Ye Pleasant Mount: 1989 1990 Excavations - Open site which ...

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These data allow us to draw some conclusions about food procurement, diet, food preparation and cuts of meat consumed, and patterns of butchering in this eighteenth- to mid-nineteenth century system. DietaryElementsatMt. Pleasant The Mt. Pleasant faunal assemblage seems to follow a pattern of increased reliance on domestic animals and birds, and a corresponding decrease in exploitation of deer through time. Bone and meat frequencies indicate that three species, deer, cattle, and pigs, respectively, dominated the diet during the earliest period of occupation. During the later period ofoccupation, cattle, pigs, and small wild mammals appear to have been more heavily utilized than deer. This may have been related to depopulation of deer through hunting during the period of occupation. Pigs provided a consistent, but low, percentage of biomass in both the upper and lower levels. It does appear that the adaptive strategy at Mt. Pleasant became more focal through time. A focal adaptation is based upon the intensive exploitation of a few species throughout the year, rather than the seasonal, scheduled exploitation of many different animals, and this may fit the pattern reflected in the Mt. Pleasant faunal collection. During the later historic occupation, the Mt. Pleasant fauna suggest a consistent focus on domestic mammals and birds, supplemented by small, but consistent amounts of small wild animals, wild birds, fish, and molluscs. The domestic animals, cattle, pigs, and chickens, are typical of both historic Indian and historic European sites that have had zooarchaeological analysis. The Mt. Pleasant sample is very small and therefore difficult to compare with analyses of contemporary sites in the region. The faunal sample from the Rae's Creek site dated between ca. 1650 and 1750. Preservation was poor, but the identified sample was larger than that at Mt. Pleasant. Species diversity was lower at Rae's Creek (Wood 1989) than at Mt. Pleasant during the earliest occupation (Wood 1990). However, this is not reflected in the current Mt. Pleasant sample, probably due to the small number of remains analyzed. At Rae's Creek, wild animals predominated. In the current Mt. Pleasant sample, deer and fish in the lower levels contributed 50 percent of the MNI and 33.6 percent of the biomass. The majority ofbiomass (52.9%) in Levels 3, 4, and 5 was contributed by unidentified medium-large mammal fragments, which could represent cattle, pigs, or deer. Wild animals represented only 2.9 percent of the biomass, while domestic animals contributed 47.8 percent of the biomass from Levels 1 and 2. Unidentified medium-large mammals represented the second highest percentage of biomass (44.2%). A much larger, though contemporary, faunal sample from the Thomas Hird Lot at the Fort Frederica site has been analyzed (Honerkamp 1975, 1980). Domestic animals dominated this assemblage, and represented 20 percent of the MNI and 78 percent of the biomass. Wild terrestrial animals and estuarine species contributed 31 percent of the MNI and 21 percent of the biomass for the total species assemblage at this site. 5
Reitz and Honerkamp (1983), using primarily the data from the Thomas Hird Lot, have identified a subsistence strategy for early historic settlers in the southeastern Coastal Plain. They determined that English settlers modified the English subsistence strategy to fit the ecological and social constraints of the new country. The English subsistence pattern for meat was based on the consumption of primarily domestic species. By the eighteenth century, deer and other wild game in Europe had been so depleted that only the wealthy and priviliged classes could hunt them. The New World adaptation to this pattern continued to include a preference for domesticated species, primarily cow, pig and chicken. Sheep, which had been a significant component of the Old World English diet, became nominal in diets in the southeastern United States, possibly because of predation or diseases. In the the southeastern United States, wild animals were more plentiful (for a time) than they had been in Europe. Deer, rabbit, turkey, and estuarine fishes and turtles were the most favored dietary supplements. The low percentage of burning on all sampled faunal remains (10%) at Mt. Pleasant suggests that preparation of meat and meat by-products was done most often by stewing, frying, roasting in a dutch oven, or baking (including puddings from blood and organs, etc.), and not from roasting on a spit over an open fire, where exposed, non-meaty bones such as shins and feet would be burned. ButcheringPractices and Cuts ofMeat This analysis of butchering and food preparation cuts is based on those bones that actually exhibit cuts, hack marks, or breakage near cuts. Blows designed to break a bone cannot always be differentiated from blows designed to cut through the flesh only, since meat processing blows will also produce gashes with secondary cracks extending from them. Hack marks may represent the following activities, (1) the separation of joints during primary butchering and carcass sectioning, (2) the removal of a thick or tough piece of meat or ligament from a bone, or (3) attempts at breaking a bone during butchering or while boning and/or trimming a portion of meat in the kitchen. Superficial cut marks on bones may represent (1) the trimming oflarge portions such as quarters into cuts for the table, (2) and/or the trimming oflegs and wings from fowl, and/or (3) the carving ofa meat portion or fowl at the table. Bones with no visible cut/hack marks on them might have been stored for later use, following the methods discussed above, or used for making soup, roast, or stew, in which case the meat could have fallen off without the aid of sharp instruments. They could also have been articulated with other bones that did receive cuts and blows, part of a larger cut of meat or debris from the trimming of meat portions, such as hind or forequarters. Therefore, cultural ideas of how an animal should be portioned and prepared for consumption need to be understood within the context ofthe times that they were utilized. 6
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Ye Pleasant Mount: 1989 & 1990 Exca
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Chapter 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Table of
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Figure List ofFigures, continued 31
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Acknowledgements The author is inde
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is not known, it may have been sett
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Laboratory Methods All artifacts we
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Chapter 2. History of Mount Pleasan
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visited by Bartram was located in 1
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Ebenezer, he purposed to quit the w
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Uchee Creek in Columbia County, wit
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was: "supplying some Creek Indians
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He [Oglethorpe] stationed small gar
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Thomas Wiggin was dead by 1756, and
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continued to live near Mount Pleasa
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Table 2, Continued. Artifact Summar
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--- Area C Area D Level bluff top M
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Table 3. Area C, Test Unit Summary.
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Chapter 4. Excavations at Trader Po
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Table 4. Artifact Summary, Midden,
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G ·' ;:. ,: ,': .:' . : ..... A B
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Figure 11. Pewter .p001l8 ad iron k
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Table 6. Ceramic Summary, Midden, c
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Tobie 7. Ceramic SU111DUIIY. FeaIUr
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Table 8. Minimum Vessel Estimate, N
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y the addition of a notched/pinched
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century, further confirming the age
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Table 10. Button Attributes. Levell
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Table 11, Continued. Glass Bead Typ
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while Mount Pleasant had fewer than
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It B Fi ur 23 En isb E em J
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Type G, which is associated with Br
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o CIII 2 Fi ure 28. Bottle lass too
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581N SOOE 10 YR 5/4 Y.Uowish Brown
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10 YR S/3 Brown Sand 10 YR 3/1 Very
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Feature 1. Feature 1 was a circular
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x 28 cm north-south and it was 19 c
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own sand. The feature contained onl
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Table 13. Mean Ceramic Dale Calcula
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documented period (1735 to 1757) wh
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In Table 16, the Trader Point midde
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Period pottery. The paucity of Chat
Page 111 and 112: with it. Since we know that Schremp
Page 113 and 114: Table 19, Continued. Summary of Eur
Page 115 and 116: Table 19, Continued. Summary of Eur
Page 119 and 120: Hemperley, Marion 1974 English Crow
Page 121 and 122: Kelly, A. R. and R. S. Neitzel 1961
Page 123 and 124: Smith, Marvin T. 1990 Historic Peri
Page 125 and 126: Appendix I. Glass Beads from Mount
Page 127 and 128: value for comparative purposes, and
Page 129 and 130: There is no Kidd designation for th
Page 131 and 132: Ontario. Kidd, Kenneth E. 1979 Glas
Page 133 and 134: ZOOARCHAEOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF THE M
Page 136 and 137: specimens that have been studied by
Page 138 and 139: The next largest taxon category by
Page 140 and 141: The domestic animals, pig, cow, chi
Page 142 and 143: Fort Michilimackinac fit well with
Page 144 and 145: REFERENCES CITED Anderson, Jay Alle
Page 146 and 147: Schmid, Elizabeth F. 1972 Atlas of
Page 150 and 151: Table 4. Species List, The Mt. Plea
Page 152 and 153: Table 7. Bone Measurements' (in mil
Page 154 and 155: Table 10. Element Distribution of M
Page 156 and 157: Table 12. Element Fusion Data, Mt.
Page 158 and 159: INTRODUCTION ZOOARCHAEOLOGICALANALY
Page 160 and 161: Mollusca A total of 46 fragments of
Page 164 and 165: Analysis of butchering patterns on
Page 166 and 167: REI ...ERENCES Aldrich, Paul I. (ed
Page 170: Table 3. Fauna from Mt. Pleasant, F
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