62 Ontario Archaeology No. 77/78, 2004 Recreating Home? A Consideration of Refugees, Microstyles and Frilled Pottery in Huronia Alicia L. Hawkins This paper revisits explanations for the presence of large quantities of frilled pottery at certain seventeenth century Wendat sites. It considers the ways in which the traditional Wenro refugee explanations are prob- lematic. An analysis of decorative microstyles is outlined, with the goal of determining whether pots from BeGx-25 (identified in the literature as Ossossané village), both with and without frills, were decorated by the same potters. The relationship between forced migration and material culture is examined and a sec- ond explanation for the presence of frilled pottery is offered. The results of this analysis are considered in light of what is known of how contemporary refugees manipulate material culture. Introduction (Trigger 2001). Whether the pottery was pro- duced by Wenro refugees or not, the appearance One of the themes in contact-period Wendat of a large quantity of pottery with unusual deco- archaeology has been the identification of villages ration holds potential for more detailed under- and missions documented in the Jesuit Relations standing of the dynamics of Wendat society in (for a review of such work see Latta 1985). In the early to mid-seventeenth century. This paper western Huronia, the work of Kidd (1953) and outlines analysis aimed at determining if the dec- Ridley (1947) served to identify a village referred orators of typical Wendat pottery were also the to as Ossossané, occupied from 1623 to 1634, decorators of unusual, frilled pottery, and and the associated 1636 ossuary. It should be explores why new styles may have been intro- noted, however, that Sagard and Le Caron refer duced and adopted. to the village of this period as Quieuindahian (Trigger 1976). While Latta (1985) argues that Background identification of Jesuit missions associated with different Wendat tribes can be a useful archaeo- The Wenro migration question is outlined in logical tool for interpretation and study of earli- detail elsewhere (Hawkins 1992, 2001), and will er material culture, some other archaeologists be briefly discussed. According to the Jesuit have used identification of sites and their traits Relations (Thwaites 1896-1901:15:159, 17:25- mainly as confirmation of the historical record. 29), a group of over 600 refugees migrated to An example of such work is Ridley’s (1964) iden- Huronia in 1639, having negotiated the move in tification of the Ossossané village(s) and the link advance. The group arrived first at Ossossané he made between frilled pottery from that site and included many people who were ill and from the Edwards site (BeGx-27) with (Thwaites 1896-1901:17:25-29). Interpretations Wenro refugees (Ridley 1973). Archaeologists of the Jesuit Relations and archaeological remains tend to accept the latter hypothesis (Garrad and have led researchers to place the Wenro home- Steckley 1998; Hawkins 1992; Jackson and land in the Niagara frontier and other locations Merritt 2007; MacDonald 1991), but it does not in New York state (Bradley 1987; Niemczycki account for all of the evidence (Hawkins 1984; White 1961,1978) (Figure 1). 2001:32-33). Furthermore, in the time since In 1973, Frank Ridley published a description Ridley’s publication, contact period studies of the of material recovered from the Edwards site and Wendat have moved from confirmation of histo- from BeGx-25, the site that he identified as the ry as understood from documentary sources to Ossossané village of 1623-34. These sites both interpretation and explication of the past contain high proportions of pottery with basal Hawkins Refugees, Microstyles and Frilled Pottery in Huronia 63 Figure 1. Map showing possible Wenro homeland locations based on interpretation of historical documents. collar modification (hereafter referred to as (not Bordenized) and chemical analysis of mate- “frilled pottery,” although notched, frilled and rial from BeGx-25 and Leonard (Figure 1). All of nocked pots are all referred to using this term) these collections, even the ones with few frilled and pottery with decorative rim motifs different pots, show considerable variability in the decora- from others common to contemporary sites in tion of the upper rim; these include the method Huronia. Ridley suggested Wenro migrants pro- of fashioning the frill as well as the nature and duced the frilled pottery, which occurs in high application of upper rim decoration. These rim- proportions. Although not explicitly stated, he focused analyses did not entail examining the assumed that pottery decoration reflected the pots for potentially informative differences in ethnic identity of the potters. He believed that paste composition, vessel size, vessel shape, body the Wenro came from somewhere near the decoration or function. The results suggest pro- Seneca (Ridley 1973). duction by more than one individual and/or Following up on Ridley’s work, I conducted experimentation with frilling as decoration. The stylistic analyses of material from a number of compositional analysis indicates that frilled pots Wendat sites: Leonard (BeGx-22), Ellery (BdGx- and those with more typical decoration do not 8), BeGx-25, Charity (BeHb-4), and Orr Lake differ chemically (Hawkins 2001:28-32). Pottery 64 Ontario Archaeology No. 77/78, 2004 from the Genoa Fort site in New York State, put forward his Wenro refugee hypothesis. however, has a different chemical signature than Frilled pottery accounts for 18 percent of the that from Ontario (Hawkins 2001:28-32). I sherds in the assemblage, while high collared interpret this to indicate that the frilled pottery sherds make up another five percent. This is a was made from the same local clays as pots deco- conservative estimate of the proportion of frilled rated in more typical fashions. sherds because children’s pots and castellations Production of pottery locally in Huronia by a were included when making the calculation. number of individuals appears consistent with However, it should be noted that this is the pro- what we would expect from a refugee popula- portion of frilled sherds at Orr Lake, not the pro- tion. However, in the time since Ridley’s publi- portion of frilled pots. Sampling may account for cation, the archaeological records in Ontario and high proportion of frilled pots from Edwards, New York state have been more fully investigated but it seems unlikely that in the other cases exca- and some possible problems with Ridley’s vators chanced upon middens with unrepresen- hypothesis arise. Furthermore, refugee studies tatively high amounts of frilled pottery. have emerged as a discipline (Ager 1999; Black The suggested location of the New York home- 2001) and may provide models for how forced land of the Wenro is based on interpretation of migrants may alter their material culture as a documents and archaeological evidence (Figure consequence of displacement. 1). According to White (1961:37) the most like- ly location of the Wenro prior to 1639 is in the Problem One: Large Amounts of Frilled Pottery Niagara frontier region, between the Seneca and and No Clear Homeland the Attiwandaronk (Neutral confederacy). Sites If frilled pottery is a marker of Wenro-ness, then, such as Silverheels, Kleis and Ellis have percent- unless explained further, we would expect to find ages of frilled ceramics that range from 8 to 19 a Wenro homeland with frilled pots similar to percent (Bursey, personal communication 2005). those found in Huronia. Furthermore, if Wenro Englebrecht (personal communication 2001) potters continued their potting traditions in their reports that between 13 and 25 percent of sherds new home, we would expect that the proportion from sites east of the Niagara River and south of of frilled pottery at sites in their homeland would Lake Erie fall into the Seneca Barbed and Genoa be greater than at Wendat sites where Wendat Frilled types. Although Noble (1980:52) reported women would, presumably, produce pots in their “a sizeable quantity of Genoa Frilled pottery” at traditional styles. Sites in Huronia with frilled the Thorold site on the west side of the Niagara pottery include BeGx-25, Edwards and Orr river, only eleven frilled pots (about 6 percent) are Lake, among others. According to Ridley (1973), present in the assemblage and several of these are 72 percent of the pots from Edwards are frilled so similar in decorative motif and method of and when he includes high collared material in manufacture that it is likely a single individual his calculations, the percent of “foreign” pottery produced them. The percentage of frilled pots in at Edwards reaches 91 percent. The high propor- this collection is an estimate because time con- tions of frilled ceramics may be a product of sam- straints did not allow me to group typical sherds pling at Edwards. However, this is unlikely to be into pots. Neither the decorative motifs nor the the case at BeGx-25. Examination of excavation method of manufacture of frill on the Thorold reports and provenience information on sherds pots is similar to that known from Wendat sites shows that Ridley excavated two main areas 100 (Figure 2). In sum, if Wenro refugees produced feet apart, and frilled pottery was found in both frilled pots in the same proportions in Ontario as of these places (Hawkins 2001; Ridley 1964, they did in New York, then we would expect to 1965). Ridley (1975) re-located the Orr Lake find only small proportions of the Ontario site, but the collections at the Royal Ontario assemblages composed of such pots. This is not Museum are the product of other collectors what we find. Ridley acknowledges this problem (Kidd 1950) and were made long before Ridley when writing about Orr Lake: Hawkins Refugees, Microstyles and Frilled Pottery in Huronia 65 Figure 2.