PADO North?

After a two year hiatus from excavating (during which time we've been busy writing up our results from the last several seasons working in Honduras), Bill and I will be undertaking a new project this summer.

This is a bit of a departure for us, as we won't be working in the Jesus de Otoro valley, nor in Honduras. Instead, we're heading north to Missouri and the site of Smiths Fork.

Missouri? Yup. You heard that right.

Due to increasing instability in Honduras and liability issues associated with taking students there at this time, we're shifting our efforts and our field school closer to home.

Though the location is quite different from what we're used to, some of the issues and questions are intriguingly similar -- the site we'll be working at has been identified as belonging to the Steed-Kisker phase, a cultural group  living along the margins of the Plains Village and Mississippian worlds. Themes relating to group identification, peripheries and cores, and borderlands have always been of interest to us and we're excited to see how these issues play out at Smiths Fork.

Also, at the end of the day, archaeology is archaeology, and we're looking forward to getting our hands dirty again. We'll be working in conjunction with the Army Corps of Engineers and collaborating with local archaeologist Doug Shaver. All in all, an exciting new chapter for us.

We'll miss Honduras, though. In fact, if anything, we'll be living a fair bit rougher than we ever did in Latin America -- camping out at the site for several weeks as we uncover a previously identified Steed-Kisker lodge house.

The site we'll be working at is located at Smiths Fork, near Smithville, MO. Steed-Kisker sites like this one date from A.D. 950-1400 and tend to be situated on terraces overlooking tributaries of the Missouri, Platte, and Little Platte rivers. Hunting, gathering, and agriculture are facets of the Steed-Kisker subsistence strategy and crafts include the production of Platte Valley Plain and Steed-Kisker incised wares.

We're excited to see what we turn up at Smiths Fork and will post more photos and updates from the field once the season officially gets underway, but for now: stay tuned!