Reliability of Archaeological Records on Cultivated Surfaces: A Michigan Case Study

Abstract

Survey of the modern ground surface is a common and important element of archaeological practice. Yet the properties of recovered surface assemblages vary according to several factors that are not intrinsic to the assemblages themselves. Such factors are briefly surveyed and one, reliability—the probability that a surface appears similar following successive cultivation episodes—is examined at length. Ina Michigan case study, the reliability of a cultivated surface is complicated by significant random variation. Among the several implications that this finding holds for research and management, perhaps the most important is the need to inspect a cultivated surface several times, not merely once, to accurately gauge its true archaeological character.