Hey y’all, just wanted to show these fired daub fragments I have found at my late Mississippian/Lamar period site. For me daub presents an unusual find, and I am lead to believe a structure was burned. Whether on purpose or accident is a mystery. This same site has produced a good portion of my ceramic finds including my profile picture. Also of note is I’ve found some shards painted with a black/grey slip and many are burnished. Will post one more time tomorrow, and then I’ll quit bunking up the North American artifact forms I swear!
I’ve thought the same about the daub being a burned structure, but I’ve also wondered if they had a cooking fire in a clay rich soil if they couldn’t wind up with a similar result.
If clay is on site , firing pottery may have occurred too.
Not sure if discards (both pre and post firing) were ever reduced to use for tempering. Likely depends on what was available.
Though a good pottery making site had it's reasons for being used repeatedly.
Accounts of firing on a long used bluff made it seem a lot of burning of fuel went on. With that , burned fragments would be no surprise.
If I'm not mistaken, that bone is a deer ulna. I understand the NA's used them for awls. The sharp tip that it once had is worn down quite a bit. That one may have been used to punctuate pottery. You think so?
Thank Ya'll for the responses. The possibility of the site being used as an area for pottery production has occurred to me but is entirely possible. I know the site was probably used to make beads on account of shell debitage and having found a bead along with preforms of ornaments. Good eye with the deer ulna. It very well could have been used in the direction of pottery, especially perhaps among some of the incised sherds I have found there.