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Title
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The Forks Project: An Investigation of the Late Prehistoric-Early Historic Transition in the Alabama-Tombigbee Confluence Basin
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Date
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1984
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Bibliographic Citation
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Fuller, Richard, Diane E. Silvia, and Noel Read Stowe. 1984. The Forks Project: An Investigation of the Late Prehistoric-Early Historic Transition in the Alabama-Tombigbee Confluence Basin. University of South Alabama, Archaeological Research Laboratory, Mobile.
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annotates
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• Really a reconnaissance level “targeted” survey with descriptive data.
• Possibly never finalized, there are no table or figure numbers within the text itself, and there are several figures with notations to paste the correct images onto the page. There are no page numbers.
• List of sites (Fuller et al. 1984:Table 1) with components that could be Choctaw/ancestral Choctaw and organized by the labels provided in the text:
o 1BA242, 1BA245, 1CK28 , 1CK222, 1WN87 (Late Woodland, Early Mississippian, Mississippian)
o 1BA243, 1BA244, 1BA282, 1BA381, 1CK32, 1CK29, 1CK219, 1CK221, 1MN227, 1WN51, 1WN76, 1WN86 (Tensaw Lake, Bottle Creek, Bear Point, Protohistoric, Early Historic)
o 1CK31 (Mississippi, Historical), a single earthen mound, sherds of Bell Plain and Mississippi Plain observed on the surface.
o 1CK32 is recorded as a single earthen mound with numerous types of ceramics and is located south of 1CK31 and 1CK108. Artifacts were observed along a levee everywhere there was ground disturbance. From a disturbed area on the top of the mound, D’Olive Incised and Moundville Incised sherds were collected (Fuller et al. 1984).
o 1CK220 (Protohistoric)
o 1CK216 (“Hooks Plantation;” Protohistoric, Early Historic), daub reported in the report.
• Site 1CK217 is reported to have Bottle Creek, Bear Point, and Doctor Lake components.
o Could be “Douglas Mound” referenced by Trickey (1958:389 ) which is three small mounds on the east bank of the Tombigbee River just above the entrance to Three Rivers Lake. This site was visited by Moore (1905 ) and gun flints and glass beads were found. Nearby, at Hooks’ Plantation, Moore (1905) reported glass beads and “European medals” in association with urn burials. Trickey’s Douglas Incised is Fuller’s Moundville Incised, var. Douglas.
• Also references 1CK219, the Doctor Lake site, which is reported to have Tensaw Lake, Bottle Creek, Bear Point, and Doctor Lake phases/components— (see also Mikell and Little 1999).
o “Doctor Lake Complex” further defined by Fuller (1998:35-36) but he and others state that they may be related to “eighteenth century Choctaw wares in central Mississippi.”
o Silvia reports both 1CK217 and 1CK219 as Tomé/Naniaba occupations in other publications.
• Site 1CK221 Bruce Trickey dug a single test unit at this site, which was observed by the crew. A local informant, the same one who showed Trickey the site, said that one of the three mounds had eroded into the river in the interim, and only one mound could be relocated at the time of the survey. One shovel test encountered a dense midden containing burnt shell, snail shells, burnt clay, and abundant animal fish bone. They also noted seeds and the site had good potential for botanical information.
• 1WN76 was originally reported by Moore, who excavated within each of the four mounds. He encountered numerous burials, of all types (extended, flexed, bundled, urns) as well as flattened skulls, and unflattened skulls interred with other individuals.
o Trickey revisited the site in the 1950s and delineated two village areas based on auger testing, however the middens seem to date to the Middle Woodland period as well as Mounds 2 and 3 (Trickey’s collection from the site is curated at the Florida Museum of Natural History, Gainesville).
o A local looter, Dick Boykin, had collected extensively from the site and allowed Fuller et al. to examine his collections which was voluminous, and Boykin stated that he had tired of digging up burials.
o USA did minimal digging but confirmed previous components and noted that although the site had been heavily disturbed by looting it was still eligible.