Archeological Dig into Floyd County Virginia Native American Village site

Originally posted September 22 2013 in Museletter, by Will Bason

Virginia State Archeologist Tom Klatka conducted a small dig in Floyd County recently at a site next to Little River on Roger Road, near 221 N. Two one-meter square test pits were carefully excavated, the dirt sifted through a sieve and the pieces of stone and ceramic artifacts found in this process laid aside for further study. He was assisted in this by Roanoke College student intern Amanda Paul and by his wife Ferri Lockhart. Residents living in the Left Bank neighborhood had shown him numerous arrowheads and pieces of pottery that they have found as they worked in their gardens set in the sandy loam bottom land beside the river, and Tom quickly identified these artifacts as coming from a band of the Totero or Tutelo Indians who lived in the areas now known as Roanoke, Montgomery and Floyd Counties at the end of the 17th century and for an unknown period of time before that.

The Tutelo were of the Eastern Siouan cultural and language family and migrated to this area from the Southeastern Ohio, living here from perhaps as early as 1100 to as late as 1700 AD. They followed river systems, farming the rich bottomland and using canoes for transportation. The site at Left Bank was well suited to thisl lifestyle, and the presence of so many ceramic pieces indicated that it was a permanently occupied village. They grew extensive gardens of corn, beans, squash, sunflowers, gourds and other crops in fertile river and creek valleys, made use many varieties of nuts, and hunted for deer, turkeys and other game. Their homes, which they called “ati” were rounded domes built of a ring of bent saplings covered with bark, and animal hides added in winter. They manufactured cord from the inner bark of basswood trees and from other sources which they used for home building, and also for making ropes, bags, baskets, mats, snares and fish traps. Their villages typically had sweat houses made of stone. They participated in an extensive trade network, by which they obtained rock for making tools and even small amounts of copper. Women were in charge of gardening , manufacturing baskets and pottery, with tanning hides, making clothes, and gathering the various nuts, berries, grapes and mushrooms that were an important part of their diet. The men constructed the houses, cleared land and hunted, using mostly long bows and arrows to bring home white tailed deer, elk, bear and turkey. The Tutelo were decimated toward the end of the 17th century by European diseases for which they had no immunity, and by increasing pressure from tribes who had been disrupted by the arrival of the Europeans, most notably the Cherokee. They merged with the remnants of closely related, most notably the Saponi , and by the end of the 18th century most had left the area, many going north looking for refuge. They spent a time with the nations of the Iroquoian Confederacy at a spot near Ithaca still known as Tutelo Park, before eventually traveling all way to Canada where they managed to continued their language and cultural practices up until the early 20th century. We are fortunate that some of this has been preserved. They practiced sweat lodge ceremonies and grew a form of ceremonial tobacco very different from the South American varieties we grow now. Corn was their most important food source, and the center of their yearly cycle of religious ceremonies. There was the seed festival in the Spring at planting time, the green corn ceremony in late midsummer, and a harvest festival in Autumn. They believed in reincarnation, and according to 18th century colonial Virginia planter William Byrd II they possessed “the three Great Articles of Natural Religion: the Belief of a God; the Moral Distinction betwixt Good and Evil; and the Expectation of Rewards and Punishments in another World.” Those interested in learning about their ceremonies and rituals are fortunate in that famous early ethnomusicologist Gertrude Prokosch Karath wrote a 119 page book entitled “Tutelo Rituals on Six Nations Reserve, Ontario”, which is available as a free pdf document to download or read online. (https://books.google.ca/books/about/Tutelo_Rituals_on_Six_Nations_Reserve_On.html) Those interested in their farming might be intrigued to learn that heirloom varieties of a Tutelo strawberry corn, and Tutelo soup bean exist, though not yet in sufficient quantity to be commercially available.

We have been under the impression that Indians did not live here on a permanent year round basis. This is evidently not the case at all, and now we know that there were farmers who worked this land and called these valleys and ridges home at the time when Europeans began their colonization of North America. There are probably a number of such sites in Floyd and identifying these will give us a clearer idea of where and how these people lived. Tom encourages those who find artifacts to keep these carefully separated as far as where they were found. This preserves their historical information and makes them much more valuable to archaeologists and collectors alike. Sites with ceramic shards are of particular interest as these indicate the Late Woodland period and are usually found in sites that were permanently occupied where the people practiced agriculture. It is good to know about the people who lived here and farmed in this beautiful place so long before us.

I think it is significant that we now know that this county was permanently settled home for Indian people, and that we know, at least generally, who these people were and a good bit about their culture. I would like very much to know more about them and their relationship to the land here. I figure a whole lot of folks have found artifacts and that between us, we can put together a much fuller picture of where they were and their way of life. In particular look for pieces of pottery, which are easy to overlook and usually are. Look for the curve of the pot in the piece and for it to be smooth on the inside of the curve and textured on the outside and the shard to be about 1/8 to 1/4 inch thick. They mostly used arrows and the birdpoints we find are mostly from this period.

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Here is a re-creation of a Tutelo ati that was made at Explore Park near Roanoke VA

Tutelo Strawberry Corn Used for grits, mush and hominy; the unique, deep rose color of this corn is preserved in the meal and grits, and turns out a wonderfully pink polenta; has a slightly sweet taste similar to that of maple syrup, so it works well as a “dessert” corn. Read more:

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