Current Research at Arkansas Archeological Survey’s Henderson State University Research Station

Abstract

During 2017, the Arkansas Archeological Survey celebrated its 50th anniversary with a series of website postings (http://archeology.uark.edu/who-we-are/50moments/), a forum at the annual meeting of the Arkansas Archeological Society, and a symposium at the annual Southeastern Archaeological Conference in Tulsa. In addition, the Survey made strides in documenting and archiving its history and collections. The Survey’s Henderson State University (HSU) Research Station in Arkadelphia continued to inventory curated artifact collections and scan older paper records and color slides. Trubitt and Cinotto, assisted by volunteers during weekly Archeology Lab Days, are updating the station’s curated collections database with artifact counts and weights, and using identified diagnostic artifacts to revise temporal information in the AMASDA state site files database. We are also adding new information on novaculite projectile point distributions to the “Arkansas Novaculite” website (http://archeology.uark.edu/novaculite/index.html) database. Ultimately, the novaculite distribution map will be expanded to create maps for each time period. This attention to the station’s curated collections inventory has sparked several new projects. We inventoried over 10,000 artifacts from 1973 testing at the Spanish Diggings site (3GA48) in Garland County, the largest of the Ouachita Mountains novaculite quarries. Novaculite debris from this quarry can now be compared with excavated samples of chipping debris and in-process pieces from other quarries and habitation sites. Diagnostic dart points (Marshall and Gary, var. Gary) indicate use of the quarry at least during the Middle and Late Archaic and Early Woodland periods (ca. 6000-200 B.C.).