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Title
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Metal Detecting in the Wake of 16th Century a.d. Spanish Expeditions
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Date
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2024
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Bibliographic Citation
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Cobb, Charles R., Dennis B. Blanton, Edmond A. Boudreaux III, Chester DePratter, Ashley A. Dumas, Vernon James Knight, James B. Legg, Brad R. Lieb, and Steven D. Smith. 2024. Metal Detecting in the Wake of 16th Century A.D. Spanish Expeditions. Journal of Field Archaeology 43:1–18.
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annotates
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In southeastern North America, the received wisdom has been that most 16th century a.d. European objects occur in mortuary contexts, the archaeological manifestation of gifting and barter between European leaders and Indigenous chiefs. Our application of metal detector surveys in four projects in Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi now throws this interpretation into question. We have found significant numbers of diagnostic iron and cuprous 16th century a.d. artifacts in residential contexts, which reflects both the huge amount of material imported into the Southeast by European colonizing efforts and the variety of ways by which Indigenous peoples incorporated new raw materials and technologies into their world views.