Utilization of Shellfish by the Pequot People during the Early Seventeenth Century

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Paper / Report Submission (General Sessions)", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Burned on May 26, 1637 during the Pequot War, the Pequot village site of Calluna Hill (59-73) in Mystic, Connecticut, is known from a single diary entry from the war. It was rediscovered in 2013 during a battlefield survey. Seven shell middens have been located and sampled since the initial identification, each of which are comprised of a wide assortment of shells and material culture. The shell middens have provided data on shellfish gathering practices, site-wide variability of collected species, and midden formation processes of the Pequot Tribe. This study was focused on determining if the middens are contemporaneous and how household and community gathering practices are observable within the archaeological record. The research has provided a clearer understanding of the relationship that the Pequots had with shellfish just months before the tribe was divided at the end of the war, eventually becoming the Mashantucket and Eastern Pequot Tribes.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2024   •
• Paper / Report Submission (General Sessions)

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow