Today was partly cloudy with a high in the 70s—perfect digging weather. Our two units in the northeast corner of the field are still flooded, so we continued working on the high ground. Unit C18 has come down on a large deposit of artifact-rich soil. As seen in the pictures below, this “midden,” or trash layer, is much darker than the previous soil layer.
The C18 crew is finding numerous pieces of prehistoric pottery sherds. A lot of these are from cooking jars, but there are a few fabric-impressed “saltpan” fragments, including this rather large piece carefully being removed by Brittany and her group. This vessel form was often used to evaporate brine to make salt, but pans could also be used to prepare or serve food.
By the end of the morning, Summer, Sydney, and Kallyn in Unit C17 began to encounter the same midden seen above in C18. While keeping a safe and neat working environment at all times is a must, the C17 crew takes a particular pride in having flat walls, a level floor, and organized equipment. So much pride, in fact, that they awarded themselves the “unit of the day award.” Congratulations.
We had several visitors stop by today. The first was Carol Smith, who brought mocha muffins. Upon eating the muffins, the crew decided that Carol, along with her husband Kevin Smith, both have standing invitations to visit the site. I am beginning to notice a pattern here…
The next visitor we had was John, a recent MTSU graduate and former field school student. John can be seen here giving his constructive thoughts on Unit C18 and reminding the field school students to remain hydrated at all times.
Meanwhile, in the western part of the field, the Unit C19 crew is hard at work finding all sorts of historic artifacts.
So far, there have been no features in this unit, but if they are to be found, we will likely encounter them in the next several days, so stay tuned!