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In Caldwell County, the upper Yadkin River rises on the eastern ®ank of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The river ®ows northeast at the foot of the mountains to form a valley nearly 20 miles long before turning east and then south to ®ow through the North Carolina Piedmont. The northeasttrending Yadkin valley is the region described here (see Figure 8 for locations of sites discussed in this chapter). Little systematic archaeological work had been conducted in the region until recently (Idol 1995, 1996; Kimball et al. 1996). However, one site, 31CW8, was excavated by Richard Polhemus in 1964 (Polhemus n.d.) and, of course, the mound excavations conducted in the valley in the nineteenth century are well known as the result of Cyrus Thomas’s mound exploration reports (Thomas 1887, 1894). The upper Yadkin River valley and the Catawba River valley are strikingly similar with respect to the presence of earthen mounds and an abundance of soapstone-tempered Burke ceramics. The presence of Burke ceramics is particularly striking. The previous chapter described the heavy concentration of Burke ceramics in Burke County along the upper tributaries of the Catawba River. Soapstone-tempered pottery has also been reported from southwest Virginia (Holland 1970:67–68), upper east Tennessee on the Nolichucky and Watauga rivers (Boyd 1986a, 1986b), and at the Ward site (Senior 1981) on the Watauga River in North Carolina. Soapstone-tempered pottery is also found in the middle Catawba and lower Catawba valley areas (see chapter 4). However, outside of Burke County, the upper Yadkin River valley in Caldwell and Wilkes counties is the only locale where soapstone-tempered Burke series pottery occurs on numerous sites, sometimes almost to the exclusion of other types. William H. Holmes (1903) was the ¤rst to write about the upper Yadkin valley pottery. His (Holmes 1903:144) descriptions of the pottery excavated from the Nelson Mound and Triangle and the Davenport Jones Mound in Caldwell County led him to observe that this pottery re®ected in®uence from the north, west, and south, but that it was from the latter direction that the major in®uence was felt. Holmes (1903:143–144) also noted the pottery bore “evidence of recentness, and in cases, of relationship to modUpper Yadkin Valley Sites and Ceramics 3 ern ware.” By modern ware, Holmes was referring to historic Catawba pottery made in the 1880s. This was the ¤rst statement describing what we now call Burke pottery and its obvious similarities to the Lamar ceramics in Georgia and to historic Catawba pottery. It is also important to note that the distance from 31BK17 to the Nelson Mound site is less than 15 miles and there is a direct link between the Catawba and Yadkin valleys through Mulberry Creek, a large creek that drains from just south of Happy Valley (the community name for the mound locale) to its con®uence with Johns River just above 31BK17. This is also the vicinity of the mound explored by Dr. James Mason Spainhour on the Michaux Farm (chapter 2), and Thomas (1891:153) reported two mounds near the con®uence of Mulberry Creek with Johns River and two more mounds in the Collettsville vicinity. Though none of these mounds has been identi¤ed, it is known from collectors that large sites are found in this area, and collectors also report sites on Mulberry Creek with soapstone-tempered pottery (Figure 8 illustrates the proximity of the major Upper Creek and Johns River sites with the upper Yadkin valley sites). Given the proximity of the upper Yadkin River to the upper Catawba River tributaries, and the occurrence of multiple mound sites and Burke pottery in each area, it seems likely that the sites in the upper Yadkin valley are related in some manner to the sites along Johns River and Upper Creek Figure 8. Location of archaeological sites in the upper Yadkin River valley. upper yadkin valley sites and ceramics / 101 in Burke County. A review of the eighteenth-century investigations in the light of and along with data from more recent work in the upper Yadkin valley is relevant to understanding potential relationships between the two areas. The investigations reported by Thomas (1887, 1891, 1894) were actually carried out in 1882 by John P. Rogan, apparently often assisted by Spainhour. The excavated sites included the T. F. Nelson Mound (31CW1) and the T. F. Nelson Triangle (31CW2), the W. Davenport Jones Mound (31CW4), and the R. T. Lenoir Burial Pit (31CW5). The remainder of...

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