NORTH CAROLINA STATE LIBRARY N - 



RALEIGH DOC 



UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA 



August, 1978 



105 1911 Building 

 NCSU, Raleigh, N.C. 27650 Tel: (919) 7S7-2U5U 



Coastal archaeology 



A look at human history 



David Phelps has spent countless hours during the 

 last 10 years sifting through garbage dumps and 

 graveyards in coastal North Carolina. 



The fruits of his labors line tables and shelves in 

 the archaeology lab at East Carolina University: bone 

 fragments, snake vertebrae, human skulls and pot- 

 tery sherds. Each scrap is marked with a series of 

 tiny identifying numbers which make it possible for 

 Phelps to tell exactly where— to the square meter of 

 earth— the piece was found. 



To the uninitiated these little bits of the past are 

 baffling. But for Phelps each is a key to understand- 

 ing the early cultures of coastal North Carolina. 



Thanks to Phelps and ten other archaeologists now 

 working in North Carolina, the once fragmented pic- 

 ture of prehistoric Indian life in this state is slowly 

 being completed. But Phelps' concerns run deeper 

 than setting the academic records straight. He 

 prefers to say that he is "attempting to organize the 

 lessons of human history." He's convinced that what 

 he digs up in coastal North Carolina is relevant to 

 contemporary residents of the area. 



Phelps believes that the link between current resi- 

 dents of coastal North Carolina and the Indians who 

 lived there 10,000 years ago is the area's wealth of 

 natural resources. It's the one constant in a world 

 that has changed radically. And he thinks it's crucial 

 for contemporary man to understand how the In- 

 dians used these resources and adapted their life- 

 styles to the land. 



The ancient garbage pits that Phelps excavates of- 

 ten tell at least part of that story. A list of their con- 

 tents reads like an Indian menu: mollusk, possum, 

 terrapin, fish, bear and deer remains. 



"While many people look at archaeology as a sort of 

 esoteric field, we like to think that eventually with 

 the understanding of how man has used particular 



(See "Understanding," page 2) 



