Showing posts with label Native American culture. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Native American culture. Show all posts
Monday, July 30, 2018
At an excavation site near the intersection of Peel and Sherbrooke streets, archaeologists have discovered more artifacts of a centuries-old village.
This excavation first started in 2016, and continues work that began in the 19th century.
"It is a major discovery because it's the continuation what [Sir John William] Dawson had found 150 years ago," said archaeologist Roland Tremblay.
Dawson was a geologist and professor in Montreal.
In 1859, workers accidentally discovered bone fragments and pottery while excavating land near the current site.
He investigated the area, which became known as the Dawson site.
Since then, archaeologists have dug up different parts of the land in search of other artifacts and clues about the village.
This most-recent dig yielded plenty of ancient tools.
"What will be preserved is pottery and that's what we found, their cooking vessels essentially, but we also found their pipes, because they were made out of ceramics and also some bones," said Tremblay.
Among the other findings? A beaver incisor and beluga tooth.
"Beluga don't usually come up to Montreal," said Tremblay.
Radio-carbon dating indicates that the village likely dates back to around 1375, well before Jacques Cartier's arrival and establishment of New France.
It's a new hypothesis that has members of the First Nations community encouraged.
"It just actually means to me that the things that I heard as a child, the oral tradition, is there and it's alive and well," said Christine Zachary Deom, a former elected chief of the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake. "The things that have been found there just really highlight that the Mohawks have been a presence all the way through."
An Arthur Conan Doyle's detective novel A Study in Scarlet (1887) we learn that Sherlock Holmes used the most effective memory system known: a memory palace. Although imagined memory palaces are still used by memory champions and the few who practice the memory arts, they are best known from Greco-Roman times when great orators, including Cicero, used them to ensure their rhetoric was smooth, detailed, and flawless. The physical memory palace, usually a streetscape or building interior, would become so familiar to the orator that it was always available to them in their imagination. By "placing" one piece of information in each site, they could mentally stroll through their memory palace, location by location, drawing out each portion of the speech in the required order without missing any element.
Received opinion is that this method of loci, as the technique is also known, dates to before Simonides of Ceos (c. 556-468 BCE), who is often credited as the inventor. However there is ample circumstantial evidence that indigenous cultures the world over have been using it for far longer than that. There is a continuous record dating back at least 40,000 years for Australian Aboriginal cultures. Their songlines, along with Native American pilgrimage trails, Pacific Islanders' ceremonial roads, and the ceque system of the Inca at Cusco all exhibit exactly the same pattern as the memory palaces described by Cicero. At each sacred location along these paths, elders would sing, dance, or tell a story, all making the information associated with the location more memorable.
The memory skills of indigenous elders exceed anything reported for the ancient Greeks. Research with the Native American Navajo people, for example, shows that they memorize a classification of more than 700 insects along with identification, habitats, and behavior. And that's just insects. A fully initiated indigenous elder would be able to relate stories equivalent to a field guide for all the birds, mammals, reptiles, fish, and hundreds of insects within their environment.
Another study shows that the Hanunoo people of the Philippines were able to identify 1,625 plants, many of which were unknown to Western science at the time. Add to that knowledge of astronomy, timekeeping, navigation, legal and ethical guidelines, weather and seasons, complex genealogies and belief systems, and you have a vast encyclopedia stored in an interwoven memorized web: a web that is tied to a real or imagined memory palace.
Cultures without writing are referred to as "non-literate," but their identity should not be associated with what they don't do, but rather with what they do from necessity when there is no writing to record their knowledge. Cultures without writing employ the most intriguing range of memory technologies often linked under the academic term "primary orality," including song, dance, rhyme and rhythm, and story and mythology. Physical memory devices, though, are less often included in this list. The most universal of these is the landscape itself.
Australian Aboriginal memory palaces are spread across the land, structured by sung pathways referred to as songlines. The songlines of the Yanyuwa people from Carpentaria in Australia's far north have been recorded over 800 kilometers. A songline is a sequence of locations, that might, for example, include the rocks that provide the best materials for tools, to a significant tree or a waterhole. They are far more than a navigation aid. At each location, a song or story, dance or ceremony is performed that will always be associated with that particular location, physically and in memory. A songline, then, provides a table of contents to the entire knowledge system, one that can be traversed in memory as well as physically.
Enmeshed with the vitalized landscape, some indigenous cultures also use the skyscape as a memory device; the stories of the characters associated with the stars, planets, and dark spaces recall invaluable practical knowledge such as seasonal variations, navigation, timekeeping, and much of the ethical framework for their culture. The stories associated with the location in the sky or across the landscape provide a grounded structure to add ever more complexity with levels of initiation. Typically, only a fully initiated elder would know and understand the entire knowledge system of the community. By keeping critical information sacred and restricted, the so-called "Chinese whispers effect" could be avoided, protecting information from corruption.
Rock art and decorated posts are also familiar aids to indigenous memory, but far less known is the range of portable memory devices. Incised stones and boards, collections of objects in bags, bark paintings, birchbark scrolls, decorations on skins, and the knotted cords of the Inca khipu have all been used to aid the recall of memorized information. The food-carrying dish used by Australian Aboriginal cultures, the coolamon, can be incised on the back, providing a sophisticated mnemonic device without adding anything more to the load to be carried when moving around their landscape. Similarly, the tjuringa, a stone or wooden object up to a meter long decorated with abstract motifs, is a highly restricted device for Aboriginal men. As the owner of the coolamon or the elder with his tjuringa touched each marking, he or she would recall the appropriate story or sing the related song.
This is very similar to the way the Luba people of West Africa use a well-documented memory board known as a lukasa. Previous researchers have claimed that the "men of memory" of the Mbudye society would spend years learning a vast corpus of stories, dances, and songs associated with the bead and shells attached to a piece of carved wood.
My initial attitude when I read this was complete skepticism. It was surely claiming far too much for such a simple device. So I made one. I grabbed a piece of wood and glued some beads and shells on it and started encoding the 412 birds of my state: their scientific family names, identification, habitats, and behavior. It worked a treat. I no longer doubt the research. Though simple, this is an incredibly powerful memory tool. Inspired by my success with the lukasa, I have also created songlines for more than a kilometer around my home. I have a location on my walk for each of the 244 countries and dependent territories in the world. I walk through them from the most populous in China to little Pitcairn Island. I also walk through time from 4,500 million years ago until the present, nodding to the dinosaurs, meeting our hominid ancestors, and greeting numerous characters from history. My memory has been hugely expanded by using this ancient mnemonic technique.
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It is the structure of the human brain that dictates the memory methods that work so effectively right across human societies. It is our dependence on writing that has eroded this skill. We can, if we choose to, implement these techniques alongside our current educational methods. I have taught schoolchildren to sing their science and to create memory trails right around the school grounds, with excellent results. We can and should learn from the intellectual achievements of indigenous cultures by adapting their techniques to contemporary life. But when we do this, we should acknowledge the source. These memory techniques are far older than our Western civilization, and they are far more effective than the crude rote techniques that replaced them.
Hurricane Irma uncovered a piece of history from the bottom of the Indian River when a dugout canoe was brought to the surface.
Officials from the Florida Department of State’s Bureau of Archeological Research in the Division of Historical Resources said they are working to preserve the the canoe, estimated to weigh 600 to 700 pounds.
Randy Lathrop, of Cocoa, shared the news of his discovery on Facebook with his friends.
"I got to it before it was picked up by the county with all the other storm debris and placed in a landfill. I'll certainly keep everyone updated on this progress, promise," he said in his Facebook post.
The Indian River is a part of the Sovereign Submerged Lands, meaning all objects of intrinsic historical or archaeological value abandoned on state-owned lands are owned by the state with the title vested in the Division of Historical Resources, officials said.
Lathrop spotted the dugout cypress tree canoe when he was bicycling and observing damage from Hurricane Irma.
"And I was like, 'That can't be,'" Lathrop said.
This unlikely archaeologist knew he had to save the canoe, as a front loader was just down the street clearing debris.
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"Could have very well ended up under a pile of trash or in a landfill, so we're just happy we were able to rescue history," he added.
A state spokesperson said the canoe is still being evaluated, but they've already noticed square nails, remnants of paint chips and the fact that it was likely buried and unexposed to the elements in the river.
The canoe is being stored underwater not far from where it was found until that preservation process can get underway.
A state spokesperson added that they hope to keep the canoe in the community where it was discovered so people can enjoy it and learn from it.
The ancient Hohokam people settled the land that has come to be known as central Arizona hundreds of years ago. And Peoria is home to the largest known prehistoric Hohokam village on the New River.
Principal Planner Melissa Sigmund said Peoria is putting a spotlight on the archaeological site by constructing an interpretive trail at a city park that is expected to be complete in the coming months.
She said the entire Palo Verde archaeological site is a significant cultural resource that covers about 80 acres in Northwest Peoria. The city owns the 16-acre Palo Verde Park site, near 73rd Drive and Briles Road in the Terramar housing community, which includes both the recreational park and the preserve area.
“The interpretive trail will allow visitors to walk through the site and learn about a variety of topics including the types of artifacts and residential areas that have been found at the site, how archaeologists learn about and preserve the past, and Native American perspectives regarding their past,” Ms. Sigmund said.
The overall cost of the project is $25,000, which includes the interpretive trail and park improvements.
Peoria contracted with Logan Simpson Design, who has worked with a number of the surrounding Native American tribes to prepare an interpretive plan for the culturally sensitive area, which includes: an introduction with park site information, site significance, area and site maps, as well as sign concepts and materials.
The firm is currently working on a drainage improvement project and phase 2 of the implementation of the interpretive plan, to include a loop trail and additional interpretive signs. Ms. Sigmund said the drainage improvements will reduce the impact of storm water on the site by channeling drainage away from the resources, limiting damage from erosion.
In the future, the loop trail could have a spur connecting the larger New River Trail that is planned to extend north and south to the west of this site, providing greater access to Peoria’s larger multi-use trail system, she said.
“Construction on the site is just beginning and I believe it is on schedule to be completed in the next few months in time for folks to enjoy the improvements in the cooler weather,” Ms. Sigmund said.
Archaeological excavations conducted in 1981 and 2010 revealed 15 residential areas containing pit houses, trash mounds, and roasting mounds, as well as a ball court and possible plaza. The site was inhabited by the Hohokam people about 1,000 years ago when residents survived by hunting, gathering and trading goods.
Council member Bridget Binsbacher, who represents the area, said the Palo Verde Preserve is an excellent visible example of Peoria’s broad collection of natural and cultural resources.
“The site provides the opportunity to expand the archaeological community and public’s understanding of those who came before us,” she said. “Improvements to the preserve will ensure the protection of these valuable resources, while also increasing the educational and recreational amenities for Peoria residents and visitors through an interpretive loop trail.”
The completion of the trail will be a journey of land preservation nearly 20 years in the making. It is a journey that included purchase of the site around 1998 and council approval of Historic Preservation Overlay Zoning allowing for the park to be placed on the Peoria Register of Historic Places. It was later placed on the prestigious National Register of Historic Places.
Mayor Cathy Carlat said in a statement safeguarding the archaeological site at Palo Verde is a top responsibility as the city plans for growth. It is an excellent example of the incredible and sensitive history that exists right in residents’ backyards, she said.
“By understanding the prehistoric culture of these lands, the city of Peoria developed an educational, reflective, and recreational asset that honors how the earliest settlers of the Hohokam tribe used these lands, and the remarkable ruins that remain today,” Mayor Carlat said.
