Pre-Colombian Jamaica: Caribbean Archeology and Ethnohistory

182 / Appendix A.
stratigraphic inconsistency here. But this may be explained by the cut and fill
situation in this part of the trench. The date for level 2 is modern.
In addition to these dates, a number of oxidizable carbon ratio (OCR) age
determinations were obtained for the site, according to the method described
by D. S. Frink (1994). In his work at the Wickliffe site in Kentucky, Wesler
(2001) found these determinations reliable and consonant with the radiocarbon
dates. At Green Castle there are evident discrepancies between the two
methods, which may possibly be due to the fact that the model used for OCR
dating tends to assume a steady build- up of deposits, and the mode of formation
at Green Castle may have been quite different.
Apart from burial 1 in the mid trench, another burial, that of a child, was
discovered in the south trench. Burial 2 occurs at a depth of about 35 cm. The
date of 430 ± 80 b.p. was obtained on material in immediate proximity to it;
hence, evidently it belonged to occupation 3.
The two burials were analyzed and in part excavated by Ana Luisa Santos
(Coimbra University). Adult burial 1, probably a male, was interred in a flexed
position, with an associated ceramic vessel at his feet. He was lying on his left
side, with the right hand gripping the left forearm. Burial 2 is that of a child,
with an estimated age at death of about 7. The inhumation was in a flexed position,
with all the bones from the lower limbs so much contracted as to suggest
that he or she may have been bound before burial. The child was lying on its
right side, with the left hand gripping the right elbow. In their general posture,
therefore, there is a definite parallel between the two burials.
The bulk of the archaeological material consists of ceramic fragments as well
as chert and other stone pieces. In general the decoration would appear to indicate
that this is a White Marl site, with no traces of Redware. Some of the more
unusual pieces found include potsherd and shell disks, a bone needle, a ground
stone artifact that may possibly be a fragment of a monolithic axe, as well as a
fragment of a petaloid celt, and several beads. There are large numbers of shells.
Apart from Pleurodonts, the majority identified so far are marine gastropods
that live mostly in the intertidal zone on the rocky shore. The faunal remains
discovered in 1999 in the northern trench and the upper levels of the mid and
southern trenches were studied by Jessica Allgood (2000), whereas the analysis
of the faunal material recovered in 2000–2001 from the lower levels of the mid
and southern trenches and the three western trenches was carried out by Lisabeth
Carlson (2002).
Allgood counted 7,110 individual specimens and Carlson counted 13,834.
With a combined total of almost 21,000 specimens, this represents, as Carl-