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NEWFOUNDLAND - Digging Up The Past

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Bianca
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« on: September 24, 2008, 09:10:31 am »



John Goldsworthy, a summer employee of the Placentia archaeology project for the past two seasons,
unearthed a brass or copper cross found on one of the upper levels of the dig, making its date of origin
some time in the past 50 or so years, according to archaeologist David Fry. 








                                                                 Digging up the past






The Charter
Sept. 16, 2008
 
The Placentia archaeology project continues to dig up artifacts that help piece together more about the area’s past.
The site, located at the former Jerseyside ball field, was once home to Fort Louis, a French settlement in the 1600’s until 1713, when the Treaty of Utrecht allowed English occupation of the area.

David Fry is the lead archaeologist for the dig, his third year working on the project, and said this has been a good year for them.

The archaeology project has been in existence for approximately ten summers now and has told much of the tale of the French and English occupation of the area.

As for what they’ve been finding in the two main trenches they are digging in this year, Mr. Fry said much of it is relatively common, although they have found some unusual items of interest.

Although he said clay pipes are quite common, a clay pipe found last year is unusual simply because it is an Ottoman pipe dating from the 1600’s. He said it is one of four similar pipes found in North America.

Mr. Fry explained those common clay pipes often help the archaeologists determine what time period they are dealing with.

“When we excavate a layer, there are a number of ways we can date those specific layers. We use clay tobacco pipes mostly because they are expendable and exceptionally datable material. Their forms, their styles and their makers marks remain consistent for certain time periods so when you find those in a layer, you can use that to date that layer and then everything else that’s found in that layer should have occurred during that time period,” he said.
Some items excavated this year include a large number of thimbles and stick pins, ceramics, clay tobacco pipes, cannon balls, some lead shots, coins, leather, lots of food bone.

“The amount of buttons we found in trench number one is surprising. We didn’t expect to find that many buttons. We thought they were gold at first but… they are starting to tarnish and gold wouldn’t tarnish,” said Mr. Fry.
He said they’ve also found some George II and III coins dating from the late 1700’s and early 1800’s but they are pretty well eroded, making their markings difficult to see.

As well, Mr. Fry said the amount of leather found at the site is unusual.

“We are digging below sea level and we have lots of water problems which eliminates most metals except for gold but preserves organics almost perfectly so we are getting pieces of shoe leather, soles of shoes, that type of thing and we are getting lots of food bone, pieces of bone with chop marks and stuff like that. The bones are usually large mammals. Cows, pigs, chickens, birds, lots of fish, large vertebrae from cod, looney size vertebra and I was told that is unique. We are finding peach pits, parts of walnut shells, almond shells,” he said.

“The artifacts are brought back to this lab and they get processed. They get washed, numbered, described and then put into a database so we can reference them later.”

While the project clues up on Sept. 22, Mr. Fry said they welcome visitors to the site and at their office, located just past the bridge on the Placentia side. The project has been open since June 23.

“The site and the lab are both open to the public. We enjoy people coming in and having a look around.”



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« Last Edit: September 24, 2008, 09:13:55 am by Bianca » Report Spam   Logged

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