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Articles 1 - 19 of 19
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Continuity Of Lithic Practice From The Eighteenth To The Nineteenth Centuries At The Nipmuc Homestead Of Sarah Boston, Grafton, Massachusetts, Joseph M. Bagley, Stephen Mrozowski, Heather Law Pezzarossi, John Steinberg
Continuity Of Lithic Practice From The Eighteenth To The Nineteenth Centuries At The Nipmuc Homestead Of Sarah Boston, Grafton, Massachusetts, Joseph M. Bagley, Stephen Mrozowski, Heather Law Pezzarossi, John Steinberg
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Stone tools have been found at all Nipmuc-related house sites in central Massachusetts dating from the 17th through 20th centuries. This article explores in detail the lithic assemblage recovered from the kitchen midden of the late 18th and early 19th century Sarah Burnee/Sarah Boston farmstead in Grafton, Massachusetts. Quartz and quartzite lithics were found in similar concentrations as historic ceramics within the midden suggesting that these tools were in active use within the household. Ground-stone tools of ancient origin indicate curation and reuse of older materials, and knapped glass and re-worked gunflints suggest knowledge of flintknapping. This article argues that …
Consumerism And Control: Archaeological Perspectives On The Harvard College Buttery, Christina J. Hodge
Consumerism And Control: Archaeological Perspectives On The Harvard College Buttery, Christina J. Hodge
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Harvard College in Cambridge, Massachusetts, offers a unique setting through which to explore cultural changes within 17th- and 18th-century America, including shifting foodways and consumerisms. Harvard’s early leaders constructed their collegiate community by controlling many aspects of scholars’ lives, including their eating, drinking, and purchasing practices. Between 1650 and 1800, the college operated the “Buttery,” a commissary where students supplemented meager institutional meals by purchasing snacks and sundries. As a marketplace, the buttery organized material practices of buying and selling as people and things flowed through it. Archaeological and documentary evidence reveals how college officials attempted to regulate, but lagged …
A Sword From The Taunton River, E. Andrew Mowbray
A Sword From The Taunton River, E. Andrew Mowbray
Northeast Historical Archaeology
No abstract is available at this time.
Occupational Differences Reflected In Material Culture, Kathleen Joan Bragdon
Occupational Differences Reflected In Material Culture, Kathleen Joan Bragdon
Northeast Historical Archaeology
No abstract is available at this time.
Filling In Round Pond: Refuse Disposal In Post-Revolutionary Boston, Mary Beaudry, Tamara Blosser
Filling In Round Pond: Refuse Disposal In Post-Revolutionary Boston, Mary Beaudry, Tamara Blosser
Northeast Historical Archaeology
No abstract is available at this time.
A Bibliography Of Northeast Historical Archaeology, David R. Starbuck
A Bibliography Of Northeast Historical Archaeology, David R. Starbuck
Northeast Historical Archaeology
A bibliography including books and articles that relate to historical archaeology in the northeastern states and provinces and all articles published in Northeast Historical Archaeology since its creation.
The Use Of Opal Phytolith Analysis In A Comprehensive Environmental Study: An Example From 19th-Century Lowell, Massachusetts, William F. Fisher, Gerald K. Kelso
The Use Of Opal Phytolith Analysis In A Comprehensive Environmental Study: An Example From 19th-Century Lowell, Massachusetts, William F. Fisher, Gerald K. Kelso
Northeast Historical Archaeology
The value of opal phytolith analysis is demonstrated in a comprehensive environmental study of a historical site, the Kirk Street Agents' House, Lowell, Massachusett. A method to measure phytolith degradation percentages is tested and shown to yield similar results to pollen corrosion indices; further research on this new method is suggested, however. Fluctuations in two classes of grass phytoliths indicate changing environmental conditions that support and expand upon changes noted in the pollen spectra. The results of the phytolith analysis are integrated with information derived from documentary research, artifactual analysis, stratigraphic interpretation, and other ethnobotanical methods to arrive at conclusions …
Growing Things "Rare, Foreign, And Tender": The Early Nineteenth-Century Greenhouse At Gore Place, Waltham Massachusetts, Christa M. Beranek, J. N. Leith Smith, John M. Steinberg, Michelle G. S. Garman
Growing Things "Rare, Foreign, And Tender": The Early Nineteenth-Century Greenhouse At Gore Place, Waltham Massachusetts, Christa M. Beranek, J. N. Leith Smith, John M. Steinberg, Michelle G. S. Garman
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Excavations and ground penetrating radar at Gore Place in Waltham, Massachusetts, uncovered part of an early 19th-century greenhouse (ca. 1806 to the early 1840s) constructed by Christopher and Rebecca Gore. Documentary, archaeological, and geophysical data suggest that the greenhouse was a formal space intended to display exotic plants and that it was built in the relatively new lean-to style, with a tall back wall and a short front wall. The artifact assemblage included tools and small finds related to the greenhouse operation, as well as the remains of at least 149 planting pots. The greenhouse was constructed during a period …
The Pollen Record Formation Processes Of A Rural Cellar Fill: Identification Of The Captain Brown House, Concord, Massachusetts, Gerald K. Kelso, Alison D. Dwyer, Alan T. Synenki
The Pollen Record Formation Processes Of A Rural Cellar Fill: Identification Of The Captain Brown House, Concord, Massachusetts, Gerald K. Kelso, Alison D. Dwyer, Alan T. Synenki
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Captain David Brown was a major participant in the April 19, 1775 skirmish at the North Bridge, Concord, Massachusetts, and his house stood very close to the battlefield. Diary entries record that his house was dismantled in 1868 and that the filling of the cellar hole began on October 16th of the same year. Archaeologists uncovered the cellars of two houses on the David Brown property: one cellar fill contained only probable 18th-century artifacts; the second contained 18th- to mid-19th-century artifacts. Pollen data indicating that the second cellar hole was filled in the fall link that cellar hole to diary …
"A Succession Of Kaleidoscopic Pictures": Historical Archaeology At The Turner House, Salem, Massachusetts, Lorinda B.R. Goodwin
"A Succession Of Kaleidoscopic Pictures": Historical Archaeology At The Turner House, Salem, Massachusetts, Lorinda B.R. Goodwin
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Although the House of Seven Gables Historic Site is principally associated with Nathaniel Hawthorne, the excavations at the Turner House site revealed a wealth of information about the Turner and Ingersoll families, who lived in the house later made famous by Hawthorne's novel. The rich array of documents contributes not only to the further understanding of the households that occupied the site, but also suggest the ways in which the surrounding community perceived the residents and their home through time. This article describes the excavations that took place on the site during the 1991 field season. The documentary evidence acts …
Scratching The Surface: Seven Seasons At The Spencer-Pierce-Little Farm, Newbury, Massachusetts, Mary C. Beaudry
Scratching The Surface: Seven Seasons At The Spencer-Pierce-Little Farm, Newbury, Massachusetts, Mary C. Beaudry
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Results of excavations conducted between 1986 and 1994 at the Spencer-Pierce-Little farm, Newbury, Massachusetts, are summarized and evaluated in light of the research questions that have guided the project to date. Under continuous occupation and cultivation from 1635 to the present, the site has that potential to contribute to many topics of interest to historical archaeologists working in New England and elsewhere, including questions about ideological and practical aspects of landscape and land use; changing agricultural practice and the effects of agricultural reform; farm tenancy; the archaeology of the household and homelot; relationships between urban and rural contexts in early …
Historic Cemeteries As Contested Grounds, Paul A. Robinson
Historic Cemeteries As Contested Grounds, Paul A. Robinson
Northeast Historical Archaeology
The author comments on the articles "This Church is for the Livinig": An Assessment of Archaeological Standards for the Removal of Cemeteries in Rhode Island and Massachusetts by James Garman and "Where Angels Fear to Tread": Cemetery Preservation Efforts by the Massachusetts Historical Commission by Edward Bell.
"This Church Is For The Living": An Assessment Of Archaeological Standards For The Removal Of Cemeteries In Rhode Island And Massachusetts, James Garman
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Legislation in both Rhode Island and Massachusetts sets standards for the removal of European-American cemeteries and the reinterment of human remains. In both states, some degree of archaeological investigation short of excavation is usually required. This paper compares the two bodies of legislation, evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of both systems. The focus then turns to two recent cemetery case studies, one at the site of a new school in Westerly, Rhode Island, and one at a church in Harwich, Massachusetts. The final section of the paper raises questions concerning the gaps between the intent of legislation and archaeological practice. …
A Recreation To Great Persons: Bowling In Colonial Boston, Ann-Eliza Lewis
A Recreation To Great Persons: Bowling In Colonial Boston, Ann-Eliza Lewis
Northeast Historical Archaeology
In 1994 archaeologists working in downtown Boston, Massachusetts, recovered what turned out to be the oldest lawn bowling ball in the New World. This research note is the result of the unexpected public interest in this artifact. The lawn ball belonged to the household of Katherine Nanny Naylor, a wealthy resident of 17th-century Boston. The lawn ball became a starting point for a small research project on the history of bowling in the New World and Puritan attitudes towards recreation in general and bowling in particular. This note opens a discusion of the tension between the need to relax and …
Worked Ballast Flint At Aptucxet, Barbara E. Luedtke
Worked Ballast Flint At Aptucxet, Barbara E. Luedtke
Northeast Historical Archaeology
The gunflint industry of western Europe represents an extraordinary revival of the art of flint-knapping, which had largely disappeared from the technological repertoire of the region after the Neolithic. During the classic period of flintlock weapons in the 19th and 19th centuries, gunflint production appears to have been performed primarily by specialists. Demand for gunflints began in the 17th century, however, especially in North America, and was sometimes met by the "do it yourself" efforts of non-specialists. An assemblage recently excavated in Bourne, Massachusetts provides an opportuntiy to study such efforts.
Book Review: An Archaeology Of Manners: The Polite World Of The Merchant Elite Of Colonial Massachusetts, By Lorinda B. R. Goodwin, Emerson W. Baker
Book Review: An Archaeology Of Manners: The Polite World Of The Merchant Elite Of Colonial Massachusetts, By Lorinda B. R. Goodwin, Emerson W. Baker
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Book Review: An Archaeology of Manners: The Polite World of the Merchant Elite of Colonial Massachusetts, by Lorinda B. R. Goodwin, 1999, Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, New York, 233 pages.
Seventeenth-Century Portuguese Faianca And Its Presence In Colonial America, Charlotte Wilcoxen
Seventeenth-Century Portuguese Faianca And Its Presence In Colonial America, Charlotte Wilcoxen
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Nineteenth- and 20th-century writers deprecated Portugal's 17th-century ceramics, and some American archaeologists have not recognized the quantity or quality of the remains of these on east coast American colonial sites, or learned to identify the sherds. Civil War in England in the 1640s deprived that country's colonies of critical economic support during those years; the colonists were forced to build ships and engage in their own trade with European countries. Colony by colony, this is examined; Sphardic Jewish merchants from Portugal living here at times promoted the trade, as well as American factors living in Portugal or its islands. The …
Trying To Think Progressively About 19th-Century Farms, Mary C. Beaudry
Trying To Think Progressively About 19th-Century Farms, Mary C. Beaudry
Northeast Historical Archaeology
Recent excavations at a 19th-century estate manager's farm at Milton, South Uist, in the Western Isles of Scotland, prompt comparison with New England farms of the same era. Of particular interest is the material signature of the move toward "progressive farming" manifested through the construction of model farms and the introduction of industrially-inspired farm management practices and technological innovations. Comparisons drawn between the Hebriden case study, Milton Farm, and the Spencer-Peirce-Little Farm in Newbury Massachusetts.
The Social And Material Lives Of The Agricultural Elite: The18th-Century Tyngs Of Dunstable, Massachusetts, Christa M. Beranek
The Social And Material Lives Of The Agricultural Elite: The18th-Century Tyngs Of Dunstable, Massachusetts, Christa M. Beranek
Northeast Historical Archaeology
The Tyngs were a wealthy family in Dunstable (now Tyngsborough), Massachusetts in the late- 17th and 18th centuries. They were descended from a Boston merchant, and maintained many commercial connections. Some members of the family became rural storekeepers in Dunstable. Historical research and archaeological data from Eleazer Tyng's house site show the different ways in which the Tyngs related themselves to the urban coastal elite, and participated in the culture of gentility and refinement. Through architecture, social connections, and material goods such as tea wares, they lived as rural elites with connections to the coast. Rather than directly mimicking the …