices for a period in which there are few remaining buildings to reference. Petrographic analysis has revealed distinctive compositional characteristics in historic mortars of the early colonial period in New York. This analysis has also shown how mortars can provide date constraints for archaeological strata by referencing a known history of development and use of binders. This research illustrates the importance of mortar sampling, the curation of representative samples for future analysis, and the informational value of this analysis to historical archaeology.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2020   •
• Boxed but not Forgotten Redux or: How I Learned to Stop Digging and Love Old Collections

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 687