Article about Pig Point in the Edgewater Patch!

Hello lovely blog followers! Our excavations at Pig Point have been featured in an article in the Edgewater Patch, an online news source. It's a two-parter, and we'll post the second part tomorrow! 

http://edgewater.patch.com/articles/part-i-archaeology-site-at-pig-point-continues-to-yield-ancient-treasures

Enjoy,
Lauren

Archaeology through the Eyes of an Intern

Written by Jillie Drutz, Lost Towns Intern


I’ve been studying it for two years, never having picked up a trowel and itching to finally get out in the field and really learn the art of archaeology. My love and fright of anthropology propelled me to do this internship with the Lost Towns Project. After spending two days in the field at Pig Point and one day at the archaeology lab in Londontown, I found out that it was nothing like what I expected. Nonetheless, it was still amazing and I was right about one thing: the history came alive.

At Pig Point, the wonderful archaeologists and volunteers patiently taught me the basics. I learned how to dry and water screen for artifacts, excavate a unit, and fill out a provenience card by measuring and recording elevation, and analyzing artifact content and soil. In the world of archaeology, the most important thing is context (location, location, location of course). While taking all of the meticulous recordings and measurements and carefully troweling the unit, it was difficult to understand exactly why this was important. It wasn’t until we finished excavating a specific stratigraphic layer of a unit, that I realized that stratum was destroyed. Those meticulous measurements preserved the material history.

Kicking off the Summer Field Season

Written by staff member Lauren Schiszik, Internship Coordinator

This past week, we had a great start to the summer field season, with an orientation for our summer archaeology interns on Thursday, June 2, and our Saturday Dig Day at London Town on June 4. While we don't have the record-breaking 17 interns that we had last summer, we are still in the double-digits with 14 interns. The majority are doing archaeology, two are doing historic preservation, and one is doing historical research. The students bring a broad range of backgrounds and interests, and range from high school to college graduates. We are happy to host all of them and are looking forward to a productive and educational summer!



Dr. Al teaches interns about archaeology in Anne Arundel County
at the intern orientation.



This season, we are trying something new. Interns will be writing weekly blogs, so that readers can get a fresh perspective on our excavations. Look for the first intern blog entry next week!

We're focusing our excavations this summer on Pig Point and Rumney's Tavern at London Town, and would love to have volunteers come and join us! Alternatively, you can take the "armchair archaeologist" approach and read about our finds here throughout the summer from the comfort of your air-conditioned office or home. 

Cheers,

Lauren

Exciting finds from Pig Point and London Town

Written by staff member Stephanie Sperling; Photos by volunteer Barry Gay:

Two bottles found in the pit; circa 1880 (left)
and circa 1680 (right)

 For those of you who missed Dig Day at London Town last Saturday, let me tell you about two of our really interesting finds.  First, as field director Shawn and former intern Mark (making a guest appearance for dig day) dug through the deep pit behind Rumney's Tavern, they came across a soil horizon that contained two large bottle fragments.  Oddly enough, one dated to the late nineteenth century while the other dated to the late seventeenth century!  Finding these two bottles about nine feet below the ground surface means that the pit must have been filled in sometime around 1880, but how did an intact bottle neck from 200 years earlier also end up there?  Right now, Dr. Al's working theory is that this might have been a brick-lined colonial well robbed out in the 1880s.



Shawn and Mark measure their excavation depth in the deep pit



Revolutionary War pewter button from
London Town cast with the letters "USA"

Erin also found a really neat Revolutionary War-period button in the screen.  This pewter button is in remarkably good shape considering its age and that it came from the plow zone (we often find degraded, crumbling pewter resulting from centuries spent in the harsh London Town soil).  This particular button was cast with the letters "USA" on the front and dates to the late 1770s or early 1780s.  This style was typical of George Washington's Continental Line infantry and was found in a unit dug just north of Rumney's Tavern.

Middle Woodland period pipe from Pig Point

We continue to find amazing artifacts this season at Pig Point.  Last week, we found a highly unusual pipe fragment in Middle Woodland context in the large midden.  This striking pipe bowl has incised rectangles and squares above several horizontal lines, making it the most elaborately decorated pipe fragment yet found at the site.  Interestingly, it looks very similar to a Middle Woodland pipe found at the Abbott Farm site near Trenton, NJ.  Pig Point has been called a "sister site" to Abbott Farm for several reasons.  Both are located in similar riverine settings and each has contributed greatly to the knowledge of regional prehistory.  Also, both sites are deeply stratified and seem to have particularly interesting Middle Woodland components.



Middle Archaic hearth in profile; note the debitage
and fire-cracked rock scattered around it



Finally, I am thrilled to report we just got a radiocarbon date back from a deep hearth feature discovered in early May.  The charcoal recovered from this ancient firepit produced a calibrated date of 4560-4460 BC!  That means this was used sometime about 6400-6500 years ago, placing it squarely in the Middle Archaic time period.  This hearth was found under a dense layer of debitage and worked flakes about 2.5 feet below the ground surface, and you can see in the picture that it plunged over a foot deep.  This is our first Middle Archaic feature at the site, further proving that people have been living at Pig Point for thousands of years.   

Dig Day this Saturday

Come one, come all to Dig Day at London Town this Saturday, June 4.  Open from 9am-2pm, activities include tours of the archaeology lab and the field site, a chance to see artifact collections from London Town and Pig Point, and the opportunity to get dirty helping staff with hands-on field activities.  Don't miss this free event! 

Here's a link to the Historic London Town and Gardens website for directions and more information about the park: http://www.historiclondontown.org/  Hope to see you all there!

Beautiful ceramics found in Rumney's Tavern excavations

Rumney's Tavern excavation with the National Historic Landmark William Brown house in the background

Middle Woodland III Report Finished!

Written by staff member Stephanie Sperling:

As many of you know, I've spent the better part of 2011 working on the final report for the Pig Point site.  I'm happy to say that the report is finished and has been sent to the Maryland Historical Trust (our grantor) for comments.  Thank you to everyone who helped!  I couldn't have completed it without you.  Thanks especially to volunteer Pat Melville who put together the most comprehensive historical summary of Pig Point ever written.  Pat worked for the Maryland Archives for many years, and I am so grateful that she used her extensive research skills to summarize countless land records, wills, and court proceedings into an accessible narrative.  Thank you!  

While the Town period of Pig Point lasted for nearly 300 years, our excavations have centered on the thousands of years of prehistoric occupation (or the Native American occupation that happened before contact with Europeans).  That was also the main focus of my report.  Based on the artifact assemblage and the seven feet (!) of intact stratigraphy, we can certainly state that people have been living at Pig Point for about 10,000 years.  Incredible!  Anyone is welcome to read the report, but for those of you without the time for a 200+ page document, I'll sum up a few of the more interesting points here.



A reconstruction of a Woodland period house at Pig Point



First, I should say that nearly every prehistoric period in the mid-Atlantic region is well represented at Pig Point.  Archaeologists break down the millennia of prehistoric time into different periods based on changing artifacts and lifeways.  For example, the Archaic period extends from about 7500 B.C. – 1000 B.C. and was a time of hunting and gathering after the last Ice Age.  People adapted to a changing climate by utilizing every part of the landscape during different seasons, and gradually they became more sedentary.  Thousands of projectile points and stone tools were left behind that tell us about the different activities taking place during this long time period.  The appearance of clay pottery marks the beginning of the Woodland period (from 1000 B.C. – A.D. 1650), when people settled down for much of the year in base camps or villages.  Eventually, agriculture developed and the villages became larger as the population grew.



Excavation of the 8,000 year old pits found
beneath the Woodland midden



Pig Point saw heavy occupation during both the Archaic and the Woodland periods.  It has always been an appealing place to live!  The rich resources of Jug Bay can still be harvested all year long (fish and shellfish, mammals and birds, marsh plants and nearby forest species), and countless freshwater springs provide a constant source of drinking water.  Last year, we excavated several features that informed us about what people were eating over the millennia.  For instance, we found two hearths dating to over 8,000 years ago that still contained hickory nut shells and white perch scales.  The charcoal found in these ancient firepits was successfully radiocarbon dated, producing the oldest dates ever in Anne Arundel County!  We also excavated more of the remarkable Woodland period midden (or an area of cooking and working stratified over 3,000 years), where we found tens of thousands of bones and shells from dozens of species.  We now know that by about A.D. 1200, the people of Pig Point were growing corn to supplement their diets.

 

A selection of artifacts from Pig Point: From top to bottom - Woodland period pot sherd; Projectile points made of non-local stone; a selection of bone tools; three incised gorgets




We have found over 200,000 artifacts from the site, ranging from animal bones to projectile points to beautifully decorated pottery, pipes, and adornments.  Some of the bones were worked into tools used for needles or soft hammers or were used for adornments (like canine teeth with holes drilled for necklaces).  The projectile points span 10,000 years and are made of both local and exotic stone (like Ohio chalcedony and Pennsylvania jasper).  Some of the clay pot sherds have exquisite decoration, as do several of the pipe fragments.  And a number of gorget fragments (a type of rectangular stone pendant) were marked with geometric lines by someone thousands of years ago.

If you would like to know more about the Pig Point site, please contact us and we’ll be happy to share more of our remarkable findings.  But the best way to learn about the site is to volunteer in the field or the lab.  We’re back in the field every Tuesday and Friday, come out to this beautiful site and join us sometime!

-Steph   

I love getting dirty in a feature!

           

Great press about Pig Point!

By Josh McKerrow, Annapolis Capital

Hi everyone - just wanted to let you all know that we got some great press about Pig Point in the Annapolis Capital on Sunday! You can read the article here.

The Capital also made a really neat slideshow of photos from the site of artifacts, staff, volunteers and interns, which you can also check out here.