Daub! And Public Tours Sunday!

 

It's been a busy couple of weeks since we last posted as we do battle with the weather, try to finish up all the units we have targeted for excavation, give a couple public talks, see a few sites, and pace ourselves to finish strong as the temps rise.  The biggest update is that we have now fully excavated the very large (and we know now quite deep!) pit feature that we uncovered at the end of the 2022 season.  What we initially thought was a mid-18th century midden has turned out to be a circa 1690s robber pit for making mortar, which was then filled with the remains of a likely much earlier wattle-and-daub post building that had survived for a considerably long time. 

Whale rib section in the sidewall

 While digging through the pit fill layers, we encountered two thick layers of daub fragments - hundreds of them - that were smooth on one side but bore the imprints of leaves, sticks, lathe, and timber on the other side and took a variety of forms.  It is, to my knowledge, the first evidence of early Bermudian earth-fast construction material and aligns with the constellations of post holes surrounding the pit.  Larry Mills, a Bermudian vernacular building expert, remarked on the hardness of the daub, which resembles concrete.  Its composition is something of a mystery and I look forward to having it chemically tested back at the University of Rochester this fall; early documents mention mixing crushed stone, quicklime, and turtle or whale oil.  The latter may be likely, since we also found two large pieces of whale bone in the pit fill as well. 

 Ceramics, pipe stems, and pipe bowls all fit mid- to late-17th century profiles, so it looks like the pit reflects a moment when an early 17th-century house was demolished (likely stripped of its usable cedar timber at a time when Bermuda transitioned to a maritime economy and cedar became scarce and valuable) and a new as-yet-undiscovered stone structure was built nearby. And so a new search begins...

Bermudians can take advantage of a rare chance to visit our archaeological sites this Sunday, thanks to a Bermuda National Trust-organized boat tour (three actually!)  Come out and see the evidence we've uncovered of an extensive array of early timber post structures, the abovementioned pit, the 18th-century "GR" military Yellow Fever refuge house, and new testing at Oven Site - and also visit our new Archaeology Lab in St. George's in the cellar of the Bermuda National Trust Globe Hotel Museum!  Tours will run from 10am to 2pm but seats on the chartered boat are limited! Click below to reserve your place!

BNT Smith's Island Tour June 25!

So much more to report - an underwater survey of the adjoining bay for instance, numerous finds related to the Regimental occupation period, and visits from old friends and SIAP alumni - but it will have to wait until after Sunday's tour...