Another nice day for late June in Tennessee... The penultimate week and lots of deep units to finish up -- rain is unpredictable this time of year, so planning is not simple for Dr. P. to walk away with solid archaeological data -- and be finished by the time the class ends. Unlike contract archaeology projects, where weather delays may be built into the contract -- not much leverage for professors when the class ends... Here Dr. Eubanks is working with Matt and Brandon on how to do profile drawings of their unit -- close to being closed out.
In our western units, the folks are still struggling through the dense rock deposits -- but keeping good spirits anyway as they recognize that figuring out this giant feature is important for the project goals -- and planning for next year. Crystal and Amanda continue to plow through the screening -- despite only a handful of artifacts per level (at best).
Dr. P. finally let the other guys in the nearby unit -- cram packed limestone -- go loose with a pick. Ben did go at it a bit exuberantly once let loose. Dr. P. described it as Ben digs "too deep and too greedily" -- I'm imagining simply a brief moment of frustration about digging solid rock for days and days :). But, with some correction, brought back to a more appropriate and correct use of the pick.
As the johnson grass continues to grow like crazy around the active excavation areas, Abby was forced to demonstrate that it is currently taller than her....
Still many intriguing things coming out of the Mississippian midden... Here, an interesting lug handle from a very large pot...
Lots of other ceramics coming out...
Perhaps more intriguing in some ways is the discovery of significant fragments of mica in the midden. This mineral is only available from quarries in the Appalachian Mountains on the North Carolina side -- and is really only used for important "jewelry" and ritual objects. Why we have multiple fragments of it in this context is an intriguing question...
And finally, this interesting canid (?) jawbone -- not being experts on this, we won't chance saying what it actually is, but perhaps a domesticated dog from 800 years ago. We have another elsewhere as well.... Fortunately, we have some already secured funding for analysis of these animal remains...
Lots of great new discoveries... More tomorrow.