Acorns and Maize: Pre- and Post-Contact Foodways at the Riverfront Village Site (38AK933), Aiken County, South Carolina

Date and Time: 
Friday, 6 May, 2011 - 18:20 to 18:40
Author(s): 
Hollenbach, Kandace D. - University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Thomas G. Whitley - Brockington and Associates

 The Riverfront Village site (38AK933) in North Augusta, South Carolina, includes significant Early Mississippian (AD 1000-1200), Early Contact (AD 1600-1670), and Late Contact occupations (AD 1670-1730) of native peoples.  Salvage excavations at the site by Brockington and Associates produced numerous floatation samples that yielded a wide range of economically important foodstuffs.  These allow us to make comparisons between the foodways of native peoples prior to and shortly after Contact, as well as a century after Contact, noting both continuity and changes through time in use of major staples, native cultigens, and Old World plants.