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In this thesis I examine Stoney Hill Rockshelter, a prehistoric site near Lancaster, Ohio. The site was occupied during the Paleoindian, Adena, and Late Woodland/Fort Ancient periods. I used lithic analysis to understand the temporal and spatial distribution of artifacts. The site was most often utilized as a generalized foraging location. It is unique for its fluted point component.

This thesis and body of work examines the experiences and collective histories of Appalachians and clay. It analyzes and responds to readings about the history of the material starting with the geological formation of clay, and moving through stories of the civilizations that have inhabited this region. Because of its history of glaciation, the Ohio Valley has an abundance of clay. For this reason, it is also one of the earliest places in the archeological record that we see pottery in North America. The use of clay in this region continued after Anglo-Americans settled on the land, with industrial uses of clay expanding and eventually leading to fine art potteries taking root in southern and central Ohio. In this body of work, I continue this collective experience in clay by engaging with my personal history in Appalachia and telling the story of how I have come to make sense of the world around me.

The Muskingum drainage basin is of particular interest because of the application of new technology, the expansion on settlement work, and the lack of GIS software applied to spatial analyzation of settlement pattern in the context of terrain pertaining to pre-Adenan, Adena, and Hopewell sacred and secular settlements. Geomorphic and environmental conditions that previous literature has associated with mounds and earthworks are floodplains, proximity to water, and hinterlands. Earthworks are mounds or embankments of earth created by human agency and are anthropogenic spaces. Spatial analysis of anthropogenic space within archaeology has a category of millimeters for intrasite to kilometers for intersite analysis. This study applies data from OAI forms using a GIS database for intersite spatial analysis. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the existence and nature of relationships between the terrain and anthropogenic landscape in the Muskingum River basin between the Archaic period, ending near 1000 B.C.E. and the Woodland period, which peaked at approximately 350 C.E. It also seeks to determine if any temporal trends exist in the terrain settings of site types of each culture or over the cultural periods.

The transition from foraging to farming has cross-culturally been associated with major changes in human technology, settlement patterns and social organization. This research project tests these relationships among prehistoric human populations inhabiting the Eastern Woodlands by considering how increasing reliance on cultivated foods during the Holocene led to economic circumstances in which investment in the specialization of plant-food processing tools was beneficial. It further identifies that tool investment benefits were only adaptive when seasonally strategic mobility had decreased to such a degree that tool carrying costs were offset by expanded tool use-life. Using the Model of Technological Investment, grounded in neo-Darwinian theory and Human Behavioral Ecology, this study uses quantitative and qualitative archaeological data to 1. Provide a general survey of the changes in human botanical diet from the Hocking Valley, Ohio, for the Late Archaic through Middle Woodland Periods, 2. Determine the relative correlation between investments in food processing technology and the incorporation of cultivated foods into the prehistoric Woodlands diet, and 3. Establish the seasonal occupation at each of the sampled sites in order to determine different degrees of sedentariness and residential stability throughout the temporal periods surveyed. A variety of archaeological methods were utilized in this study, including macro-archaeobotanical analysis, pottery and ground stone macrocharacteristic analysis, and analyses of settlement and feature data from habitation sites The results of these analyses indicate that 1. Relatively high levels of investment in the construction of food-processing technology only occurred after population mobility decreased to such a degree that allowed for an extended use-life of an individual tool, 2. Middle Woodland populations in the Hocking Valley were essentially residentially stable farmers, and 3. The relationship between plant domestication, technological innovation, and sedentariness was co-evolutionary.

This research endeavors to explain why Ohio’s prehistoric inhabitants placed their earthworks on the Central Ohio landscape at those specific locations. It constructs a probabilistic model based on the locations of known archaeological sites from the Early and Middle Woodland period. Known locations were compared to a set of randomly placed comparison points using digital GIS landscape coverages, and remote sensing imagery to find areas where unknown earthwork sites were more likely to occur. The sample of nine known earthwork sites and nine randomly placed points were located in an arbitrary area of 3825 km2 in Central Ohio. For each of the 18 points, landscape and descriptive variables were collected to find a set of traits for each site. The variables were assessed statistically using Monte Carlo analyses and Multiple Components Analyses in SAS to see if differences existed between the two populations. While some of the variables did not have statistical significance, visual appraisal of the data did reveal patterns, for example, viewshed and gateway direction. For other variables, the statistical analyses did find that known archaeological sites were more likely to be found in certain environmental areas compared to the random points. Of the variables that did have statistical significance, a number of them were then selected, intersected and clipped in the GIS coverages to identify Similar Environmental Groupings on the Central Ohio landscape. These Similar Environmental Groupings were areas where certain variables co-occurred on the landscape. The GIS identified 69 such Similar Environmental Groupings, with 18 of those of special interest based on the variables tested. These Similar Environmental Groupings were places where Early or Middle Woodland earthwork sites were more likely to be located based on the statistical analyses. Visual searching of the 69 Similar Environmental Grouping areas was conducted on various remote sensing imagery with the goal of finding vegetation or soil signatures that would indicate a buried archaeological earthwork structure. While no unknown sites were found visually, ground truthing with various geophysics techniques may find such buried evidence. This research has shown how difficult it is to pinpoint archaeological sites as there are so many variables and pragmatic events to consider. Nevertheless, the GIS model presented here is a dynamic one that can be adapted for further research.

Prehistoric architecture in the Eastern United States has been investigated since in the early 1940s when William S. Webb excavated several Woodland structures in Kentucky. For the past 70 years archaeologists have debated the configuration and function of these structures and produced several renderings and reconstructions of their forms based on historic Native American examples, modern Bedouin settlements, and from “archaeological imagination”. The premise of this thesis is to offer a comprehensive interpretation for the form and function of the McCammon Circle structure through comparative data on Woodland prehistoric structures in the Eastern United States. The McCammon Circle represents the subsurface remains of a large circular structure, which was excavated by Weller & Associates, Inc. in 2005, that dates to the Middle Woodland period. These remains include various post holes, features (pits/basins), and a somewhat sparse artifact assemblage, including various lithic and ceramic artifacts from the site. The first part of this study will involve a comparison of the structural attributes of floor area, average posthole diameter, and average posthole depth for each of the 36 analogous structures within the regional study to the McCammon Circle. The McCammon Circle will be placed contextually with the interpretations for form and function of the other structures in the comparison. The form of the McCammon Circle will be compared to five building forms in the region. The function of the McCammon Circle will then be compared to other researcher’s interpretations for the similar structures within the aforementioned comparison. These comparisons will allow for a comprehensive interpretation for the McCammon Circle in regards to the most widely accepted viewpoints in the regional archaeological community. These comparisons indicated that the McCammon Circle was most similar to structures that have been interpreted as unroofed in form and ceremonial in function. The second part of the study will be to test the ability of an engineering analysis utilizing Euler’s formula in determining the possible form of the McCammon Circle. Euler’s formula will be used to determine whether or not the structure could have supported a roof by testing the load bearing capabilities of the structural posts. Euler’s formula will be used to see whether or not it is applicable to aiding in the interpretation of prehistoric structures in general. This will hopefully allow future researchers to decide whether or not Euler’s formula should be included within their own engineering analysis of prehistoric architecture based upon its merits and shortcomings. Euler’s formula proved to be unreliable in ascertaining the form of the McCammon Circle because it failed to take into account several other variables, such as horizontal loads and soil dynamics, which are integral to determining possible building form. However, Euler’s formula may prove complementary to interpreting prehistoric structural form when combined with other engineering analyses.

For two millennia, prehistoric populations manufactured and used pottery in Ohio’s Hocking Valley; much debate has occurred among scholars concerning ceramic traditions and transitions. This study utilized Energy Dispersive X-ray and X-ray Diffraction technologies to explore what clay resources were used in production, if and why transitions in production occurred, and how archaeologists might best understand ceramic manufacture in the Hocking Valley. Results demonstrate a long continuity among ceramics produced with a systematic shift in temper resources during the Late Prehistoric Period; changes appear to be less the result of cultural tradition and more related to functional performance and opportunism.