Dear Dan, Chris, Caroline and all the other contributors to this thread,
thanks for the feedback - it is much appreciated. 

The shop in question is associated with a mid 19th century prison and is
historically recorded as containing a casting furnace, smith's forge and
tin-plate worker. Labour returns indicate a whole range of goods were
produced, including cast iron and brass items, all manner of wrought
iron goods and tin/copper plate wares.  I assumed, if there were a
wooden floor, that some kind of masonry footing would be required for
the furnace & forge (there is even a reference to a lathe - but its
location is unknown), and that these footings may have extended
laterally to incorporate a 'skirt' at floor level (either mass or
suspended - as in the manner of a common fireplace hearth).  It's good
to know that others have observed/researched these kinds of composite
flooring arrangements.

The 'evidence' for a wooden floor at this site is rathermore the lack of
evidence for any other type of flooring, such as flagstones or
earth/crushed rock - which in my experience leave pretty clear
indications.  In this site (which was only tested in the corner - away
from the casting and forge areas) the only evidence for any sort of
occupation at all was a thin veneer (1-2cm max) of ferrugenised clay
sand draped over a topographically convoluted and poorly
consolidated/compacted construction-related landfill surface - (i.e. the
sort of deposit that you commonly find under wooden floors.  The FeOx
horizon also contained specks of window glass - akin to sweepings grade.
Unfortunately, because the overlying deposits were so fubar (I figure
you all know what that means) and dug with volunteer labour, it was only
recognised in section, so no chance for pattern studies.

Chris, I took a small sample of this material prior to backfilling.  Any
chance of sending it over your way for some microscopy?

Cheers all.

Greg

Greg Jackman
ARCHAEOLOGY MANAGER

Port Arthur Historic Site Management Authority
Port Arthur
Tasmania
Australia  7182

Ph: (03) 62 512 336
Fax: (03) 62 512 322

Visit our new website: www.portarthur.org.au


-----Original Message-----
From: HISTORICAL ARCHAEOLOGY [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
Daniel H. Weiskotten
Sent: Saturday, 6 November 2004 1:45 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: blacksmith floors

At 10:53 AM 11/5/2004 +0000, you wrote:
>        In your discussion I was surprised to see no mention of
hammer-scale.
>This is a mixture of flat flakes of iron oxide shed from the metal as
it
>is heated and cooled, and spherical particles formed by  the
>solidification during flight of the spray of molten iron oxide (plus
>flux if used) formed when the work piece is struck by the hammer.

Yes, I noticed that too.  I recall asking around about what kind of
analysis could be conducted on the debris, which was really massed into
a
solid block and almost impossible to break free.  It was suggested that
I
have some metalurgical and microscopic analysis done to determine what
kinds of metals, and if there were scale, filings, flakes, cut-offs,
etc.  "Unfortunately" this excellent site was avoided by NYSDOT and no
further work or analysis was done, and it was therefore not recommended
in
the report.

         Dan W.