Pre-Colombian Jamaica: Caribbean Archeology and Ethnohistory

22 / Chapter 2.
were never reported. Excavations at Bellevue–Mannings Hill (K13) were carried
out in 1974–1975 and 1976–1977 by C. W. Medhurst and John Wilman
(AJ 1976, 3:3–12; 1976, 4:12–40; 1977, 1:2–9; 1977, 3:1–9, 12–19) and the
same authors continued their work at Rodney’s House (S5) in 1978–1979 (AJ
1978, 3:1–10, 12–24; 1979, 4:1–2; 1983, 3:20–22; 1984, 2:9–11). The results
were fully reported. In the southwest portion of the Bellevue site, a circular
arrangement of postholes was located, and was convincingly interpreted as
a house foundation (Appendix 9). This is the first such feature to be adequately
documented in Jamaica. Both excavators remarked that at Rodney’s House filleted
rim sherds were confined to the top part of the deposits. This was taken,
incorrectly, as an indication that the site had to be older than White Marl.
John Wilman’s last excavations were carried out in 1983 and 1986 in the vicinity
of his property at Upton (A43) (AJ 1983, 3:20–22; 1984, 2:9–11; Wilman
1992–1993).
Captain C. S. Cotter was mainly concerned with the first Spanish capital at
New Seville (Cotter 1948, 1956, 1970) although he also excavated at Windsor
(A19) not far from where de Wolf put down her sounding (Cotter 1952).
Lt. Comm. J. S. Tyndale- Biscoe was involved with a number of sites on the island,
including the University Midden (Long Mountain North) (K8), but he
did not report in detail on any of them ( Tyndale- Biscoe 1952, 1954). Perhaps
his most interesting contribution relates to Bowden (O9), which he first discovered
and described ( Tyndale- Biscoe 1960a, 1960b, 1962). He called it “an
Arawak kitchen midden with an individuality all its own,” on account of the
style of its pottery decoration. This he described as having been made with a
“ square- pointed stick,” to produce either a single line of punctations or a zigzag
pattern. In his view, one could speak of a “Port Morant style” on a par with
the Montego Bay style, and the material available in the Lee Collection tends
to bear this out. It was because of Tyndale- Biscoe’s description (with which
he agreed) that Vanderwal conducted his excavations at Bowden in 1968, although,
as we have seen, he did not publish the results.
Finally, it should be mentioned that R. P. and A. K. Bullen carried out excavations
at Tower Hill (K7) in 1961 (Bullen and Bullen 1974), and excavations
were also conducted at Bellevue–White River (A45) by J. P. Dering, J. K.
Southerland, and J. E. Fandrich in 1991 (Dering 1992; Dering and Southerland
1991). Dering thought the remains showed “the social isolation of a marginal
horticultural village,” but it is uncertain how far this agrees with Lee’s discovery
of a gold disk at the same location.