A common misconception about archaeology is that archaeologists study dinosaur bones. The truth is that archaeology is a branch of anthropology. Since anthropology is the study of humans, archaeology is the study of humans in the past. Paleontologists are actually the ones who study dinosaurs. Archaeologists are scientists who utilize theory and methods from many disciplines to piece together the story of the human past. I like to say that archaeologists are very similar to detectives: we hunt for clues about specific people, places, and events. We use these clues to solve mysteries and to add information to the historical record. Our clues usually consist of what we call material culture.

Material culture, also called artifacts, is anything that humans have made or used. Artifact types run the gamut, from stone tools to textiles. Archaeologists use the artifacts they find, in conjunction with the context in which these items are found, to learn about the activities people were engaged in during the past. Since material culture is anything that people have made or used, you are surrounded by material culture right now! It’s fun to look around at your own potential ‘artifacts’ and think about what a future archaeologist might learn about you.

Generally archaeologists find material culture by excavating in the ground. By carefully and methodically peeling away the layers of dirt we discover not only artifacts, but changes in the soils. These changes can come in the form of different sediments, which would indicate episodes of natural sediment deposition. The study of these layers is called stratigraphy. We also look for human-made changes in the soil that tell us people did some kind of activity. We call these features. Features are an artifact type that we cannot dig up and take to the lab with us. Features could be something like a small round stain in the soil from a wooden post or picket that rotted away. Or perhaps a large pit-shaped discoloration that tells us a big hole was dug in the area, like a trash pit, for example.

Individual archaeologists often specialize in a specific subject area. But, very generally archaeology can be split into two broad camps: prehistoric and historical archaeology. Prehistoric archaeologists study humans who lived in time periods before writing was invented. Historical archaeologists study humans who lived during time periods with a written record. We call these writings the documentary record. I specialize in historical archaeology because I love using the documentary record along with the archaeological record to piece together stories of the human past. During the Search for the First Fort Vancouver some of the documents I will be using consist of diaries, hand-drawn maps, and Hudson’s Bay Company reports. It is so exciting to be reading through a collection of letters, for example, and suddenly find a comment about the first Fort Vancouver! When doing historical archaeology research you never know when you will discover a little puzzle piece that will give you big a clue about the past.

Over the coming months I will be sharing with you clues that I have discovered about the first Fort Vancouver during my research. So keep checking in!