That 400 year old pottery sherd I found looked like a modern plate at first

I was digging with a local group near Santa Fe last spring and pulled up a rim sherd that had this super clean, even glaze. Everyone around me said it was clearly 19th century Spanish colonial based on the color. I disagreed because the clay body felt way denser than any colonial piece I'd handled before. I spent an afternoon comparing it to reference samples at the lab and it actually matched a 1600s Pueblo glaze ware that's super rare. I learned that sometimes the obvious answer is wrong if you don't trust the feel of the material. Has anyone else had a find that everyone misidentified because it looked too modern?

2 comments

2 Comments

hugo8258d ago

Remember that feeling you described, @the_nina, when the lab pushed the date back 600 years. It reminds me of how folks misjudge old stone walls around here. You'll see a wall that looks too straight and uniform, everyone assumes it's 19th century field clearing. But if you look close at the lichen patterns and how the moss grows in the cracks, it's often a boundary wall from the 1700s. People get hung up on the surface without checking the deeper signs.

the_nina8d ago

Did you end up glazing any pieces yourself to test the theory? I did something similar with a blackware fragment from Arizona that everyone swore was 1900s tourist trade stuff because of how perfect the polish looked. Turned out it was a 1300s Hohokam piece with a really fine clay recipe that hardened almost like stoneware. The lab tech told me that some of those old pueblos had access to kaolin deposits that most archaeologists dont even know about yet. That moment when the date stamp gets pushed back 600 years on something you're holding is wild.