French Artifacts of Mississippian Life

In my particular corner of archaeology, we read the accounts written by the French during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to better understand what life was like in colonial communities, and also to get a glimpse of native traditions and beliefs that were not written down by those who practiced them. Both the French and native traditions of the period were a mixture of the ancient and the then-modern.

There are some observations by the French, made in the southern Mississippi River Valley during the early eighteenth century, which provide particularly elusive glimpses of something that was more ancient than modern at the time. These accounts record the last echoes of Mississippian cultural practices that dated back to the eleventh century, and which were largely abandoned and forgotten in native communities by the time of the arrival of Europeans in North America. In a way, what the French saw at a village in modern-day southwestern Mississippi was a view back into time - even then.

Temple mound at the Grand Village of the Natchez.

Some of my favorite passages relate to a temple that sat atop a flat-topped mound at the Grand Village of the Natchez. Inside was a sacred fire that burned day and night, as well as a number of baskets inside of which were kept the bones of the previous leaders of the community, who were known as the “Suns”. The descriptions of the temple, made just before the ancient practices that constructed them came to an end, provide views that we can never really approach when we dig into the ground.

“There is no window, no chimney, in this temple, and it is only by the light of the fire that you can see a little, and then the door, which is very low and narrow, must be open… The old man who is the keeper keeps the fire up and takes care not to let it go out. It is in the center of the temple, in front of a sort of mausoleum…This would be rather graceful were it not all blackened with smoke and covered with soot. There is a large mat, which serves as a curtain to cover a large table… on which stands a large basket that is unlawful to open…”

“I saw a number of little earthen pots, platters, and cups, and little cane baskets, all well made. This is to serve up the food to the spirits of the deceased chiefs...”

“The interior of this temple is divided into two unequal parts by a little wall which cuts it from the rising to the setting sun. The part into which one enters may be 20 feet wide and the other may be 10, but in this second part it is extremely gloomy… There is nothing remarkable in the inside of the temple except a table or altar about 4 feet high and 6 long by 2 broad. On this table is a coffer made of cane splints very well worked, in which are the bones of the last great Sun. The eternal fire is in the first part of this temple. In the other and more secluded part nothing can be distinguished except two planks worked by hand on which are many minute carvings which one is unable to make out, owing to the insufficient light.”

Mississippian figurine (wood) from the Spiro Mounds.

There are also a few drawings of what the French saw at Natchez. The image below is particularly haunting. It illustrates the funeral of the “Tattooed Serpent”, who was the brother of the spiritual and political leader of the Natchez nation. Note how the route of the funeral procession is depicted with a simple looped line. What kind of artifact from the ground could provide such a view? Meanwhile, eight villagers are ritually strangled as the body passes by, on its way to the temple on top of the mound. It is difficult to overstate the value of these accounts and drawings today.

The funeral of the Tattooed Serpent.

The site of the Grand Village is still there today. The mounds on which the temples stood are covered in well-mown grass, and the place is now a quiet park. Follow the Natchez Trace, one of the oldest roads in the country, to where it meets the Mississippi River.  Stand on the low mounds and remember the fire that burned day and night.

The Words They Used

Particularly for an archaeologist, it can be a lot of fun to know a linguist. My friend Michael McCafferty studies, among other things, the language of the Miami and the Illinois, which was the native tongue of the region from about 1600 to about 1750. Population decline amongst the Illinois (and the increase in French settlers) favored French as the local language by the mid-1700s. This was exchanged for English after the arrival of significant numbers of American settlers after 1800.

Michael provides me occasional insights into the language of the Illinois, which help interpret what we find in the ground, or which simply breathe a little life into the physical remains of the past. Below are a few things he has shared with me. (The Illinois words have been reproduced here in the way the French missionaries wrote the language.)

In Illinois: cacar8gana

In French: os de Cerf pour faire des pierres a fl.

In English: deer bones for making arrow stones

In Illinois: irenakic8a

In French: pot de terre fait par les sauvages

In English: earthen pot made by the wild ones

In Illinois: nitchingasichima achiski8akic8a  

In French: je presente au feu la gueule du pot de terre pr le seicher

In English: I introduce the neck of the earthen pot to the fire to dry it

In Illinois: 8apakic8nessa ("little white pot")

In French: de fayance  

In English: (French) faience

In Illinois: atehiminanghigi areni tchipacamina8e nipinirakinchi

In French: avec des fraise on fait une eau qui est coe une Espece de vin

In English: with strawberries they make a water which is like a kind of wine

In Illinois: nanta8a8ia am8i (literally ‘timber rattlesnake shit’)

In French: charbon de terre  

In English: coal

A Little Bowl in the Fort

Native American pottery fragment from the third Fort de Chartres.

Archaeologists spend a lot of time talking about pottery. This humble little fragment from our recent work at Fort de Chartres is an illustration of why that is.

Ninety-nine percent of the ceramics we find at eighteenth century sites in Illinois are European products – mostly French wares before 1750. French merchants and colonists brought these here. The Native American residents of Illinois had ceased to make pottery by this time, and were using brass kettles and the occasional piece of French faience. The dominant indigenous group during the occupation of Fort de Chartres was the Illinois nation. By the time the third fort was constructed in 1732, the Illinois had been without a native pottery tradition for about 50 years. The last evidence for their manufacture of pottery (called “Danner Series) was in pre-1680 contexts in the upper Illinois River valley.

Danner Series sherd from the 17th century Zimmerman site, in the upper Illinois River Valley.

By the 1680s or 1690s, the Illinois were no longer making clay pots. The reason for this is complex. The old chestnut has been that they traded in their ancient practice of pottery making for shiny new brass kettles, which were more durable. However, a closer look at the seventeenth century villages of the Illinois reveals that for one or two generations, brass kettles and old-style clay pots were used at the same time. The former did not immediately replace the latter. Instead, the end of pottery-making seems to have followed population decline and social disruption. In other words, brass kettles didn’t destroy clay pots; warfare, disease and resettlement did, at least in Illinois. 

European brass kettle.

This brings us back to the tiny sherd found this fall at the fort. It is of native manufacture, but it was not made in Illinois. It was made in the southern Mississippi Valley, probably by the Natchez. There are references in the historical record to “Indian pots full of oil” brought up from the southern part of the valley, where indigenous pottery traditions were still alive and well during the eighteenth century – and where French brass kettles were also in use. 

Eighteenth century Natchez bowl.

This little vessel would not have been big enough to use to ship bear’s oil upriver, however. It was probably a little bowl or small bottle, decorated in a pattern of incised lines. It probably came to Illinois as part of someone’s personal possessions. It was also one of the last pieces of traditional pottery in use in the central Mississippi River valley, where Native American ceramics had been made for over 2000 years prior to the arrival of the French.

Such artifacts can be the tips of enormous historical icebergs….

The Garden by the Fort

This post will begin to describe the results of our 2012 archaeological testing at the site of the 1732 Fort de Chartres, in Randolph County, Illinois. The fort was built by the French to provide a military and governmental center for the Illinois Country colony. It was the third of four versions of the fortification.

Like most French colonial forts of the period, this version of Fort de Chartres was of the “Vauban” plan, consisting of central square area flanked by four diamond-shaped bastions. The central area housed most of the buildings associated with the fort (as well as the parade grounds), while the bastions provided defensive views of the walls of the fort and also housed specialized buildings. The walls of the fort were constructed of wooden poles set into deep trenches. The outlines of those trenches are still visible in the subsoil today, and allow us to accurately map the size and shape of the structure.

Our work at the site exposed the northeast bastion of the fort.  The base map above shows the features that we encountered there. The tan color represents areas of subsoil exposed by our test units and trenches. The black lines represent wall trench features. The gray shapes are pit features, and the small red shapes are posts.

In appreciation of the hard work provided by the good folks at the Fort de Chartres Heritage Garden (who demonstrated eighteenth century colonial culinary traditions at the Winter Rendezvous), I will begin with something unusual that we found outside of the limits of the fort.

As you can see in the second plan map (below), there are a series of narrow, perpendicular trenches that are anchored to the very tip of the bastion of the fort. These were very shallow features that could only have supported short, narrow posts - such as those that one would expect on low fencing. Such a fence would not have been sufficient to contain large animals, and instead, I am of the opinion that these trenches reflect a produce garden that was situated just outside the northeast bastion of the fort.

Trenches outside of the fort, as first exposed in excavation block.

This was a bit of a surprise, as the area around the fort (called the glacis) was meant to be kept clear for defensive purposes. However, Fort de Chartres was located in a rather sleepy place, militarily speaking. During the last years of this facility (which probably stood until the mid-1750s) most of the soldiers affiliated with the fort were actually stationed elsewhere. It would appear that those remaining in the fort, or perhaps some of the residents of the adjacent village, eventually set up a garden just outside of the bastion. A fragment of an unusual French stoneware pot or jug was found in one of the fence line trenches, and may have been used in the garden for watering or for other purposes.

What intrigues me about this find is that it is so unofficial. The little fence wasn’t part of the grand plan of the fort. Instead it represents both the everyday reality of needing to grow your own food, as well as the slow, quiet tide of village life that eventually overtook the site of the 1732 fort.

Back to Fort de Chartres part I

One of several storms approaching.

I have been lost in writing a sequel to the “At Home in the Illinois Country” book, this one focusing on seventeenth and eighteenth century Native American villages and French forts in the Illinois Country. For this reason, I’m afraid I haven’t spent much time updating the blog this summer. However, I finally got a break from the lab and the computer – as we spent another 2 weeks at the site of the 1732 Fort de Chartres.

This year, we opened a larger area, in hopes of exposing the plan of the northeast bastion of the fort. The project did just that – and we now have a good idea of how the fort was built, repaired, and what kind of activities occurred inside. The next few posts will focus on what we found. But first, here are a few snapshots of the 2012 work, and our dedicated volunteer crew. Thanks to everyone who leant a hand in the rain and the cold wind.

More to come….

Site view.

Jane profiling a pit feature abandoned before 1760.

Ron excavating one of the wall trenches that supported the bastion wall.

Robert mapping the wall trenches.

Margaret removing the redeposited remains of a fireplace.

A damp and dedicated crew, October 2012.

Crew pictures courtesy of Corinne Carlson...

A Forgotten Eighteenth Century House in St Louis?

Speaking of archaeological features in St Louis (see my last post), here’s a remarkable structure that’s about to become archaeology. The remains of this stone house are located between Lafayette Square and Choteau Avenue. These photos were taken in the mid 1990s, and I’m sorry to report that the building has since lost one of its exterior walls.  It’s now just a picturesque ruin, but I’m wondering if anyone recorded the house when in was in better shape. 

The house as it looked in the mid-1990s.

The sign posted on the front of the house during the 1990s claimed it was constructed “circa 1790” by a “French fur trader” called  Joseph Mottard.

Does anyone out there know anything more about this site? I hope someone recorded it back in the day…. 

Ruins of the house in 2010.   

Early French Ceramics 1

This is probably one of the earliest pieces of French pottery from documented contexts in Illinois. It was found during the 1950s atop Starved Rock, site of La Salle’s 1682/83 Fort St. Louis. The top of the rock, however, was also the site of a significant Peoria Indian occupation during the first decades of the eighteenth century. It is unknown which component this artifact was affiliated with, but in either case, it was probably in the ground before ca. 1720.

The artifact is a fragment of a distinctive green glazed jug (made in western France) known as “Saintonge”, from the region where such pots were produced. Potters there made these lead glazed jugs for centuries, and they were exported across western Europe, as well as the French colonies. Pictured is a non-archaeological example of a similar jug, made around 1800.

European Apothecary Pots

During our recent excavations at the third “wooden version” of Fort de Chartres (see 2/29/2012 post), we recovered a large fragment of an unusual form of salve or unguent pot. These little pots contained various types of viscous substances, usually medicinal salves, or in some cases, certain kinds of cosmetics.

Most 18^th century French colonial sites in the Illinois Country produce fragments of apothecary / pharmacy pots, but they are different than the pot found at Fort de Chartres. More common are tin glazed varieties made in France. Thus far, sites in Illinois have generally produced only small fragments of the French unguent pots, but they seem to have been short, slightly ovoid, shouldered vessels.

Fragments of 18th century apothecary pots from Cahokia, Illinois.

The pot found at the fort (from 1740s or early 1750s contexts) is a distinctive type made in the Netherlands, rather than the typical French variety. It is nearly identical to pots frequently recovered in Amsterdam from 17^th and 18^th century contexts. I believe it is the first of its kind found in Illinois, however.

Two Dutch pots:
 The Fort de Chartres specimen (left), and an example excavated in Amsterdam (right).

Sometime after 1800, French unguent or salve pots became very popular, and are frequently found in 1830s-1850s contexts in St. Louis. These pots were of a different shape than their 18^th century predecessors, with straight sides, small flaring lips, and no shoulders. They were generally coated in a bright green or bright blue tin glazes, while the 18^th century varieties may have been more often glazed in plain white.

Two French, tin glazed pots from 1840s contexts in St. Louis. 

Like many old European ceramic traditions, the French and Dutch unguent pots were replaced in the international market by British whiteware pots during the mid 19^th century.

The "Cahokia Courthouse"

Below are a few artifacts from the 1930s excavations at the “Cahokia Courthouse”. They didn’t make the final cut of my recent book on French domestic sites, so I thought I’d share them here.

One of the few eighteenth century vertical log buildings still standing in the village of Cahokia is known as the Cahokia Courthouse. The building was constructed around 1740 as a private residence for the Le Poincet family. In 1793, the house was purchased by the Common Pleas Court of the United States for use as a courthouse, in what was then St. Clair County of the Northwest Territory. After about 20 years as a court building, the structure was sold and converted back into a residence. 

By the beginning of the twentieth century, the 160-year-old house, damaged by flooding and showing its age, had been abandoned. In 1904, it was purchased, dismantled, and hauled across the Mississippi River to St. Louis, where it was exhibited at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. After the exposition, the old building was purchased by the Chicago Historical Society, hauled back across the river and reconstructed in Chicago’s Jackson Park. What remained of Le Poincet’s house remained in Chicago until 1939, when it was returned to Cahokia. Prior to its reconstruction, basic archaeology was conducted on the site for the State of Illinois by archaeologist Paul Maynard.

All of the ceramics in this photo predate circa 1770. “A” and “B” are fragments of Rouen-style faience platters. “B” has been drilled with a hole that once held a lead staple, used to repair a break or crack in the platter during the 1700s. “C” is a fragment of a faience plate from Provence. “D” is a tin glazed plate made in Spanish colonial Mexico, and shipped to Illinois via New Orleans. “E” is an unusual serving dish from Italy, known as “Albisola Slipped”. This would have been included in French shipments from Mediterranean ports such as Marseille. Finally, “F” is a fragment of a kitchen bowl made in western France.

An Important French Colonial Text as a Free Download.

Pease and Jenison’s 1940 volume Illinois on the Eve of the Seven Years War is available as a free download at the Internet Archive. This is an important text, and a must-have for anyone interested in the French colonial history of the Midwest. The original printing has become hard to find, but thankfully there is now a digital copy available. Better yet, it is searchable! A real resource…..
[Just click on the image above to go to the Archive page]

The Shadow of a 250-Year-Old Fort

This is why we dug where we did in 2011 (see Fort de Chartres posts February 29 and March 2). This is an aerial photo taken in 1928, which shows an unusually vivid soil stain in a cultivated field. This contrast-enhanced version clearly depicts a square enclosure with what appear to be four bastions, one on each corner. The northwest bastion is blurred by erosion. Archaeological remains of structures rarely leave behind such vivid stains – caused by changes in the organic composition of the topsoils, created by past activity. 

History of the Fort in Cross Section

During our November 2011 excavations at Fort de Chartres (see February 29 2012 post) we uncovered a segment of a large, deep, wall trench that once supported vertical logs that formed a palisade wall of the fort. The profile or cross section of the ditch told quite a story – and is a good example of how and why we read soils the way we do in such features.

• On the western edge of the trench, Zone A was a sandy clay soil that contained no artifacts. This zone probably reflects the dirt excavated in 1732, which was backfilled against the new, upright logs.
• Zone B represents a posthole affiliated with that initial palisade wall.
• Sometime after the construction of the fort, parts of the palisade wall were repaired, including the portion uncovered by our excavations. This repair involved the removal of some of the original posts, and the redigging or expansion of the wall trench that support the uprights. That rebuilding activity is represented by Zone C, an old topsoil that was backfilled against a second line of posts.
• Also associated with that replacement post setting is Zone D, which fills the eastern edge of the expanded palisade trench. This soil was similar to Zone C, but was greasier and more heavily laden with animal bones and other artifacts. This suggests that the soils used to backfill the trench (from what was the inside of the fort) were more contaminated with occupation-related debris. In other words the ground surface inside the fort was more littered with trash that just outside of the palisade walls.
• Finally, Zones E/F represents the fill of a posthole associated with the replacement palisade wall. This was old topsoil that fell into the posthole when the fort was dismantled, sometime during the 1750s. 

So, visible in this unit was the initial 1732 construction of the fort, a circa 1740s repair episode, and the dismantling of the fort sometime in the 1750s. The palisade trench was about three feet deep, and supported a wall that was probably about 10-12 feet tall. Traces of charcoal at the bases of both lines of postholes suggest that they were partially carbonized before they were set, to slow the decay of the wooden posts once they were in the ground. Mineral (manganese) staining was also visible at the base of some of these posts, as well as across the base of the wall trench. This suggests that water often collected at the base of the palisade trench, at least in places. That's why we draw profiles....

Lead Bale Seal from Fort de Chartres

This is a lead bale seal found during our 2011 work at Fort de Chartres III. The seal was probably used during the 1740s or early 1750s. While we usually assume lead seals found in 18th century French contexts were part of the fur trade (used to bind together furs for export), the few that have been recovered in Illinois are often associated with bales of French goods (cloth or clothing) that were being imported into the colony. I have a hunch that is what this one was affiliated with, but we haven't been able to decipher it....

On that topic, below are two lead seals found at the nearby Ghost Horse site, occupied between 1735 and 1770. At least one of these was actually attached to a bale of men's hosiery. Better yet, there is evidence that the house was occupied by Pierre Laclede, who wintered at the village of Chartres in 1763, just prior to founding the city St. Louis.

(The Ghost Horse site is described in the new book At Home in the Illinois Country - see sidebar link.)

Digging at Fort de Chartres 2011

I thought I’d begin this blog with a bit of news. Last November, Dr Margaret Brown and I led a small crew to the site of what we now believe to have been the third of four incarnations of “Fort de Chartres”, constructed by the French near the Mississippi River (near the old French town of Prairie du Rocher, Illinois) in 1732. In just six days of digging, we managed to expose portions of the fort’s north east bastion –  deep trenches that supported the palisade walls, and two pit features containing a range of artifacts used inside the fort during the 1740s and early 1750s. The sample is one of our best glimpses into life at the fort (and the surrounding community of Chartres) during the heyday of the French colony in Illinois.

The site is located near the reconstructed remains of the fourth (and final) Fort de Chartres  - this one made of stone during the 1750s. It was abandoned in 1771, and was partially rebuilt as a state historic site during the mid 20^th century.

I will feature some of the artifacts found at Fort III in upcoming posts. We also shot a little video of the November excavation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-uXGvxZYsw