Day 6 of Digging

On Friday we got a lot done despite the intermittent rain showers in the morning (and Teresa’s unfulfilled promises that it would clear up by 11am).

EU3 is turning out to be a very productive unit in terms of artifacts, producing a lot of historic ceramics, window glass and now, 35cmbd, many articles of personal adornment. In the southwest corner of the unit, along the foundation of the Higginbotham House, we found 5 shell buttons all in the same area. Because the significance of this find was ambiguous, we collected a soil sample and collected the artifacts in this area separately. It is difficult to interpret this find, however, though as we also found two broaches in this level. One in the Northeast corner and the other when looking through the screen. Below is a photograph of one of the broaches which seems to be a cuprous crown-shaped pin (though this might be a belt buckle). We still have no idea when it dates to.

EU4 and EU2 were closed out today. In EU2 Marisa and Kate D hit the C horizon (a yellowish-brown sand) at about 107cmbd. In EU4 Kate J hit C horizon about 72cmbd.

In Eu1/EU6 Ashley and Dave took out the artifacts in the trashpit feature and bagged them. The objects were wrapped in plastic styrofoam material and bagged individually. The milkglass dish was almost complete. Almost 30 cans came out and will later be analyzed for the manufacturing method used. We still haven’t identified the large car-battery-like object from previous posts.

In EU5 Mike chipped away at the complex stratigraphy he is finding. This unit does seem to show some of the similar stratigraphy with EU3 so Mike may find the same variety of artifacts found there. He is already pulling out buttons and found a ferrous toy jack.

Dave and Ashley laid out EU7, EU8, and EU9. EU7 is on the West side of the cottage. EU8 is on the West side of the Garge. EU 9 is on the East side of the Higginbotham House. Although Ashley managed to get through 15 cm of EU7, the other two will be opened on Monday. We are also planning to start STPs around the Hen House on Monday.

Have a great weekend! We are going to Polpis!

Tags: african american history, archaeology, higginbotham house, nantucket