Crossing the Borders: New Methods and Techniques in the Study of Archaeological Materials from the Caribbean

Functional Analysis of Caribbean Tool Assemblages / 107
species of plants, but it is not yet clear which plants were responsible. More experimentation
is needed to clarify this issue. Whether the two varieties of plant working
polishes, both predominantly oriented perpendicularly, are related to subsistence
tasks such as peeling tubers, or to craft activities like scraping plants for
producing fibers for rope making or basketry, is also unclear. It is argued here that
the perpendicularly oriented polishes on the flint implements more likely were involved
in making objects of plants. From ethnographic sources we know that, as
the need arose, many objects in the tropical forest are made of the ample plant material
present in the forest, to be rejected after use. Scraping shoots or stalks for
weaving or plaiting is therefore a very plausible explanation of the transversely
oriented plant working traces. The querns with plant working traces found at
Plum Piece are mote likely to be connected to food processing, like crushing palm
fruit. However, the querns too may have been used for processing fibers from palm
(Nieuwenhuis this volume).
Considering the relative rarity of good quality flint and the effort that must
have been expended in its acquisition, it is puzzling that most of the flint implements
selected did not display any traces of wear. Flint is not locally available and
one would expect it to be heavily used. Although some activities, like cutting meat,
leave few traces on flint, the lack of extensive use- wear is yet another argument for
seasonal occupation of Plum Piece. The attraction of the location lies indeed in
the plant resources surrounding the site. The use- wear analysis of different categories
of tools further corroborates this supposition, showing the important role
of the plant and woodworking toolkit.
Anse à la Gourde
Anse à la Gourde is situated on the east part of Grande- Terre, the limestone island
of Guadeloupe (Figure 8.1). The site is located on a narrow piece of land that ends
at the Pointe des Chateaux. On the basis of the ceramic assemblage generalizing
four phases are distinguished belonging to the Saladoid (a.d. 400–a.d. 850) and
Troumassoid series (a.d. 850–a.d. 1400) (Hofman et al. 1999, 2001). The site was
excavated on a large scale and yielded an enormous amount of artifacts: ceramics,
shell, stone, flint, coral, and bone were encountered. Flint was mainly brought
from Antigua, stone pebbles and rocks had to be imported from La Désirade or
Basse- Terre. Shell was therefore considered a valuable substitute, serving as a raw
material for tools and ornaments. Anse à la Gourde has revealed a rich variety of
shell beads, adornments, and three- dimensional objects, as well as a range of tools
such as celts (axes, adzes, and wedges), bivalve- scrapers, and knives, fishhooks,
gauges, and spoons ( Lammers- Keijsers 1999, 2007). Only a limited range of shell
species was employed, all of which can be obtained rather easily around the reefs.
Two hundred bivalves, of which some were clearly gathered after the death of the
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