Don’t ask me to listen to a talk about any science ending in ‘ology.’ I’m going to be busy. But, when we heard that there was going to be a talk on anthropology during our visit to Jamestown, we joined. (You know, we can always sneak out if it’s boring.) Well, not a chance. It was riveting. The leader, Jeff, showed us some of the current digs and some of the things they had found. They dug out a well, where people tossed trash when the well ran dry and they found lots of interesting things - like the breast plate of armor and helmet in this display of a reconstructed well in the museum. Each artifact is at the level it was found in the actual well. Pretty cool but the best is still coming.
They found 3 skeletons. Now the detective work begins.
Who are they?
How did they die?
Why did one skeleton have a bullet in the right knee?
Why did one skeleton have some strange hack marks in the cheek area and around the head?
Why was one skeleton buried with a captain’s staff?
And, here Jeff went to town. He sat us down on some benches and began the detective work.
That staff? Probably means that the guy was a head honcho. The bones indicated that the male was a European male about 5’ 3” tall and about 30 - 36 years old. There were 4 men who died during the first years of the colony, all in their early 30’s. One, a captain who died in 1607, was buried outside the fort on the parade ground in a gabled coffin with a captain’s staff. This also fits the site where this skeleton was found. There was other archaeological evidence and other records analyzed but a name was finally attached to this skeleton: Captain Bartholomew Gosnold. They also used his skull, hair styles and dress of a typical 1600’s captain and have developed this likeness for him.
What about that bullet? It was in the skeleton called JR (Jamestown Rediscovery) 102C. Well, the Natives did not have guns so the shot must have come from an English gun. They took some measurements and tried shooting a gun and, nope, the guy did not shoot himself by accident. Someone else shot him. Was it a hunting accident or did someone deliberately shoot him? Jamestown was a pretty tense colony for a long time since they were starving and all alone with no backup.
Then there’s the skeleton with the strange hacking marks on the leg and a mutilated skull found among butchered dog and horse bones and other food remains. All discarded into a pit during the ‘Starving Time’ in 1609 - 1610 when 240 of the settlers out of 300 crowded into the fort died. People have suspected cannibalism in Jamestown but finally had some possible proof. The hacks were by someone who was not used to cutting. They were around the flesh in the cheeks and around the base of the head. And, yes, they happened after the person had died. The detective work was exquisite on this one.
They took some of the shin bone material and examined the teeth and determined that it was from a 14 year old girl.
Without going into what I don’t understand about isotopes, they examined her and decided that she ate a lot of protein which means that she was of the upper classes. But, she didn’t eat on pewter plates which the upper classes did so she must have been a servant girl in an upper class home.
They then look at her teeth and determined that she had drunk water in the southern part of England where the water had a different composition than that in the northern part.
They also knew that she had recently arrived in America since her diet was a wheat based diet form England not the corn-based diet in America.
The hack marks? Well, Dr Douglas Owsley, chief forensic anthropologist at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History determined that the skull had undergone multiple blows and slices form at least 3 different sharp-edged metal implements. These blows were from some one not used to cutting meat since they were tentative and in strange places.
And, they named her Jane. They they modeled her, gave her the coloring and styles of 17th C England and came up with:
Pretty cool. Who says anthropology isn’t interesting?
We also saw and got to handle some copies made from 3D imaging. This original of this copy is something that someone would throw on the ground where they thought a cavalry might attack them. These little things always have a point up and can lame a horse. Since the English in Jamestown thought that the Spanish might attack them from land, they tossed lots of these out on the ground around the fort. Note all the little lines which indicate the layers that the 3D copies builds up.
Here’s a 3D copy of a bone and again note all the layers built up to make this bone.
3-D scanning is revolutionizing archeology and education. An archaeologist can send a 3D image to another archaeologist rather than the original bone. They can then both analyze it at the same time. On the other hand, it is so cool to handle something like this where we couldn't handle the original bone.
‘Better to remain silent and to be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.’
Abraham Lincoln
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