The Shea Site: A Prehistoric Fortified Village on the Northeastern Plains

Archaeobotanical evidence of prehistoric maize (Zea mays) consumption at the northern edge of the Great Plains

“…AD 1010e1270) such site on the Canadian Prairies. Non-local lithic (e.g., Knife River Flint, catlinite) sources dominate, and the ceramic assemblage includes vessels similar to Sandy Lake [15,28,29], Red River [28], and Lisbon Wares [57]. The large loop-handled vessels examined in this study are very similar to NEPV vessels described by Toom [57] from North Dakota (Fig.…”

Reassessing the northern limit of maize consumption in North America: stable isotope, plant microfossil, and trace element content of carbonized food residue

“…These prairie sites may represent seasonal, or permanent, shifts in economic orientation towards the exploitation of bison (Hamilton, 1982;Meyer and Hamilton, 1994). In at least one case (Michlovic and Schneider, 1993), the makers of Sandy Lake ceramics adopted a full-fledged Plains Village lifeway, including habitation in a large fortified village and adoption of a mixed horticulture-hunting economy. In general, however, virtually all Sandy Lake and Blackduck habitation sites in both the prairie and mixed forest regions tend to be small and ephemeral, with no archaeological evidence of horticulture or domesticates.…”

Understanding Northeastern Plains Village sites through archaeological geophysics

“…The Shea site had been excavated in 1984 and 1990 (Michlovic and Schneider, 1993) and therefore some archaeological information was available prior to our work, especially the presence of a bounding ditch almost 2 m deep. That work suggested that soil removed during that prehistoric construction episode had been placed along its interior where postholes were found, indicating the presence of a wooden wall or defensive palisade (Michlovic and Schneider, 1993, p. 121). While no structural remains were defined, a few postmoulds, hearths and pits were documented in those studies as well as a living floor inside the ditch.…”

“…Excavations were conducted on both ditches (see Figure 4) (Michlovic and Schneider, 1993), which revealed that the prehistoric inhabitants disposed of garbage in the ditches for a period of time, after which sterile sediments washed in covering these discarded materials, presumably after abandonment of the village. This pattern of an artefact‐rich layer capped by a sterile sediment layer was visible in both ditches excavated.…”

“…The inner ditch (Figure 3) was almost entirely filled with garbage refuse and sterile soil during the occupation of the village, while the outer ditch was not subject to such intensive infilling. Michlovic and Schneider (1993, p. 124) interpret this variable filling as evidence of seasonal use of the village site because the thick, culturally rich ditch‐fill contained a large quantity of discarded materials, the layers overlap each other, and also the large quantity of art‐facts and an analysis of the plant remains suggest that the site was occupied only during the warm seasons.…”