Greetings,

An unusual lead disk was found at the Calkins Bridge site (20AE809).  I
have posted an image on the CCRG web page http://www.ccrginc.com/#news .

I was hoping that somone had seen similar artifacts and would be
willing to share information.  I have attached some of the pertinent
information and speculation concerning the disk we found below.

The Calkins Bridge disk measures 22.55 mm in diameter, is 4.29 mm
thick, and is perforated with a single hole in the center (3.05 mm in
diameter).  The surface of the disk is smooth and has figures
etched/incised on either face.  One side exhibits a human-like form with
bird-like legs, while the other presents a bird-like image.  The edge of
the disk on the human-like side has been beveled and notched at regular
intervals (approx. 6.5 mm).  The opposite side is flat.  The lead has a
light brown/tan patina and the etchings also are patined.  The size of
the artifact suggests that the disk may have been made from a partially
flattened musket ball.

The Calkins Bridge site is a multi-component archaeological site
located on the Kalamazoo River in southwest lower Michigan (Allegan
County).  While diagnostic artifacts from the site indicate a long term
use of the locale, spanning the Archaic through historic periods, most
of the features were attributed to an early Late Woodland occupation.
The site includes subsurface features, small quantities of animal bone,
and botanical remains (Garland 1984 [ed.]; Hambacher et al. 2003a ).
The lead disk was found between 10 cm and 20 cm below surface within a
layer of historic fill likely resulting from the construction of a
hydroelectric dam in the 1930s.  While associated with a fill layer, it
is our opinion that the fill was redeposited soil from the same site.

While lead disks are not common, perforated and unperforated disks have
been found have been found on archaeological sites in the Upper Great
Lakes region.  They are reported at Fort Michilimackinac and are
described as pertaining to craft activities or as fishing weights
(Armour 1966:3-4; Maxwell and Binford 1961:106).  Other lead disks from
that site that exhibit toothed edges and two holes are interpreted as
whizzers (Stone 1974:154).  These are interpreted as dating to the 1715
to 1760 period.  Plain lead disks with single holes and disks with
serrated edges and two holes from the eighteenth century Guebert site in
Illinois were also classified as whizzers (Good 1972:154-157).
Perforated lead disks have also been found on the Rock Island site
(Mason 1986:60, 61, 80, 83, 106, 113).  Although no function is offered
for the Rock Island disks, they are associated with the Period 3 (1670
to 1730) and Period 4 (1760 to 1770) occupations.  None of these
examples were decorated or incised.

Two perforated lead disks were recently found at the Converse site in
adjoining Kent County, although these artifacts are not dated or
interpreted (Hambacher et al. 2003b:9-6, 9-7).  One of the Converse site
disks appears to be decorated with numerous small triangular
impressions.  A "ceramic coated lead washer" was found at the Calkins
Bridge site during the 1982 investigations, but no further information
was available on that artifact (Adams and Garland 1984:12).  Thus, the
Calkins Bridge disk is unusual in that it represents an intentionally
decorated object.

Decorated disks, naub-cow-zo-win disks, have been found on Late
Woodland sites in northeastern lower Michigan (Cleland 1985; Cleland et
al. 1984).  However, these disks are made of shale.   Perforated stone
disks (slate, steatite, igneous rock, and mudstone) are known from other
Late Woodland sites where they have been interpreted as discoidal beads
(see Pendergast 1974:36), but these are not decorated.  A perforated
catlinite disk was recovered at Rock Island, but no function is offered
(Mason 1986;162, 164).  The catlinite disk is associated with Period 3
(1670 to 1730) from that site (Mason
1986:164).

Historic and ethnographic accounts of Great Lakes tribes indicate that
a variety of dice games were played (Clifton 1977:421, 423; Culin
1907:61-68; Densmore 1979:115-116; Ritzenthaler 1953:166-167).  Most of
the playing pieces were made of animal bone or horn, but some were made
of metal.  In some instances the pieces were incised or shaped in the
form of an animal, person, or object.  Some of the pieces were
perforated disks and some of these were incised, but typically these
decorations were geometrical shapes.

Although the lead disk from the Calkins Bridge site was recovered from
a mixed context that produced historic as well as prehistoric artifacts,
the unusual nature of the artifact is worthy of comment.  Since it was
rendered on lead, and potentially on a former musket ball, the artifact
was assumed to date to the historic period (lead was also procured
historically by Native Americans in the Great Lakes region [Spector
1975; 1977]).  The recovery of morphologically similar disks at Rock
Island and Guebert support such a conclusion and offer a possible late
seventeenth or eighteenth century age for the object (Good 1972:154-157;
Mason 1986:60, 61, 80, 83, 106, 113).  The disk is also a good example
of the utilization of an exotic raw material to create a traditional
object.

The naub-cow-zo-win disks derive their name from the Ojibwe term for
personal charm or amulet (Cleland 1985).  These artifacts are
interpreted to be personal charms which were worn as adornment (on a
string) or carried in a pouch.  Many of the known naub-cow-zo-win disks
are incised with symbols that appear on rock art and on nineteenth
century birch bark scrolls in the region (Cleland 1985; Cleland et al.
1984).  Late Woodland naub-cow-zo-win disks have a limited distribution
in the Thunder Bay region of northeastern lower Michigan (and possibly
Georgian Bay, Ontario).  The disk recovered at the Calkins Bridge site
is visually similar to the  naub-cow-zo-win disks and may have served a
similar function, despite being historic and from southwestern lower
Michigan.

Best Regards,

Sean Dunham

Sean B. Dunham, RPA
Commonwealth Cultural Resources Group, Inc.
Phone:  517-788-3550 / FAX:  517-788-6594
e-mail:  [log in to unmask]
http://www.ccrginc.com

References Cited

Adams, D. L. and E. B. Garland
1984    Historic Use of the Calkins Bridge Site.  In Archaeological
Investigation of the Calkins Bridge Site (20AE809), Allegan County,
Michigan, edited by E. B. Garland, pgs. 10-14.  Department of
Anthropology, Western Michigan University. Kalamazoo.

Armour, D. A.
1966    Made at Mackinac: Crafts at Fort Michilimackinac. Mackinac
History Leaflet No. 8. Mackinac Island State Park Commission.

Cleland, C. E.
1985    Naub-cow-zo-win Discs and Some Observations on the Origin and
Development of Ojibwa Iconography.  Arctic Anthropology 22(2):131-140.

Cleland, C. E., R. D. Clute, and R. E. Haltinger
1984    Naub-cow-zo-win Discs from Northern Michigan.  Midcontinental
Journal of Archaeology 9(2):235-248.

Clifton, J. A.
1977    The Prairie People: Continuity and Change in Potawatomi Indian
Culture 1665-1965.  The Regents Press of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.

Culin, S.
1907    Games of the North American Indians.  Twenty Fourth Report of
the Bureau of American Ethnography to the Smithsonian Institution,
1902-1903.  Government Printing Office, Washington, DC.

Densmore, F.
1979    Chippewa Customs.  Minnesota Historical Society Press, St. Paul,
Minnesota.

Garland, E. B. (editor)
1984    Archaeological Investigation of the Calkins Bridge Site
(20AE809), Allegan County, Michigan.  Department of Anthropology,
Western Michigan University. Kalamazoo.

Good, M. E.
1972    Guebert Site: An 18th Century Historic Kaskaskia Indian Village
in Randolph County, Illinois. Memoir No. 2, Central States
Archaeological Societies, Inc.o recovered at Rock Island, but no fun

Hambacher, M. J., K. C. Taylor, and S. B. Dunham
2003a   Archaeological Investigations at the Calkins Bridge Site
(20AE809), Allegan Dam Spillway Rehabilitation Project, Allegan County,
Michigan.  Commonwealth Cultural Resources Group, Inc., Jackson,
Michigan.

Hambacher, M. J., J. G. Brashler, K. C. Egan-Bruhy, D. R. Hayes, B.
Hardy, D. G. Landis, T. E. Martin, G. W. Monaghan, K. Murphy, J. A.
Robertson, D. L. Seltz
2003b   Phase III Archaeological Data Recovery for the US-131 S-Curve
Realignment Project, Grand Rapids, Michigan.  Commonwealth Cultural
Resources Group, Inc., Jackson, Michigan.

Mason, R. J.
1986    Rock Island: Historical Indian Archaeology in the Northern Lake
Michigan Basin. MCJA Special Paper No. 6.  The Kent State University
Press, Kent, Ohio.

Maxwell. M. S., and L. R. Binford
1961    Excavations at Fort Michilimackinac, Mackinac City, Michigan:
1959 Season. Publications of the Museum, Cultural Series Vol. 1, No. 1.
Michigan State University, East Lansing.

Pendergast, J. F.
1974    The Sugarbush Site: A Possible Iroquoian Maplesugar Camp.
Ontario Archaeology 23:31-61.

Ritzenthaler, R. E.
1953    The Potawatomi Indians of Wisconsin.  Bulletin of the Public
Museum of the City of Milwaukee 19(3):99-174.

Spector, J. D.
1975    Crabapple Point (je 93):  An Historic Winnebago Indian Site in
Jefferson County, Wisconsin.  The Wisconsin Archeologist 56:270-345.

1977    Winnebago Indians and Lead Mining: A Case Study of the
Ethnohistoric Approach in Archaeology.  Midcontinental Journal of
Archaeology 2(1):131-137.

Stone, L. M.
1974    Fort Michilimackinac, 1715-1781, An Archaeological Perspective
on the Revolutionary Frontier.  Publications of the Museum, Michigan
State University, Anthropological Series, Vol. 2.  East Lansing.