Not to muddy the waters--but....
 
Let's not forget that it was another famous Virginian (not to detract from
Marley and Dan) Thomas Jefferson who deserves our approbation for the
earliest stratigraphic excavations in America. In fact, and this is not yet
well known, recently discovered correspondence suggests that Jefferson
actually devised a stratigraphic recording system remarkably similar to the
Harris matrix. A series of letters between Jefferson and Kentucky's own
Daniel Boone (Kentucky Historical Society, Record Group #12) contain
sketches of what appears to be Jefferson's system for recording strata
within his mound excavations at Monticello (my apologies to the folks at
Monticello for releasing this before the press conference). Unfortunately,
the significance of the numbered matrix was lost on Boone, who assumed it
was just another of Jefferson's classically derived plans for frontier
towns. Not surprisingly, the Jefferson matrix bears a stricking resemblance
to the plan of the recently excavated town of Boonesboro (O'Malley 1993).
 
Had Boone not misplaced the letters during one of his quiet moves west to
avoid creditors, the entire history of stratigraphic excavation and
recording might have been altered. What is curious, however, is that the
papers appear to have made their way to England, and later to Bermuda, in
the possession of one Tanya Rose Boone in the mid-19th century. But that's
another story....
 
Have a great weekend!!
Don Linebaugh
 
 
 
At 05:55 PM 6/11/98 EDT, you wrote:
>Geoff carver wrote: problem here in germany (and possibly elsewhere in
europe)
>is that too many people are still excavating things like medieval town
centres
>using arbitrary levels!!! they don't know about stratigraphic methods because
>they only know what their professors told them, and the professors only know
>about profiles and  plans a la Mortimer Wheeler
>  >>
>Well they clearly only looked at the pickies and didn't read Wheeler as
>despite all his faults he (and the usually forgotten first Mrs Wheeler) and
>the underated Kathleen Kenyon developed modern stratigraphic excavation as we
>know it. The basic principles were established by the 1940s. However, modern
>urban archaeology was an indirect German invention- as Grimes, Noel Hume and
>Oswald developed it on London bomb sites- so they should no better (Actually
>I'm normally a good European but it is the World Cup- that's football my
>American friends).
>paul courtney, Leicester, Uk
>
>
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Don Linebaugh                           tel:(606) 257-1944
University of Kentucky                  fax:(606) 323-1968
Program for Cultural Resource Assessment
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