Page 39 - Maryland Historical Trust - Archaeology Colonial MD

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The Sheepshead, which was very popular in 17th- century Maryland, but is very rare in the Chesapeake today.
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Excavating a late 17th-century pit at St. John's which yielded a large sample of animal bones.
recently been confirmed by a pollen sample taken from the original topsoil found under some of the St. John’s foundation stones. Its study by pal- ynologist Gerald Kelso found a mix of tree pol- len and a few grains of ragweed but not a single grass pollen specimen. This confirms the nature of the environment the first settlers encountered. The small quantity of ragweed, usually associated with disturbed soils, likely came from the agrarian activities of the Yaocomico Indians living nearby.
The other factor was considerable num- bers of predators including wolves, bobcats and perhaps coyotes. Sheep and lambs were helpless against these animals and required constant care by a shepherd to protect them. On the labor- starved Chesapeake frontier, it was far more eco- nomical to have a person focus their efforts on growing tobacco instead of minding sheep. Direct evidence of this problem was uncovered by exca- vators in 1973 when the burial of an animal was found in St. John’s backyard. Originally thought to have been some type of pet, analysis showed that it actually was that of an adult female sheep.16
Most of her hind quarters were missing, al- though none of the remaining bones showed any cut marks. The grave yielded almost no artifacts, which indicates that it was a very early burial since a major midden for the house developed in this same area after the first years of occupation. Sadly, the abdomen area of the ewe yielded the remains of two baby lambs. Their bone and den- tal development indicates that they were within two weeks of birth. Given this find, a historical reference found in the Calvert Papers proved of
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