Date of Award

6-2020

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Department

Anthropology

First Advisor

Dr. Michael S. Nassaney

Second Advisor

Dr. Lynn M. Evans

Third Advisor

Dr. José António Brandão

Keywords

Archaeology, fur trade archaeology, fort Michilimackinac, Michigan history, colonial ceramics

Access Setting

Masters Thesis-Open Access

Abstract

Ideal for both the French and British, the location of Fort Michilimackinac was selected to serve as a key entrepôt for European goods from the colonized east coast to be traded for furs from the Upper Country. The diverse population that formed around Michilimackinac included French and British soldiers, traders, craftsmen, and their families, as well as large seasonal populations of Native Americans. While the Fort’s interior continues to be vigorously examined, little focus has been directed to the larger, multicultural village that emerged outside the fort’s walls in the latter half of the eighteenth century. Excavations from 1970-1973, conducted by Lyle Stone, attempted to explore this external settlement and uncovered three rowhouses. Drawing from the archaeological assemblage recovered during those excavations, a clearer picture of the lasting French presence, and subsequent civilian British establishment in the region emerges. In this study, analysis is conducted on the ceramic and personal adornment assemblage collected by Stone during the four-year mitigation project (1970-1973). The goal of this thesis is to determine the socioeconomic and ethnic identities of the occupants of the extramural settlement at Fort Michilimackinac in the latter half of the 1770s, and the role they played in the development of communities in the Upper Country.

Download

Share

COinS