The excavation of George Washington’s childhood home is coming along nicely. Although we really have not found many features, we have been finding plenty of artifacts indicative of a domestic residence. Stoneware, refined earthenware, tobacco pipe stems and bowl fragments, buttons, and wig curlers all provide ample evidence of our proximity to a domestic space.
I have really enjoyed learning the different techniques employed in excavating. “Hands on” experience coupled with previous Archaeology courses has really increased my knowledge and enthusiasm for Archaeology.The field director, Paul Nasca, and graduate assistant Christa Beranek, are very knowledgeable and professional archaeologists. I am thankful for their excellent instruction and endless patience. Archaeologists are patient people!
This week I finished one unit and started another. I uncovered a feature in the unit I finished, and I dug a feature in the unit I started. All in all, features are exhausting things to deal with due to the enormous amount of paperwork involved. But, as Paul pointed out to the school this week, they are way more important and informative than the artifacts we recover. The artifacts are better understood within the context a feature can provide.
This week’s field trip to St. Mary’s City, Maryland, provided me an example of how archaeology is used to literally reconstruct the past. The reconstructed 17th century structures paired with historical interpreters at one of the plantations allowed me to understand the economy and thinking of that time. By and far, my favorite reconstructions were the Native American longhouses. They seemed much more cozy and comfortable than the structures the colonists were building in the early 17th century!
---Tim Schoonover |
