Linda,
 
I know you have had this concern for some time because I know we talked
about it ten or fifteen years ago. Fact is, Ed Harris is flat-out wrong.
The vast majority of substantial prehistoric sites in Eastern US are found
in highly uniform alluvial or colluvial deposits upon which many centuries
or milennia of pedogenic processes have been at work. Detecting
depositional episondes is very often impossible...not always, but very
often. When sites lie on relatively flat floodplains, or at the base of a
hill, one can only assume that, in general, older materials will be found
lower than younger materials. Period. You work from that assumption, or
you don't dig 99% of the sites.
 
Many times prehistorians can locate interesting soil discontinuities or
stratigraphic events such as the burial of former topsoils, etc. In those
cases, prehistorians almost always dig stratigraphically. Likewise, when
dealing with cultural strata, such as multiple fills of a pit,
intersetcing burials, etc., prehistorians dig stratigraphically. I know of
zillions of studies of prehistorians peeling apart burial mounds by
reconstructing nearly every aboriginal basketful of dirt placed on them
2500 years before. Likewise, I know of numerous studies of shell-midden
excavations which recreate nearly individual meals from the Archaic
period! Stratigraphic excavation was introduced by prehistorians, from
Richard Ford to Mortimer Wheeler. The notion that prehistoric
archaeologists don't understand stratigraphy is simply bizarre, and wrong.
 
There are bad archaeologists and good ones. Bad ones insist that there is
only one way--THEIR way--to dig a site properly. Good ones make creative,
even ingenius, use of what they have to work with. If you have
stratigraphy, by God, use it. If you don't, go to plan B, which sometimes
(but not always) may be some form of arbitrary-level excavation.
 
Now, I have listened to this "prehistorians can't dig their way out of a
paper bag" crapola for 20 years here in Virginia. It is a complete red
herring, and utterly ridiculous.
 
Dan Mouer
Virginia Commonwealth University
[log in to unmask]
http://saturn.vcu.edu/~dmouer/homepage.htm
 
On Wed, 10 Jun 1998, Linda Derry wrote:
 
> I've been puzzled over a similar issue here in the Southeastern U.S.
> Recently, I sponsored a skills workshop in urban archaeology in Alabama.  We
> had several speakers.  Every skill presented was appreciated with great
> enthusiasm, except one.  We had  Edward Harris  (himself) come and teach us
> about using the "Harris Matrix."  My thought was that this was a useful
> vehicle to help record and understand the complex stratigraphy  we find in
> urban settings.  Unfortunately, most  of the archaeologists
> present seemed unconvinced.  The primary problem appeared not to be his
> presentation, but the fact that most of them opened up sites in arbitrary
> levels.   Since then, I began to realize that I had grown up
> (archaeologically speaking) in  a very different tradition than my
> colleagues.  This horrified me.  We had been talking apples and oranges all
> along .  My
> reality about what lays beneath the soil is completely different than
> theirs.  Suddenly, I was being ridiculed for seeing soil layers that in
> their minds were impossible to see - except in profile.    And, I sincerely
> believed as Dr. Harris so bluntly put it that day that  "if you can't see
> the layers
> as you dig them, you shouldn't be excavating, then should you? "  (got to
> love him!)
>
> So, my question is, what's going on here?   How, widespread is this
> alternative point of view in the U.S.    Dig first, figure it out later in
> the profile.   (I was taught that this was something we Americans
> outgrew).  Or have I led a sheltered life and I'm actually holding the
> alternative view?  ( hey, even the sane person  can begin to question his
> saneness when living in a mental ward.)
>
> Anyway, I'm concerned that regionalization of archaeologists - or
> "inbreeding" between pairs of graduate schools - has created some VERY
> different  excavation approaches  - and the differences are not related to
> research designs but to very different basic understandings  about the very
> nature of the resource.   But we are all pretending the differences don't
> exist.  Anybody have a comment on this.?
>
> Finally,  Let me add that I am very sincere in this posting, so please don't
> abuse me too badly.
>
>
> Linda Derry ([log in to unmask])
> Old Cahawba Archaeological Park
> Alabama Historical Commission
>