Northeast Subsistence-Settlement Change: A.D. 700 –1300

Figure 9.4. Histogram of feature depths.
Figure 9.6. Histogram of feature length-to-depth ratio.
suggests either the presence of different types of
hearths at the two sites, or reflects differing levels of
hearth preparation. Following the same pattern, small
storage pits at Broome Tech average only 8 cm deep,
less than a third of the 28 cm Thomas/Luckey average.
Interestingly, the 87 cm depth of the lone storage feature
at Broome Tech is much greater than the 59 cm
average depth for Thomas/Luckey, but approaches the
90 cm upper limit for Thomas/Luckey storage pits.
Estimated feature volumes reinforce the size distinctions
noted for feature depths (Figure 9.5). The volume
of Thomas/Luckey features have an average volume
Figure 9.5. Histogram of feature volumes.
of 0.348 cu. m, nearly four times the 0.096 cu. m average
for Broome Tech. Ninety-four percent of the
Broome Tech features are less than 0.1 cu. m, compared
with only 23 percent at Thomas/Luckey. A closer
examination of these small feature reveals that 78% of
the Broome Tech features are less than 0.01 cu. m, while
none of the features identified at Thomas/Luckey are
this small. All of these data point to the clearly smaller
size of features at Broome Tech. A potential very important
contrast to this general pattern is the single large
Broome Tech storage pit, with an estimated volume of
1.568 cu. m, 20 percent larger than the biggest
Thomas/Luckey storage feature.
Feature Shape. In addition to variation in feature
size between the two sites, there are also subtle differences
in feature shape (Figure 9.6). To gauge variation
in profile shape, a maximum length-to-depth ratio
(L/D) was computed for each feature. Features with a
high score tend to have a large surface area relative to
depth, and indicate shallow features. A perfectly hemispheric
profile would have an L/D of 2. Features at
Broome Tech have an average L/D of 11.2, more than
triple the 3.3 L/D for Thomas/Luckey (Figure 9.6).
Nearly 70 percent of the Broome Tech features are at
least six times longer than they are deep, while only 8
percent of the Thomas/Luckey features are so proportioned.
The relatively high ratio at Broome Tech is largely
driven by the numerous ephemeral hearths, which
have an average L/D of 13.1, compared with the single
storage feature with a 2.2 L/D. The lower L/D ratio
for Thomas/Luckey appears as a largely unimodal
Chapter 9 Pits, Plants, and Place: Recognizing Late Prehistoric Subsistence and Settlement Diversity in the Upper Susquehanna Drainage 177