Watson Brake
Watson Brake is an archaeological site from the middle Archaic period south of Monroe, in Ouachita Parish, Louisiana. Found was a complex earthwork mounds of eleven designated as artificial mounds of different heights, by a plurality of elongate back to an oval with about 300 meters east -west and about 200 m in a north -south direction over a total area of about nine acres are connected. The Mounds of the hunter, gatherer and fishing culture of 3500-3000 BC dated and thus represent the oldest known complex building in America since.
The facility is named after one of the same watercourse, which in turn combines the name of a former landowner Watson with an old English term for the Barrens.
The plant
On a river terrace above the Ouachita River are eleven Mounds to a nearly flat surface. Today, the river is about 500 m away from the complex, in prehistoric times was a tributary just below the mounds, which was cut off during the period from inflow, silted and now forms a marshy lowlands. They are divided into a northern and a southern half oval, to the west is a larger gap, in the east a smaller to a cut in the edge of the slope. The highest Mound A reaches a height of 7.50 m above the center, the lowest Mound K of only about 1 m. Today's heights correspond well about the original conditions, a different good condition but is considered probable.
The plant was built in several phases. The first beginnings took place around 3500 BC, when the Mounds K and B, and possibly also already Mound A were begun. As a result, the builders moved south and west of the first mounds and piled waste of food preparation that were found as a stratum, which was particularly rich in organic material. The system in the modern sense was built from about 3350 BC, Mound J followed probably only around 3000 BC About half of the Mounds was repeatedly after long interruptions increased, as evidenced by the fact that the soil formation had already begun. The Mounds E, G, H, K and L had only a construction phase, which is surprising, at least with respect to the second largest Mounds e. The Mounds C and F have two by a young soil horizon on separate layers, I and J have three, B and D four layers. The highest A mound has at least seven layers, which are separated by a bottom horizon. However, it is not entirely clear whether bore and samples have reached the original ground level before the establishment of the Mounds, so that may exist deeper layers. The building material of the Mounds is the surrounding soil, the northern mounds are essentially composed of the material of the eastern edge of the slope and rich in gravel from the river terrace, the southern mounds are probably a bit too far from the edge of the slope, which is why the material for its construction from the immediate area was taken southwest and contains hardly any debris.
The back, which connect the mounds, are only partially built of earth material around large parts consist of the remains of the food preparation, particularly the fragments of shattered cooking stones and a variety of objects made of clay, which also served for cooking and baking.
The total investment is about 33,900 cubic meters or a little over ten Olympic swimming pool. Comparative experiments with human labor organize this volume as a readily accessible one for a culture at the level of the middle Archaic period. With a working time of several months per year between major phases of food acquisition, had between 35 and 40 people can build the system in only seven years. After the data suggest a widely distributed construction in several phases over 500 years, these requirements into perspective considerably.
The people of Watson Brake
An analysis of the artifacts found allows an insight into the conditions of life and management of the prehistoric inhabitants of the region. They lived mainly of aquatic food from the immediately adjacent to the plant watercourse. Fishbones make up more than half the weight of the tracks found animal food that come in relation to meat content much heavy bones of white-tailed deer to 30 weight percent, more food classes such as small mammals or waterfowl are each less than 10%. River snails and mussels were found only in small numbers, but abundant in living organisms, as well as the shells were very small, indicating strong extraction and overexploitation of stocks. Plant foods provided the roots of hackberry trees and geese feet as well as the fruits of Hickory and the grapevine. They show morphological studies have shown that there are natural varieties, not yet cultivated. There is also no evidence for the storage of supplies, which also points to a pure existence as nomadic hunter-gatherers.
Through investigation of statoliths from the fish waste could be determined that all seasons occur in approximately balanced ratio. Watson Brake was therefore used all year round, which is unknown whether this is true or sedentary hunter-gatherer sporadically but mostly evenly distributed throughout the year at the plant passed and whether it always acted the same people in the latter case.
Their stone tools presented the residents themselves out of the rubble of the river terrace forth as the countless discounts and splitter tool production show. A few stone tools are made of sandstone or silicified wood, these materials are a few kilometers away in the immediate surroundings. Among the tools prevailed projectile points, drills and blades. The projectile points were partially known types are assigned, so it is in almost half of the identified types of Evans points with wider edge and lateral indentations, like many Ellis points and a Pontchartrain tip, which is unusually large and wide. In addition, cores were found, from which deductions had been won already and will continue to serve for the production of new blades. Other tools were hammers, grinding stones and various rubbing stones. Artificial pearls were also made from the local materials that were used as jewelry. For this narrow stone drills were required, which were found in large numbers. In the climate of the northern Louisiana artefacts are obtained from organic material poorly. Measurable is awls made of bone or antlers, a bony spatula, fish-hooks, and a completed and commenced several pendant made of bone.
Most finds are cracked cooking stones and various objects made of baked clay, which served for the preparation of food. In addition, six fire pits were found and three post holes. The latter lay on his back or in a soil horizon inside a Mounds. Surrounded were the tool finds thousands splinters and discounts from the production of stone tools. Total 32.640 worked stones and broken pieces are found, with a total weight of 16.9 kg. Of these, only 392 finished or clearly recognizable tools and 175 cores, the rest of debris and deductions from production. The lithic objects distributed over most Strati in the Mounds and back, only the upper layer of the higher mounds were relatively fundarm. This indicates how the distribution of fire pits indicate that rings and low Mounds man served as living space, which were again covered partly in later phases of construction with earth.
The area enclosed by mounds and back free surface is almost devoid of any artifacts that find density rises on the flanks of the mounds and back quickly to the average level in and on the earthworks. Either the free surface was kept clean, or for religious purposes or the residents of the facility she entered for the same reasons never. There are no graves in Watson Brake known, but a few scattered human bones were embedded in the building material found. The archaeologists interpret as involuntary intervention in earlier burials when excavating the building material.
As a result, the excavator of Watson Brake come to the conclusion that there has been a case egalitarian hunter -gatherer culture, which still has no signs of social stratification. The use of local stone speaks exclusively towards regional exchange of goods or trade. The favor of the location with inexhaustible natural resources allowed them beyond mere subsistence, the establishment of the Mounds.
Meaning and tradition
The Mounds of Watson Brake Mounds the first in the southeast of North America, which could be dated using scientific methods clearly in the middle archaic period in 1997. To date, the Mounds of Poverty Point as the oldest earthworks of North America, where its age has been adopted by around 1500 BC were. The date of commencement of Poverty Point has now been corrected by new sampling since 2001 and significantly improved methods themselves to something over 200 years forward to the 18th century BC. Until the publication of the first datings Watson Brakes in the middle archaic period, the cultures of this period were considered to be highly mobile, small hunter -gatherer groups who had little incentive to social change or the emergence of social leadership. The construction of large earthworks according to a well thought out plan, not fit these ideas.
In early statements archaeologists spoke of a radical turning point in the scientific theories:
" Only rarely find archaeologists something that is so completely changed our view of the past, as in this case. "
Watson Brake is also the most complex of all known now Mound plants that were built in mittelarchäischer period 4000-3000 BC. They range from a single mound up to groups of up to eight mounds and even Watson Brake eleven. The mittelarchäischen Mound systems also differ in the artifacts found. Just west of the River projectile points of Evans - type were detected with extra-wide flanks and lateral indentations, only in northeastern Louisiana, the objects were found in baked clay, which are regarded as an aid in the preparation of food. One of the Mounds of Frenchman's Bend is the only one in which people repeatedly have created a flat surface, which then used as a floor of a residential place before the mound was a long time later increased. Under two mounds, also at Frenchman's Bend and Monte Sano post holes of a wooden structure are demonstrated at Monte Sano is a fireplace that was used for cremation. Joe W. Saunders, director of the excavations of Watson Brake concludes that " the only common property of the medium Archaic Mounds are the mounds themselves." He notes that the mounds were not the expression of a solidified culture and in the middle Archaic period independent, simultaneous cultural trends existed, of which the construction of Mounds was just one.
The culture of the builders is difficult to capture because almost exclusively on the mounds are excavated. There are no burials with grave goods known and possible settlement or hunting places without Mounds as far as found, not yet been studied in detail. In addition, many mounds were only artifacts, but not dated by scientific methods.
The tradition of the Mounds collapsed by 3000 from BC and was recorded only about 1,300 years later, at the end of the Archaic period again. The reason for this interruption and resumption is unknown. In the meantime, the long-distance trade of extremely good stone material and other goods developed. Then the systems of Poverty Point Site developed west and Jaketown east of the Mississippi River. The builders of these regions have focused on one system and largely dispensed it to build more independent Mounds.
Regardless of the mounds on the lower reaches of the Mississippi also was in the middle of the Archaic period, around 3000 BC, more than 1000 km north-east on the Ohio River and its tributaries, another tradition of the building of monumental installations. Here, the people did not build from the ground, but it accumulated huge quantities of mussel shells, a substantial part of their diet, so-called shell middens on. The culture that is called after the place where Indian Knoll as Indian Knoll phase, is regarded as another early in the emergence of complex societies in southeastern North America, where it is assumed that the middens at first involuntarily arose from waste of food preparation at appropriate and frequently visited living quarters and have been systematically expanded over time. In Indian Knoll were over 1,100 graves, some with grave goods found to provide an insight into the culture, as it is absent in Watson Brake, since there currently are no graves.
History of Research
The Mounds of Watson Brake were first noticed in 1981 by a local resident after a portion of the land was liberated at a clearcutting of trees, and in 1984 recorded an archaeologist an initial plan of the plant, which was first mentioned in the following year in a publication. First datings were based on surface finds and took a creation during the second millennium BC onwards, at the end of the Archaic period and thus in the time frame of the known plant of Poverty Point about 100 km to the west. However, lacked the typical ground and Tonbällchen that were used in the Poverty Point Culture for heating of food. 1992 pedological study of the largest mounds was made that around 2000 BC probably made a slightly earlier date. All these datings were considered controversial, generally the Mounds of Poverty Point as the oldest, secured adopted. In 1997, the results of drilling in Mounds and connecting back were published, together with the first 14C - datings based on material from the cores. The 14C dates settled Watson Brake to once again well over 1000 years earlier in the middle of the Archaic period, with an age of 5400-5000 years Before Present. The drilling individual artifacts have also been recovered from the material of the Mounds, including Projektilspizten from the Evans - type with lateral indentations that match the date in the middle Archaic period.
The southern half of the locality could not be examined prior to 1998, as the former landowner granted no access. Only when the land was purchased by a development association and transferred to the State of Louisiana, archaeologists had access to the entire system. A comprehensive, multidisciplinary program led to a thorough investigation led by the University of Louisiana at Monroe, which was completed in 2004 and published in 2005. The data shifted the first approaches of the plant by another roughly 100 years forward and revealed by the analysis of drill cores clues to the history of building. Also, artifacts have been studied and determined.