Hit 2,000 year old pottery shards in one weekend dig near Santa Fe

Honestly I joined a community dig in New Mexico last month thinking we'd find maybe a handful of broken pots. Nope, our team pulled over 2,000 shards from a single test pit in two days. It really hit me how much everyday life leaves behind even after centuries. Has anyone else been shocked by the sheer volume of stuff at a site?

2 comments

2 Comments

abby_kim5517d ago

Whoa, 2,000 shards in one weekend is wild! Did you guys end up finding any rim pieces or decorated ones mixed in with the plain body sherds? I've always wondered how archaeologists can tell the difference between a trash dump and an actual living area just from that volume of pottery. Like, was it all from the same kind of vessel types or did you see a mix of cooking pots vs. storage jars? Just curious if the sheer number changed how you looked at the site overall.

mason.mary17d ago

We actually pulled about 60 rim sherds out of that mess, which was way more than I expected for a "trash" context. Decorated stuff was rare, maybe 10 pieces total with incised lines or painted bands. The key difference between a trash dump and a living floor is the scatter pattern and the breakage. Trash dumps tend to have more complete profiles and less wear on the edges, while living areas have smaller, more crushed pieces from people walking on them. For vessel types, it was mostly medium sized cooking pots with soot buildup, but we found a few storage jar handles too. The volume actually helped because once we sorted everything by fabric and thickness, we could see distinct groupings that pointed to different use zones. Honestly, if you ever get stuck with a massive pile of sherds, just sort by rim diameter first, it saves so much time.