Sunshine, Surfing, and Sifting: A Synopsis of Week Three

Week Three of Memorial University's 2025 Field School on Turpin’s Island, Little St. Lawrence

We are halfway there! Excavations have continued and time has flown by in the pits of Turpin's Island. Things have been changing, and the trenches have opened. Here is a synopsis of this week’s archaeology and our fun here in St. Lawrence.

Fig. 1 Location of trenches 3A (left) and 1B (right)

 Our weekend wound down with a peaceful SUNday in beautiful St. Lawrence. We all took the day to regroup and finish work after our Saturday night festivities. Thanks again to Hubert, Paul, Gary, and everyone else at the Trophy Lounge for making that night so special for us! The "Come from Away's" are now all proud honorary Newfoundlanders!

After fueling up Monday morning, we headed back to Turpin’s Island for our third week of excavations. Clarke, Sanaa, and Kayla continued their excavations in Unit 3A (an area of 2.50 m by 4.00m), trying to understand more about the Newman & Co feature they uncovered. They investigated the drain surrounding the feature to better understand its construction and relationship with the wall located on the shoreline. This feature is extremely rich with artefacts.

Fig. 2 Excavation in 3A and artefacts characteristics of the Newman & Co. occupation of the site.

In yellow, hypothesis of the general location of 3A in Meres drawing (1786)

Unit 1B’s excavations continued with Brendan, Maya, James, Sam, and Anna. The objective of this long trench (1.00 m by 6.00 m) is to better understand the stratigraphic accumulation and archaeological context in this sector. Many French artefacts have been identified in this area previously.

 Fig. 3 Trench 1B, excavation and sifting

Adam and Sam completed drawing and measuring Test Pit #46, which documented a small sector of the Turpin’s house, and they started working separately. Sam was assigned to Unit 1B while Adam worked in Unit 3A.

Rosalie and Raphaëlle continued to excavate Test Pit #45, trying to gain more insight into the feature they found. This feature is certainly the surprise of this year’s excavation. We decided to position a test pit in the conical pile of rocks that is visible to everyone within the landscape of the island. The prior hypothesis was that rocks were placed there when removed from the fields around Turpin’s Island. Excavations demonstrated that this “conical pile of rocks” was in fact an oven!!! It is a beautifully well-preserved feature. The hearth is made of bricks and the oven dome is made of stones and mortar. At the moment, it is difficult to date the feature, but we hypothesize it was built during the tenure of the land by Newman & Co or by the Newfoundlander families and not during the Basque or French occupation of the island.

 Fig. 4 A 3D reconstruction of the oven

Mark continued his excavation in Test Pit #54 working to uncover the feature that had been found. He is investigating a small portion of a very large stone feature. The goal is to date and determine the function of this coastal feature.

Starting Tuesday, TA Kayla was assigned to the lab with Sam, Adam, and Brendan to clean, sort, and catalogue the artefacts that have been found so far. Everyone else continued to work away in their respective units under the hot summer sun and sea breeze.

 Fig. 5 Lab work and artefacts

Fig. 6 The effect of the warm weather on students!

On the hottest and sweatiest day of our season so far, some folks were in the lab working, while the rest of the team continued to dig. In Unit 3A, Clarke and Sanaa found various artefacts, earthenware, glass pieces of wine bottles, and nails. Adam’s trowel skills were missed as he was working in the lab, sorting and cleaning the artefacts found in Test Pit #46. In Unit 1B, Maya, James, and Anna found interesting artefacts such as glass, ceramic, the handle of a French stoneware container, and a musket ball.

Rosalie and Raphaëlle continued to excavate in Test Pit #45. They cleaned off the bricks found at the bottom of their pit and took pictures of the four walls to start measuring and drawing their excavation of the oven.

Fig. 7 Rosalie and Raphaëlle working on stratigraphies from Test Pit #45, the oven

Mark continued excavating Test Pit #54. After uncovering the extent of the feature, which is believed to be a wall or foundation from an old building, he continued to dig south of the wall to try to find artefacts which could help date the feature. We are on the edge of our seats with this one… will hope we will be able to date this feature by the end of next week… stay tuned.

Before we ended on Wednesday, we were visited by our seal friend of Little St. Lawrence, Slippers. On this hot summer day, we were treated with an early end of the day and an evening at Shoal Cove Beach (Thanks to Dr. Losier!!!). Our night was filled with fun as the group surfed, swam, made a bonfire, and cooked hot dogs and marshmallows.

 Fig. 8 A night in Shoal Cove

As another beautiful day in St. Lawrence commenced, the team continued to work while thinking about how nice it would be to be at the beach again. Sanaa and James swapped with Adam, Sam, and Brendan to work in the lab with Kayla. Rosalie and Raphaëlle finished drawing the Northern wall of Test Pit #45 and continued to excavate two more layers. Mark continued excavating Test Pit #54 uncovering various ceramic types including whiteware, creamware, and pearlware. He also uncovered an assortment of bones, mostly cod bones. Near the bottom of the test pit and feature, Mark started uncovering French ceramics from Breton and Normandy, which could help assign a date to the context in this test pit.

In both Unit 1B and 3A, excavations continued as per usual with TA Valentin using the RTK to plot the coordinates of the artefacts found in both units. This information is then used to create a map of the distribution of artefacts across the site. Both teams continued to excavate and sift through their excavated material, bucket by bucket, ensuring no artefacts were missed. 

Fig. 9 Fog over St. Lawrence

On Friday morning, the fog started to roll in across the island as we started our day's work. The fog was much appreciated as it gave us some time out of the sun and cooled the warm morning air. Sanaa and James continued their work in the lab with Kayla. Everyone worked together like a well-oiled machine on Friday as we came together to help with various tasks across the site. In Unit 1B, the team uncovered pipe stems, French ceramic, and various pieces of metal. In Unit 3A, the team continued to excavate the drain/trench feature in their unit. They had a “bamboo forest” in their unit due to the amount of bamboo marking sticks for artefacts they had. We use bamboo skewers to mark the location of artefacts before recording their location with the RTK.

Mark continued to find bones and ceramics in Test Pit #54. In the morning, while Adam was helping sift the material from Mark’s pit, a copper coin was found! This discovery was very exciting; however, work will need to be done in the lab in order to discern any information from the coin. Later in the day, Mark made an exciting discovery as he found half of a rim of a French Normandy Stoneware container.

Fig. 10 Mark showing the rim of a Normandy stoneware container and the drawing of the profile

After a long, sweaty, work week, the team headed back to the house for a party! A snow crab party!!! The archaeologists turned into make-shift chefs for the night and assembled a feast of potatoes, fresh snow crab, homemade mayonnaise, and garlic butter. There could not be a more perfect way to celebrate the start of the end of week three.

Coming up, Thursday, July 17th. The archaeological team will be hosting a community outreach event at the Recreation Center in St. Lawrence at 7pm. All are welcome and encouraged to stop by to ask questions, meet the team, or just say hi. We would love to see you all there!

Stay updated with us for the next blog post and artefacts of the week series. The site is open to visitors, and we would love to see you out there! Weather permitting, we are on site 8:30am - 4:30pm Monday to Friday until July 18th! Follow the signs from Highway 220 in Little St. Lawrence and we hope to see you soon!

References:

●     Losier, C., Ledger, P., Whitridge, P. (2024). “Turpin’s Island, Little St. Lawrence, CfAu-05. Small Scale Archaeological and Paleoenvironmental Excavation” Provincial Archaeology Office 2023, Archaeology Review, Vol. 22, p. 95-109.

●     Losier, C. (2025).“Turpin’s Island, Little St. Lawrence, CfAu-05. Survey and Identification of Features”. Provincial Archaeology Office 2024, Archaeology Review, Vol. 23, p.188-201.

Authors:

Sanaa Mrad

Mark Stephenson