A Cognitive Historical Model for American Material Culture: 1620-1835 Author(s): James Deetz and Richard L. Bushman Source: Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research. Supplementary Studies, No. 20, Reconstructing Complex Societies: An Archaeological Colloquium (1974), pp. 21-27 Published by: The American Schools of Oriental Research Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20066624 Accessed: 15-08-2017 04:06 UTC

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Chapter II complex societies to raise this point and to illustrate it with a society which fits this de scription. I might point out that it is an em pire, the British, but that it is also a frontier; and it is certain that the material culture of a A Cognitive Historical Model frontier society differs at least in the form of for American Material archaeological remains from that of the parent culture which gave it birth. Culture : 1620-1835 My insights are based on the work of Henry Glassie, a Folklorist trained at the University of Indiana, with a strong cultural, geographical, and structural anthropology background (e.g. James Deetz 1969). Basically, the model here is one which considers certain aspects of general culture in space and time. It is a formulation of what happened in Plimoth particularly between I should like to present briefly some rather 1635, when our documentary data begins and exciting developments in our project in histor our archaeology effectively starts, and ca. ical archaeology primarily in the old Plimoth 1835. The description of this period was first read at a conference at Winterthur in Dela Colony area, where we have been working pe ware in 1972. riodically for about 10 years. And what I would like to attempt here is the development While it is quite possible that every English of what might be thought of as an explana colony established during the 1st half of the tory model which uses material culture to in 17th century would have passed through dicate and reflect the non-material dimensions broadly similar changes in the cultural systems of human behavior, by emphasizing my con involved, this model here applies only to New cern with the cognitive dimension of culture. England, Massachusetts Bay, and the Plimoth I realize this borders perilously on paleopsy colonies. And it argues for three sequential chology, and it might be argued as impossible, cultural types or configurations, one follow particularly in data which are not accompa ing the other and each somewhat different nied by written or historical materials. How from the other. The initial system in Massa ever, ours is, and therefore we can formulate chusetts was that brought to the New World such things. I offer it not so much as a great by Englishmen, and it most closely conformed hope, but rather as a caveat that maybe there to that which they practiced in their former are things in our data which we are not aware homes. Since the population of early Massa of if, for no other reason, than because we do chusetts, particularly Plimoth, was not repre not have the kinds of control which enable us sentative of contemporary English society in to see them. its entirety, their culture was also not totally I would suppose that there is a cognitive representative. The life ways which were dimension even in the simplest of societies, transported to New England in the early 17th which has some effect, however small, on the century were basically those of the less pros way their material assemblages manifest them perous steward, yeoman, and husbandman. selves either to the ethnographer or archaeol Deeply rooted in an earlier medieval tradition, ogist. But I think in most instances at the the culture of the Puritan separatist colonist somewhat more simple end of the cultural was conservative, potentially self-sufficient, complexity scale (in terms of socio-economics) and heavily shaped by religious attitude. Once this tended to become buried in more impera established in the New World, this system un tive aspects of culture. Subsistence being fair derwent minor modification as a result of a ly urgent, there is not that number of alterna somewhat different environment, but it con tives available to a culture for it to employ tinued relatively unchanged for a generation. one or another. Thus, if in fact this is even This period I would date ca. 1620 - 1660. partly so, one could suggest that the cognitive The Puritan Revolution led to a dramatic dimension of material culture assemblages reduction in immigration during the 1640's, may become more visible, more explicit, and creating depressed economic conditions, a may tend to surface to a greater degree as one shortage of imported goods, and a cultural moves up the scale of complexity. Therefore, isolation which led to a slow but steady diver I think it is appropriate in a colloquium on gence from the earlier yeoman life ways. This

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divergence was reinforced by the increased larly away from the cities. And only then did presence of individuals who had been born in the regional boundaries begin to dissolve and the New World. From this semi-isolated so the overall rate of cultural change begin to ac ciety, a distinctive Anglo-American culture celerate. Since the immediate origin of this emerged; one probably less English than be new popular culture was England, as society fore, and less than it would become by the felt its effects it became re-Anglicized. There eve of the American Revolution. This second fore the vector of cultural change in New Eng cultural system, ca. 1660-1760, was a typical land can be thought of as a broad sweeping folk culture marked by strong conservatism, arc diverging from its English parent in the resistance to change, and regional variation. early 17th century and curving back to unite So strong was the conservative nature of this with it under the influence of new life styles early folk culture that it continued relatively appearing in the mid-18th century and be unchanged in the more isolated rural areas of yond. By the turn of the 19th century even New England until well past the middle of the the most remote areas of New England were 18th century. in this new cultural system which extended The impact of the Renaissance in the form unbroken over all of Anglo-America. In of the Georgian tradition was felt at different archaeological terms, this period can be viewed times in 18th century colonial America; earlier as the first true horizon in American history. in the metropolitan centers - ca. 1700; later in Now then, that is essentially the model, in the deep countryside - ca. 1760. And while rather brief terms. The questions remain: is buildings in the Georgian style began about this model to be found in the data? Is there the turn of the century in the more elite sec any kind of fit with the data? Can any mani tors of the society, for the purposes of the festation of this model be picked up in the model in question the key element is that various material culture categories with which time when those cultural changes which the we, as archaeologists, function? I would sug term "Georgian" denotes have an effect on gest an affirmative answer, and I will confine the majority of society. Henry Glassie has my comments to three categories: ceramics, argued that "Georgian" is far more than a sty gravestones, and architecture, to demonstrate listic category. Indeed, it can even apply to a how this model can be seen to fit and does re distinctive Anglo-American mind set, charac flect these changes in these areas of material terized by symmetrical cognitive structures, culture. homogeneity in the material culture, a pro From 1631 on, probate inventories (record gressive and innovative world view, and an in ing everything in everyone's house and often sistence on order and balance that permeates prices and in what room objects were found) all aspects of life from the decorative arts to combined with archaeology are helpful in the the organization of space by society. Glassie analysis of the ceramics. There are very few has demonstrated elegantly how this particu in number and type from the first period; so lar cognitive system can affect everything few that when we dug the first site which was from farm layout to carved chests. In these representative of this period, we thought we aspects, it contrasts sharply with the earlier had missed the site entirely. The historical medieval tradition. As opposed to the 18th records indicate that at this particular time century, I would suggest here that the yeoman and in this particular class, ceramics played an and husbandman culture of New England in exceedingly minor role, being related primari the 17th century was far more medieval than ly to dairying activities. They simply were it was anything else. By the term "medieval" not involved that much in food preparation I mean a culture that was far more heteroge or food consumption. neous and assymetrical in its cognitive aspects In the second period, in sites which we have and conservative outlook. Another way of excavated and also from the probate inven viewing it would be as an organic vs. mechani tories, ceramics tend to increase radically. cal system. They diversify in numbers and forms, and The impact of the Georgian world view on large numbers of rather fine imported types the older medieval-derived New England folk appear in the area for the first time. They culture led to a third cultural system, which seem to have occupied a larger position in the can be viewed as the first popular culture to total, what we call, food ways pattern of the appear in America. Only by the latter half of culture. However, they were not doing it the the 18th century did this new popular culture same way they were in England. In England affect the majority of the population, particu individual plates were already beginning to be

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used as well as individualizing drinking con Two trash pits yielded 28 chamber pots, yet tainers. On the other hand, in New England there was a total of 4 chamber pots from 5 the comparative rarity and elegance of the farms in the 17th century. Clearly this is a plates indicate that they were used in what difference, but what does it mean? Lewis Binford would call a socio-technical Glassie's argument that the Georgian mind function exclusively. They were hung on the set was marked by bilateral symmetry which wall for decorative purposes; they were not can be seen in e.g. architecture, furniture dec used for eating. They were a kind of poor oration, gravestone design, and farm layout is man's pewter and pewter was a kind of middle an excellent example of anthropological struc class man's silver. tural analysis of American cultural materials. There was a surge of undecorated types j The structure which he posits for the Georgian through the 1640's and into the 1650's, an derived cognitive system stems from the con occurrence which, following Ivor No?l-Hume, | cept of an ordered universe, which in turn is just might relate to the Puritan attitude to an attribute of the new scientific natural phi ward decorative elaboration. We know they losophy of the 18th century. A reasonable passed laws in Massachusetts Bay establishing suggestion might be that such a world view what one could wear and how short one's hair could lead to a greater concern for an ordered had to be cut. Even though there was no leg fit between man and the physical world of his islation regulating what kind of plates one had, making. Thus they altered the medieval there may have been a certain set of attitudes asymetrical relationship between individuals generated on behalf of the population which and their material culture. A new, one man, would lead them to bring in essentially plain one plate, one chamber pot relationship may undecorated forms. However, we must keep have been operative. And indeed, it was one in mind that plain forms were being made in in which not only were the members of a so England at that time, and that certainly had cial group rigorously accomodated by their an effect. artifacts, but in matched sets. Basically, in this second period, we see One could raise the question of how many greater diversity in ceramics used differently people there were involved, but I don't think From the way they were being used in England. that is a valid consideration since this is not an But still, according to Glassie's model and the issue of ecology or adaptation but one of cog one I have developed from it in a randomized, nitive differences - partly due to man's urban non-structured way, the food was not con made rationality. Therefore, I think it raises sumed from individual pieces; communal con certain concerns about the use of certain bod tainers seemed to be the rule. This is seen not ies of data for things such as population esti only in the inventories, but again is explained mates. by the archaeological assemblages that we One also might say that the people were have recovered from farm sites through this too poor to afford these things. It is very com period. Thus it seems to fit the suggestion mon to find a man with 50-100 acres of culti that we are still dealing with the medieval cog vation who didn't even own a bedstead. And nitive map here, but that the manner in which this, of course, pertains to the way the culture the ceramics are being used in New England weights value. The source of supply was at differs from that of old. hand in nearby Boston, and we know that We excavated a series of trash pits which some people were obtaining it. In Plimoth are very tightly dated to the third period, one finds that a merchant who was poorer from ca. 1760 on. The ceramic inventory was than a yeoman farmer might have had much radically different from anything that had more matched, structured material culture sets come before. The most striking contrast seen than the yeoman farmer. The farmer still had in this later assemblage when compared to the his mind made up according to the older, earlier one, is the preponderance of plates and medieval ancestry, and the merchant was more chamber pots. Not only were plates more cosmopolitan and a part of a different social common, but for the first time they belonged class. to matched sets. Matched sets had been pro Gravestones fit this model beautifully. The duced in England for about 100 years before, earliest ones, up to ca. 1660, are not decorated but they did not appear in the New World un at all, but they are very competently executed. til about 1760. More puzzling of course is the It makes sense if one takes into consideration large number of chamber pots, which consti a pure Puritan aversion to decoration. From tute the most common shape in the collection. j ca. 1660 to 1760 there is a bewildering region

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al diversification of strange inexplicable forms. dislikes it, or who assigns a historian to com And then ca. 1760 suddenly there is a profu ment upon it. Here is James Deetz who is so sion of cherubs with a much greater effort to brash that he comes onto our very own turf copy other carvers in a very slavish way, where and tells us what is happening. Yet surely he is as earlier there is a freedom of creativity. inviting that toughening-up process. Even the symbolism is relevant here, in that Let us assume that everything says about the cherub is far more fitting with a Renais Plimoth is true, and, furthermore, that it is sance-derived tradition while the death's head true for even larger segments of colonial soci and its derivatives better fit the medieval pat ety than Plimoth. What would a historian do tern. with this discovery? How useful is it and how Third, in architecture, the best example of does it fit into ordinary historical work? Let the earliest houses is the Fairbanks House in me illustrate what I mean by showing how Dedham. It is a medieval, lopsided building Deetz's discovery fits into two explanatory with curved wind braces and wings sticking schemes of the 18th century with which I've out in every direction. But by about 1660, a been working. regional diversification in architecture began The first is a complex and comprehensive in this country which does not compare to modernization theory. As applied to the 18th anything in contemporary England. This con century, it tries to explain not only the social tinued again through the relevant period. The background of revolution, but also a variety of Cape Cod salt box with central chimney, sur other things such as the first major widespread viving clear into the early 19th century, is a religious revival in America, the Great Awak very nice example of just this pattern. But ening. This theory places the 18th century col the Georgian house style is one which is radi onies in a very delicate spot in the course of cally different and exhibits the same horizon modernization: in that moment just prior to tal tendencies. industrialization. The rural agrarian, small vil As Glassie has pointed out (personal com lage pattern is breaking up, and the new indus munication), when one walks into a pre-Geor trial organizations have not yet taken shape. gian medieval-derived house, one walks right Cities are forming here and there, but no fac into the middle of the whole seething range of tory towns and only modest industrial devel activities from childbearing to cooking, home opments of any sort. This is roughly the point craft, and sleeping, all happening in one hall. at which a good many of the revolutions of the When one walks into the door of a Georgian modern world have taken place, e.g., in England house, one sees doors. And when one walks before 1640, America before 1776, and France, through those doors, one is very likely to see Russia, and China at similar points in their his even more doors before getting to the final tories. It is a fragile moment in the history of a activity that is going on. This again is bilater society's growth. ality of the Georgian plan, this ordered, logical In America the indices of that state of society symmetry which seems to have come in at this are first, accelerated population growth. The time and is not evident in the earlier period. curve breaks at about 1710 and then speeds up People would even gingerbread their older ward, leading to crowding in the settled areas. houses to make them look stylish on the out This in turn leads to movement ? both into cities side, although they could not remodel totally. and out to the frontiers. Subsequently unaccus Thus it appears that the concern about privacy tomed tensions develop within older towns, not and individuality reflected in the architectural just with people who leave but with those remain form of a Georgian house may in fact be def ing who are unable to cope with the differences initely related to ceramic diversification and which the new form of life has thrust upon gravestone formality. The evidence suggests them. Infighting and various kinds of internal that these things fit together in a recognizable disruptions occur. Finally, for the purposes of form and pattern. this purely illustrative list, the first signs of commercialization appear ? a greater balance COMMENTS ON PROF. DEETZ'S PAPER of products for the market, less for subsistence. Farm prosperity depends upon a national or Richard L. Bushman a larger market, no longer upon local or cli matological factors alone. In the American col There comes a time in the life of every great onies market involvement takes the form of a idea when it ought to be torn apart, when there great interest in paper money issues and a should be someone who doubts it or thoroughly striking increase of debt in all classes. People

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get tied into the commercial network. The re similate it into their own life styles. The pre sult of all the changes is a disintegration of tra vious folk culture was glacially slow to change. ditional society. The change is most apparent \ In a recent study made of vernacular architecture in the break-up of the village institutions and in Marblehead, Massachusetts, the remaining the loss of support for personal identity. People 400 of the 600 houses built before 1820 were are less likely to follow an orderly pattern from analyzed. The striking finding was the persistence birth to death. of folk patterns amidst all the alterations in ar In this general explanatory theory, it is pos chitecture fashion. Deetz says that when a folk sible to understand a number of things, among culture gives way to an imitative culture some them Deetz's idea about the need for order. It thing important is happening. People look not seems likely that if this is indeed happening in only to their parents and to village precedents, 18th century society, there would be some con but outside and beyond the village, necessarily scious effort for people to construct forms that introducing a measure of cosmopolitanism into would reassure them of their place in the world; their lives. To understand all this, a simple im order and balance are precisely what they would itation model is insufficient. be seeking when the old sources are no longer The question is, of course, what happens to available. That would be true of house plans, people in the 18th century that they are able matched dinner sets, and all the other things to perceive a Georgian style and to perceive that which seem to go along with this style of life. the style would be desirable for them and ac They provide an external pattern to meet an ceptable for the ordering of their lives. Similar internal need. occurences take place in England in the same This explanation is appealing because it is era. Wedgewood, the first mass produced china comprehensive in two ways: for a large middle class market, appeared for 1) It ties together many things within the the first time in 18th century England. It just society, including personality; it pro may be that certain forms or cultural changes vides an explanatory scheme of the are first disclosed in the material culture. Ob proper magnitude to explore all things jects measure phenomena that words miss. In that happen, not only change in cogni short, we have much to learn from those tive style but also in the outburst of a chamber pots. certain kind of ideology, religious re DISCUSSION vivals, and so on. 2) It also seems to reach across societies Prof. John Demos of Brandeis commented through time and space to include upon the general question of collaboration be those that have entered the modern tween historians, people who work with some world under our inspection in the last kind of written records, and the archaeolo 200 years. gists. Various tributes to such practice have On the other hand one becomes uneasy with been offered during the colloquium. He was this kind of explanation simply because it is so struck by the contrast between many of the comprehensive. One has the same anxieties that speakers, particularly the archaeologists who one gets about psychoanalytic models. Further were talking about the move to cooperate more, the experiential lines do run through with the ethnohistorians, and others who psychic processes, and it is very hard to follow doubted the procedures. For Demos, the type such a casual chain. Consequently, I have been of contact which occurs now with Deetz and drawn back in recent years to more localized a few other American historical archaeologists and modest explanations. In the case at hand, is entirely new and much more informative. for example, Deetz's discovery could simply Deetz's comments have to do with a set of be a form of imitation. It could be conventional very primitive reactions to the possibilities diffusion very much like the commonplace that lie inherent in this kind of work, particu emulation in our society today. The lower larly from the point of view of American his classes watch the upper classes and try to fol tory. One of the most striking things that low them. Thus the Georgian style sifts down comes out of his model is the periodization and spreads. According to Deetz, however, that he selected. Basically, the two dates that this explanation is insufficient. He suggests emerge again and again are 1660 and 1760. that this is not only a form of copying but per For generations now in American colonial his haps the first instance of it. It is the kind of tory courses there has been a traditional divi emulation characteristic of ambitious, striving sion of subject matter: from 1600 - 1660 people who perceive a higher culture and as which is usually called the settlement process,

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then from 1660 - 1760 which is called the de- I mains; and one does become aware at a cer velopment of provincial culture, and finally tain point that they represent a fairly narrow the revolutionary period which is usually taken slice of life. There is a very democratic ele to begin at about the year 1760. There ap ment of leveling to Deetz's trash pits, which is pears to be a surface fit which is very in a very salutary thing. triguing even from the standpoint of the most Parenthetically, Demos was intrigued by the traditional colonial historian. The really in allusions to the use of written records in some teresting questions would arise when one tried of the papers of South and Central America. to work out the dynamic relations between He thought that the references were mainly to this material culture analysis and a more con- i travelers' records which bore on the life of the ventional political or social history of the pe native populations. He was impressed by the riod. Some of the most recent work concern fact that American historians are trying to get ing the background to the revolution has taken away from that type of evidence. For instance the line that, somewhere embedded in the travelers' accounts of Indian life in New Eng buildup to the revolution, there was a kind of land have a very low status among historians. "re-anglicazation" of the American political He wondered whether the Latin American rec and social culture. This reverses much of ear ords were different. lier historical wisdom on the colonial period Eva Hunt answered Demos' question about and the revolution: that the revolution occur the sources used in American early history. red as a result of the colonies gradually be Travelers' accounts are not used now. In the coming more and different from England. classical work, up until about 20 years ago, The point now seems to be to the contrary: people read the same primary sources that that the country was becoming more and were published in the 16th, 17th, or 19th cen more like England, and this in turn, in com turies, written by colonial officers, by rectors plex ways is essential to our understanding of of monasteries, or by travelers. People, as why the revolution happened when it did. they moved around the countryside, picked Deetz's ceramic analysis, for instance, would up a little data here and there, and then they appear to fit in below the surface. wrote their life accounts from which emerged Another aspect of this kind of work is of j scenes of different cultures and different peri particular interest to American colonial histo ods. They are not very trustworthy, and un rians: it has brought in, particularly with fortunately a lot of interpretation was found some of Deetz's gravestone work, a dimension I ed upon early colonial primary sources which of regional contacts which is perhaps the most are to some extent quite dubious. One prob neglected sphere of historical inquiry so far. lem was that 16th century Spanish was very If one could summarize the early spheres of difficult to read, so that the published versions colonial life, one might have at the highest lev were used, particularly since they were readily available in the libraries in the United States. el the imperial system, next the individual col ony, and at the lowest level, the local town Now ethnohistorians are working with manu community. The levels of the empire and the script materials which have never been used colony have been widely investigated in the before, such as court cases from villages where early historiography of the period. Perhaps in the local Spanish authority, not literate the last 10 years the most vigorous line of re enough to write his own interpretation, called search activity has concerned the village or the in Indian witnesses. Thus there is page after town. Now a number of historians are begin page of 10 different witnesses relating in de ning to feel that there is a kind of intermedi tail their own versions of what had happened ate group. The villages were clustered and in their own society, in their own cultural tra were not self-sufficient in any means or in any dition, and sometimes quoting extensively line of activity. With respect to Deetz's work from old traditions which were pre-hispanic in with gravestones: the exchange of styles and origin. working techniques between villages in certain Bernard Wailes of the University of Penn areas can be very suggestive for wider patterns sylvania added that he had found in Deetz's of contact. These finds also are going to en model an absolutely classic migration-diffu able one to get quite close to the lives of the aver sion form. He said that diffusion does exist, age people. When we talk about early America however much some dislike it, in prehistory. we are talking about a culture which is high Having presented an example of forceful long ly literate at least at the level of the elite. range diffusion, he asked Deetz to comment One is almost overwhelmed by the written re upon which end of the line he thought change

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was primarily generated. For example, in and actually received a reply from a lady, at terms of exported pottery from Britain, did one point, who said she wanted the very new exports generate a market simply because peo est of current styles. He did not want to com ple wanted to buy the latest thing, or was it ment further or form definite conclusions about possibly the other way round, where the so the problem until more data was analyzed. cial situation in New England was demanding something that prompted export trade to Thomas Charlton pointed out, in relation meet the demand? to the aspect of cognitive systems that in 1961 Dr. Deetz replied that until ca. 1760 mer Fischer published an article dealing with art chandise was coming into the ports, Boston styles as cultural cognitive maps. On the basis being the main port of entry, and was probab of ethnographic studies using human relation ly being absorbed differentially, depending up area files and a codification of two dimension on where the particular absorber sat on the al art styles it was possible to demonstrate sta socio-economic scale. Perception of the mer tistically significant correlations between for chant of what he could or could not sell af mal features of art styles and such aspects as fected how much he ordered. The striking egalitarian and hierarchical societies. This falls thing is that the shape inventory in the colo into the cognitive system in as much as the art nies is not like that in contemporary England. ist is the mediator, is the one who is viewing Later the market was very style conscious. In the society, and essentially is making the art fact Wedgewood wrote letters to Americans, as a model in that society.

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