Artist rendition of a Monongahela Foley Farm phase village
Humans, world over, used some form of shelter to insure
survival. The type of shelter is normally influenced by a combination of geographical,
environmental, ecological and social conditions though other mitigating factors
also play into the equation. During the Late Woodland and Late Prehistoric periods
A.D. 700-1550, native peoples living along the rivers and streams of
Pennsylvania employed certain types of architecture that changed little over
time. Archaeology is the principal tool that scholars employ to decipher the
past, and it is precisely archaeology i.e. postmolds that contribute to our
understanding of Native American architecture and settlement patterns. Archaeological
sites linked to these periods, yield clear evidence of the type(s) of houses
and their arrangement within a settlement. Anthropologically, this is
fundamentally understood as the community pattern. Observed differences in
community patterning can be demonstrated for different parts of
Pennsylvania. For this discussion, we
will use three major physiographic regions to illustrate the diversity of
Native American architecture that scholars have identified across the landscape
through archaeological studies.
Glaciated/Unglaciated
Plateau (western Pennsylvania)
In this region of Pennsylvania houses were principally
round-shaped structures organized around a central plaza and surrounded by a
palisade. Houses were vaulted wigwams with bark covering and sometimes had a
semi-subterranean appendage built onto the sidewall. This type of architecture
was common to the McFate, Meade Island and related people from A.D. 1000 – A.D.
1400. Longhouses, likely constructed with vaulted roofs and sheathed with bark
were used by Iroquoians on the Upper Allegheny and Lake Erie Plain. These were
encircled with palisades. Monongahela and other groups in the lower Upper Ohio
Valley and Allegheny Mountains built wigwams and a curious form of house having
straight to slightly out-sloping side walls and a conical roof of bark. Arranged
around an open plaza and protected by a palisade both types had the
semi-subterranean appendage feature, others were free-standing. After A.D. 1575,
a plaza centered petal-structure consisting of a large circular structure with
multiple appendages began to appear on Foley Farm phase settlements.
Artist
rendition of a wigwam
Experimental
reconstruction of a Monongahela house with conical roof
Appalachian
Mountains/Susquehanna Lowlands (central Pennsylvania)
Late Woodland house types in the central and upper
Susquehanna were stereotypically vaulted longhouses. There was a tendency for
this form of dwelling to increase in length over time. Early in the Late
Woodland Clemson Island Early Owasco periods, these were better described as
“short houses” resembling a cube in shape. The community pattern appears to
have been a loosely organized one. By A.D. 1300 dwellings achieved the greater
lengths of northern Iroquoian style, hence the term – “longhouse”. These
longhouses were arranged in rows of eight or more to a settlement and
surrounded by one or more palisades. The semi-subterranean feature associated
with the houses of the Upper Ohio Valley were never attached to the side-walls
of longhouses in this region of Pennsylvania.
Experimental
reconstruction of a small longhouse and semi-subterranean structure
Experimental
reconstruction of an Iroquoian arbor roofed longhouse (under construction).
Blue Mountain/Great
Valley/Piedmont (south-central and south-eastern Pennsylvania)
Longhouse architecture has not been identified for the Late
Woodland/Late Prehistoric periods in this section of Pennsylvania. As with the
lower Upper Ohio Valley and Allegheny Mountain sections wigwam-shaped houses
were the preferred form of architecture in the Great Valley section during the
Mason Island, Montgomery and Luray phases. However, none have been identified as
having the attached appendage nor have any been linked to a palisaded
settlement. This settlement model
appears to mirror the early Clemson Island habitation of central Pennsylvania where
the houses were loosely organized in linear formation, near small streams.
South of the Blue Mountain water gap, the community pattern of the Shenks Ferry
culture evolved from unplanned to planned settlements. During the early Blue
Rock phase the pattern was evidently like the Great Valley settlement pattern where
houses were circular-shaped and loosely organized. By the later, Lancaster and
succeeding Funk phases, Shenks Ferry houses evolved into oval-shaped short
longhouses with vaulted roofs. Well
organized into a planned arrangement of one or more house rings having many
houses, the settlements were fortified by one or more palisades. A large
circular-shaped structure, of an unknown function, was built in the center of
these later settlements.
Experimental
reconstruction of a Shenks Ferry house (under construction)
As we have seen, Pennsylvanian’s Late Woodland/Late
Prehistoric period houses varied from region to region. The environment and social
organization of a culture were major dictates as to the type of dwelling being
created. Experimental archaeologists provide us with some detail and guidance
relative to how houses were constructed by people of the distant past. The
primary building materials available to them would have been poles for the framework
and bark for hafting the pieces together and to cover the building. These
resources were harvested from trees growing in the nearby forest. Raw materials
would have been manipulated with stone celts, adzes and other tools. Although
houses could be built during all seasons of the year, the spring would have
been better suited when trees were easily debarked and the softness of the
ground made securing the poled framework into the earth an easier task. Because
of their size, smaller wigwam structures took less effort while the large
longhouses of 100 feet or more in length would have been a corporate task
undertaken by most of a settlement’s population.
We hope that you have enjoyed reading this bi-weekly
addition to This Week in Pennsylvania
Archaeology and encourage you to
visit us again at this web site for more fascinating information about Pennsylvania
archaeology.
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