TG
Taylor Golding
  • biological anthropology
  • Mechanicsville, VA

Mechanicsville resident participates in summer archaeological field school

2014 Oct 27

Taylor Golding, a senior biological anthropology major at James Madison University, was one of seven JMU students who spent part of their summer uncovering evidence of first encounters between Native American Indian communities and Spanish explorers during the 16th and 17th centuries.

JMU's summer archaeological field school in Georgia focused on two Native American communities likely visited by Hernando de Soto in 1540 -- a 16th century Indian village at the edge of an abandoned channel of the Ocmulgee River near Jacksonville, Ga., and a large, virtually undocumented Mississippian mound located on a plantation in Dougherty County, Ga.

Students received instruction in field methodologies including excavation, record-keeping, initial laboratory processing and soil sampling, and ultimately became responsible for implementing the research program. Careful analysis of the artifacts and other findings will be completed over the coming months.

“It’s really important to stay focused,” said Taylor Golding, a senior biological anthropology major. “We were studying people who would never talk again, who couldn't tell us their story. All we really had to go on were the artifacts these people left behind and the clues we could find in the soil. If you lost focus, you could unintentionally mess up … and when that happens, you essentially destroy a part of the human story.”

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