Processing Artifacts from Native American Site in Charles County

At last we have finished the processing of the artifacts in the Shovel Test Pit (STP) phase.   On January 31  Peggy, Josh and Carol finished processing the artifacts from the one unit that was west of the road.

Carol has entered all the data into the Excel spreadsheet, and Jim has input the location of all the STPs into Auto cad.  Now we just have to come up with a plan for the next phase.  We need to start work soon since we will be losing access to the property.

Thursday Jan 17 Peggy, Carole, Carol, and Josh  finished sorting the last of the artifacts recovered from the site.  (Yea!!!)  Once these have been cataloged Jim will be able to determine where excavation units would be useful in helping us understand the site. 
(We still have a little more work processing the STPs and the one unit done on the west of the road, but no additional excavation is to be done in that area.)

Thursday Jan 10 Elsie, Peggy, Carole, Carol, and Josh were able to finish sorting, etc. three more transects.  Still three more transects and one excavation unit to go.

Saturday December 8 we finished washing all the remaining artifacts from the STPs.  Elsie, Barbara R, Peggy, Carol, and Josh all helped.  Josh showed us the information he had gathered about a "barn" site.   We even had time to start processing artifacts from one of the transects that had been washed in November.  We lost track of time and worked an extra hour.  And once again I forgot to take any photos.

Friday morning November 9 Elsie, Carol, and Josh finished washing the artifacts from the STP's that have been dug to date.  And there was still time to finished sorting, counting, and weighing all the remaining artifacts that were dry.  Carol got excited when she washed a really good example of a Pope's Creek pottery sherd.  The exterior was net-impressed and was decorated with two parallel finger swipes.  The interior was combed.  Here are some photos.  Click to learn more about Pope's Creek pottery

Pope's Creek - exterior
(net-impressed with finger swipes)

Pope's Creek - interior
(combed)

Thursday morning October 4 Carol S., Elsie, Josh, Peggy, and Carol continued with processing the artifacts from the northern site.  Then Wednesday morning October 10 Peggy and Carol worked on the artifacts and talked about identifying lithics and about bonobos. 

Friday morning September 28 we washed the last of the artifacts from the southern part of the site.   It only took about an hour to complete the washing.  So we pulled out all our cataloging stuff and began sorting, counting, and weighing the artifacts from the northern part of the site.  Once again I forgot to take pictures of those helping (Barbara K., Carol, Elsie, and Rich). 

The artifacts from the STP's dug in June were washed on Sunday August 5.  Thankfully we were able to be indoors.  Barbara K. Barbara R., Carol and Rich helped wash.  Below is a picture of Barbara R. holding up the last bag.  Now we just need to sort them.

The Last Bag (June) - Barbara R. and Rich

On June 23 we started sorting, counting, and weighing the artifacts.  All the STP's in Transect A were completed.  Since we completed digging Transect M the day before, we have a way to go.  I forgot to take pictures of those helping (Barbara K. Barbara R., Carol, Elsie, and Josh), but here are a few pictures of the sorted artifacts.

As many of you know a derecho went through Charles County early June 30, and many of us were without power (unless we had a generator).  So only Steve and Carol showed up to catalog artifacts. Since there was no air conditioning, they gave up around noon.  Even so they were able to complete the processing of three transects.  Also Carol found a fragment of what appears to be a soapstone bowl.

On July 8 only Steve and Carol showed up again but they were able to complete processing all the artifacts that have been washed to date.  We still need to wash about artifacts from four transects.