Today, excavations continued on the multitude of features in and around Structure 1. Several postholes and "rodent burrows" were excavated by Pat, Lacey, John, and Meagan...
The faint dark stain shown in the photo below labeled as "Feature 25" was a suspected posthole...
And, as we suspected, it turned out to be another deep posthole as shown in the photograph below after excavation...
As the slow work continues around Structure 1, other student crews are expanding our investigations in other parts of the Sam Davis property.
Ryan, Tiffany, Meagan, and Lauren continue to work just west of Structure 1 in an area that we think may be beneath where Structure 1 once stood... They investigated several rodent burrows -- and found another posthole.
Two crews are now working in the east yard area. They are finding some promising artifacts -- including large partial bricks and other artifacts that suggest we are possibly in the vicinity of yet another unrecorded building... In the background Amanda, Lesley and Mackenzie are starting a new excavation unit and in the foreground, Tracy, Michael, and Andy are starting their second excavation unit.
The partial plate fragment shown below was discovered in the east yard area today -- it has a "maker's mark" on the back that we hope will provide a fairly tight date for this piece of pottery.
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While parts of our day are quiet and interrupted only by our own noise, we are often reminded of the proximity of the present -- and the airport.
Today ended much as they always do as our routine settles in -- carefully covering our excavations to protect fragile clues of the past at the Sam Davis Home from the elements.
Archaeology is hard work -- the heat, humidity, threat of storms, chiggers, ticks, sweat bees, dirt, sweat, and just simply the tedium of digging are not at the top of the list of "our favorite things." What makes this all worth the effort? As James Deetz wrote -- the "Small Things Forgotten" is a part of what makes this worthwile. Discovering a button lost a century or more ago -- wondering who last touched it; discovering a fragment of plate, cup, or saucer -- wondering who broke it and how; discovering a posthole -- wondering who dug it and when and why... All of those things provide some part of why archaeology captures our imagination -- despite the hard work. And, ultimately, for many of us -- it is about a search for answers to larger questions. The reminder at the end of the day as we contemplate "the big picture" -- while our search is for some lost cabins that once housed enslaved African-Americans at the farm of Charles Davis, we hope our results contribute to something larger. The African Diaspora dispersed millions of Africans and their descendants throughout the globe. Slavery, the Civil War, and their legacy continue to affect us today. Archaeology is not just about the ancient past -- it is another way to understand how we came to be where we are today and to try to understand where we are going.
Join us again on Thursday for another update on our work...