Jesuit Crucifixes Or Whitby Jet Witch Charms: A New Interpretation Of Jamestowne’s Jet Objects

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Opening the Vault: What Collections Can Say About Jamestown’s Global Trade Network", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The Jamestowne jet crosses, currently interpreted as Spanish Catholic crucifixes, seemingly represent evidence that the early English settlers embraced a hybrid Protestant faith. However, these crosses stylistically resemble British Whitby jet witch charms, a group of artefacts that oral tradition suggests, were employed in the magical protection of dwellings, particularly in relation to counter-witchcraft. If a Whitby origin can be established for the Jamestowne crosses, they would potentially represent material evidence that British folkloric practices and beliefs crossed the Atlantic to early US settlements in the early modern era, a period in Britain when the practice of magic was in decline. To identify the origin of the jet used to make these objects, some Jamestowne jet artefacts and a suite of modern jet samples with known provenance were analysed using a multi-technique approach. This presentation will describe the results of this investigation and offer a possible attribution for the Jamestown crosses.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2023   •
• Opening the Vault: What Collections Can Say About Jamestown’s Global Trade Network

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow