Schmidt, Christopher W. and R. Criss Helmkamp (Department of Sociology and
Anthropology, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana)
PRELIMINARY SCANNING ELECTRON MICROSCOPIC ANALYSIS OF HUMAN DENTAL MICROWEAR FROM TWO LATE
WOODLAND SITES IN NORTHWEST INDIANA
Dental microwear analysis has been applied to the study of two archaeological
sites from northwest Indiana. These two sites, Blue Sea and Demerly, are located
in White and Carroll counties respectively. Blue Sea was excavated during the
summer of 1990. Dating of the Blue Sea site to the Late Woodland period is based
on the presence of several Late Woodland period projectile points. The Demerly
site is also a Late Woodland site and is located on a sand dune terrace in the
Wabash Valley near Rock Creek. This site was excavated during the summers of 1991
and 1992.
Each site had a small amount of human skeletal remains. Despite the paucity of
remains, both sites did have human dental remains. One molar from each site was
examined under a scanning electron microscope. Observations of the teeth concentrated
on dental microwear. Microwear consists of microscopic scratches and pits on tooth
enamel as a result of mastication. Abrasive pre-agriculture diets tend to cause
a larger percentage of microscopic pits in tooth enamel, while softer agricultural
diets tend to leave significantly fewer pits.
Throughout much of the eastern United States, the Late Woodland period marked
the intensification of plant domestication. However, because of limited archaeological
research, the Late Woodland diet in northwest Indiana is poorly understood. Paleobotanical
studies at the Demerly site produced no equivocal evidence of domesticated food
resources. The dental microwear analysis of the Blue Sea and Demerly molars should
indicate the degree to which domesticated foods were a part of the Late Woodland
diet in northwest Indiana.
The teeth were studied via a JEOL JSM-840 scanning electron microscope, housed
in the Electron Microscopy Center in Agriculture at Purdue University. Each tooth
was prepared for scanning electron microscopy on a separate stub and sputter coated
with 200 angstroms of gold palladium. They were fixed to the stub with copper
tape and silver paint. A standard 500Xmagnification was used for all SEM analysis.
Microwear features were observed on micrographs. Scratches were differentiated
from pits using a length to width ratio of four to one.
Quantitatively, the Blue Sea and Demerly feature counts are high relative to the
Georgia and Florida coasts precontact, early contact, and late contact sites.
When the relative frequency of pits is observed, the Blue Sea and Demerly teeth
appear more like the agricultural early and late contact sites (Table
4). The percentage of pits in the Demerly and Blue Sea teeth is less than
the late contact sites of the Georgia and Florida coasts. It is well established
that these late contact populations consumed a predominantly maize diet. It is
evident the Blue Sea and Demerly individuals each consumed a diet comparable to
the softness of a predominantly maize diet. The Blue Sea and Demerly individuals
appear to post-date the introduction of agriculture into northwest Indiana. [return to 1993 abstracts menu][continue to next]