Have you considered broken pipes as paving material for pathways.  Seems
like Noel Hume has mentioned this in one of his books, and I have personally
seen this at the Peyton Randolph site in Williamsburg.  I know this is hard
to address through a "test" but if you can widen your excavation, you may be
able to see a spatial pattern that indicates path rather than sheet refuse.

Linda Derry, Director
Old Cahawba - AHC
719 Tremont St.
Selma, AL 36701 - 5446
ph. 334/875-2529 / email: [log in to unmask]


> -----Original Message-----
> From: HISTORICAL ARCHAEOLOGY [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Tim
> Dinsmore
> Sent: Thursday, April 18, 2002 11:50 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: clay pipe fragments & tavern sites
>
>
> It is commonly assumed that when excavating tavern sites of the colonial
> period one should expect to encounter numerous clay tobacco pipe
> fragments for the obvious reasons.  However, it appears that this is not
> necessarily the case.  A case in point:  a tavern site I located
> recently (occupational date range: 1765-1803) resulted in the recovery
> of approximately 20 white clay tobacco pipe fragments.  Granted, our
> testing has been minimal but in no case have we found more than one pipe
> fragment per 2.5- foot square test unit.  A colleague of mine has found
> similar results at a tavern site partially excavated in Portland,
> Maine.  Have others found this to be true on some tavern sites or is
> this just a fluke?  Conversely, on another 18th century homestead site
> that was occupied for twenty years (1765-1785), we have recovered over
> 12,000+ clay tobacco pipe fragments.  Primary documents indicate that
> the occupants also retailed goods from the home and this may account for
> the unusually large number of pipe fragments.  In one five foot square
> unit we uncovered 498 tobacco pipe fragments!  Ninety five percent of
> the clay pipe bowl fragments do not exhibit burning (no blackened
> interiors), and thus I have concluded that the majority of pipes were
> not smoked when broken.  This would add support to the retail theory in
> that it's likely that a shipment of pipes meant for  retail were damaged
> upon shipment, and discarded about the site as sheet refuse.  Does this
> seem a reasonable explanation to others... that if pipe bowls lack a
> blackened interior then they likely were never smoked?  I suppose it
> depends how many times the pipe was smoked.  If it was smoked only once
> or twice perhaps the interior would not be stained.  Sounds like I need
> to purchase some pipes and pass them out to smokers.
>
> At any rate, I would be very interested to hear other peoples comments
> on tavern sites and the number of pipe fragments found and on whether
> unblackened pipe bowl interiors is a good criteria for determining pipes
> that were never smoked.
>
> Tim Dinsmore
> archaeological consultant
>