Historic Archaeology

One of the things I enjoyed most about my most recent dig is that it was Historic Archaeology. Which means the artifacts were super diverse. Not just chert flakes and groundstone like I saw at my other digs. It was also really neat because it was in Historic Nauvoo. We got to dig up little pieces of china, glass, brick, and square nails and then we would go off touring the historic sites and see the very same things, just whole. I don't think I have ever paid attention to china in my life until I was picking up tiny pieces of it.

Glazed brick I found. It means it was overheated in the baking process.

A brick walk outside the historic Willard Richards home. The two vertical bricks in the right corner are glazed at the bottom corners.

My sister talks about "connection" with her kids. Basically connecting a recent experience with something else. I felt myself doing that a lot, and it was fun.

A little man from a piece of earthenware I found.

A full plate found in the Browning Gunshop. Someone at the dig found one of the same men that are in this plate.

I found this piece of bright blue earthenware at the Samuel Smith home site.

The bright blue of the previous piece matches the dark blue plate in the background. The tumblers on the table are the same pattern as some of the glass fragments I found. This setup is in the Wilford Woodruff home.

Thanks for bearing with me as I geek out over this, but it was really exciting to make all these connections and just find such a variety of artifacts that these people used.