Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society, Vol. 16, No. 4 Massachusetts Archaeological Society
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Bridgewater State University Virtual Commons - Bridgewater State University Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Journals and Campus Publications Society 7-1955 Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society, Vol. 16, No. 4 Massachusetts Archaeological Society Follow this and additional works at: http://vc.bridgew.edu/bmas Part of the Archaeological Anthropology Commons Copyright © 1955 Massachusetts Archaeological Society This item is available as part of Virtual Commons, the open-access institutional repository of Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, Massachusetts. BULLmN OF THE MASSACRUSETTS ARCI-IAEOL061CAL SOCIETY VOL. XVI NO. 4 JULY, 1955 SWEETS KNOI...I. 61 MAURICE ROBBINS, .AJrimJB AND AaNOLD STAPLES TWO BURIALS ON TIlE SLOCUM RIVER 77 DoUGLAS S. BYBlIS PUBUSHED BY THE MASSACHUSmS ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY, INC. MAURICE ROBBJNS, Editor, 23 Steere Street, Attleboro. Mass. WILLIAM S. FOWJ.BR, Secretary, Bl'ODSOD Museum, 8 No. Main Street, Attleboro This journal and its contents may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, re-distribution, re-selling,loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. ©2010 Massachusetts Archaeological Society. SWEET'S KNOLL By MAURICE ROBBINS, ARTHUR AND ARNOLD STAPLES The Taunton River rises in Lake Nippenicket Delabarre carried out a series of excavations on in Bridgewater, Massachusetts, and, after leaving Grassy Island, the results of which were published Bridgewater, Hows in a general southerly direction in American Anthropologist. The majority of the in its journey to the sea at Narragansett Bay. The material found by Delabarre is now in the collec drainage basin of this river, which is fairly extens tion of Mr. Rudolph Haffenraffer of Bristol, Rhode ive, (some 300 square miles) is one of low relief, Island. This collection was studied by Johnson and few hills rising more than one hundred feet above this study forms a part of his report to which we the plain. To the north, a complex chain of hills will refer later in this paper. and ridges separates this river system from the Dighton Rock, which is also situated near the North and Neponset river systems. eastern shore of the river, is a nationally known The wide valley of the Taunton River is low in monument and has been described in numerous gradiation, and the river, particularly in the Berk papers and newspaper accounts. Perhaps the most ley-Dighton region, is bordered by numerous exhaustive and accurate discussion of this famous swamps and marshes from which small, spring-fed rock is that written and published by Dr. Dela brooks How into the river. Between these lowland barre3 to which the reader is referred for further areas the surface often rises abruptly to form knoll information on this subject. like hills, the slopes of which offer excellent, though restricted, camp sites. Most of these eleva On the western or Dighton shore of the river, tions show indications of former occupation. just north of Cobb's Wharf is an Indian site known to local collectors as "The Boats", from the presence The head of the tide in the Taunton River is at of several old hulks which have been drawn up on present some twenty-five miles from its mouth, the shore at this point. The surface of this site today well above the Berkley-Dighton region. Terraces is but a few feet above mean water in the river. are a prominent feature of the landscape along the This may be another of those sites abandoned by lower river; one reaches an elevation of about ten its occupants several centuries ago when a rising feet above mean water and is readily noticeable water level made the river-bank sites undesirable. along the eastern shore in Dighton. Several Indian Extensive cultivation makes impossible a thorough sites are located on this terrace. investigation of this ancient site. However, Mr. The specific area of interest in this paper lies Edward F. Rose, formerly of Dighton, carried out just south of the Berkley Bridge, upon which a small test at this site in 1952.4 The data reported Center street crosses the river. Approximately a by Rose together with the artifacts found by many mile and a quarter below this bridge the river surface collectors have been examined by the widens to form a sort of bay which is nearly two writers and seem to indicate a respectable antiquity thousand feet in width from Dighton to Assonet. comparable to that of sites which have been called In this bay are two important sites, Grassy Island, archaic. reported by Delabarre in 1925 and again in 1928,1 Further back from the river and on a terrace and by Johnson and Raup in 1947,2 and Dighton which rises to about nine feet above the present Rock, known historically as a "writing rock" since water level are a number of additional Indian sites. the eighteenth century, and the subject of an These are indicated at 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, on Map No. 1. exhaustive paper by Delabarre in 1928.3 Johnson From these sites collectors have recovered most of and Raup have shown that Grassy Island, which the stone types known to southern New England lies near the eastern or Assonet shore of the river, archaeology; historic types of clay pottery and was once a part of the mainland, and that it was trade goods mark most of these sites as existing into occupied by Indians at a time when the mean water late historic times. level in the river was somewhat lower than at pres ent. By means of an elaborate study in which they Approximately one half mile south of the junc explored the geological and botanical aspects of the tion of Somerset avenue (Route No. 138) and problem as well as its archaeological aspects, they Center street in Dighton, a narrow dirt road or came to the conclusion that a rising water level cart path leaves the main road on one's left (east) forced the abandonment of the site before 1200 and leads across the tracks of the New York, New A.D. Prior to the work of Johnson and Raup, Haven, and Hartford Railway to a cultivated area. 61 PROfilE THROUGH SWEET'S KNOll ALONG LINE A_ A' B-e' _ ~EE T'S_KN~l G,A·10' ..L LOW LAND A ----- RIVER /tI/ ------{\ GRASSV ~ ISLANO Q OIOH TON ROCK N. ~ e ~ ~ MAP OF AREA ADJACENT TO o SWEET'S KNOll. ~ 500VOS. en SCALE ~ W W ~ TAUNTON RIVER en :..tl~.--lI_ III j. -"I I' _ '.111', I~__------------------! !!'L~ _.\11'_ IL .'. r "fHE BOATS" 2. : III - I I _.Ill ...lli._ ~::..----~----=.:~- ~ ----~ / GOUN Ty ST. " II II" I'" ~Q~ /!, " ,'I' !/ ~ Map No.1 SWEET'S KNOLL The road terminates at the base of a rather heavily with those from other sites to which a space in time forested hill which rises abruptly between the river has been assigned. and the cultivated area. To one's right (south) a The vertical occupation at Sweet's Knoll is gentler slope leads to the lesser of two knolls which confined to a rather narrow band of soil. As it is are known collectively as Sweet's Knoll. Upon the situated upon an elevation subject to considerable nearer of these twin knolls is located the site erosion in some spots the overburden of loam tends described in the following pages. (Map 1.) to be unevenly distributed. The slopes are subject This smaller knoll attains an elevation of to the greater amount of wash and are consequently approximately thirty feet above mean water in the less heavily mantled than the more level areas river. Although its landward slope is gradual, pro toward the western and northern sections of the viding sufficient level area to induce occupation, site. An average depth of about sixteen centimeters the river slope is quite abrupt. Between the knoll of loam was present throughout the excavated area and its larger twin to the south is a narrow marshy although there is a recorded variation from ten strip through which a small and unnamed brook centimeters on the slopes to twenty-eight centi flows into the river. From the top of the knoll one meters in one or more squares. However, as only has an excellent view of the river and the bay to seven artifacts are recorded as having come from the south, and to the east across the river to the the loam, its relative thickness is of little importance highlands of Berkley and Assonet which were to this study. About forty per cent of a total of heavily occupied in Indian times. two hundred artifacts recovered at Sweet's Knoll were found resting upon the top of the sub-soil at Possibly because of its limited area this knoll the base of the loam; the balance being distributed seems to have escaped the usual surface disturbance throughout the succeeding twenty-eight centi due to ploughing, although there probably has been meters of soil, with a tendency to concentrate in the a considerable amount of erosion, particularly on upper ten centimeters of sub-soil. The compression its more abrupt slopes. On the north the removal of of traits into this relatively thin hori;lOn makes it sand and gravel in recent times has encroached difficult to establish stratigraphic horizons. How somewhat upon the area occupied by the Indians. ever, we shall attempt to accomplish this result, An area of twenty by twenty-four meters was through careful attention to detail. staked out in two meter squares and examined in detail to a depth· of somewhat less than a meter. Chart No.