SOIL MORPHOLOGY ON STEEP UPLAND SLOPES IN THE BLUE RIDGE: DID NATIVE AMERICANS QUARRY HERE?

Both historical records of Native American settlements and archaeological models of the Blue Ridge indicate that Cherokee settlements in western North Carolina were located in valley bottoms with easy access to water and flat terrain for building. However, there is increasing evidence that across America many Native communities quarried and spent significant time on steep, upland slopes. We completed soil geomorphic analysis as part of a larger project aimed at investigating Paleo Indian or Cherokee occupation or quarrying in the Mills River area. Specifically, we examined soils on the ridgeline, the upper slope, and the mid-slope to understand how hillslopes formed, when colluvium stabilized, and how stable the hillslopes are today. Our process included describing fourteen soil profiles in the field as well as completing loss-on-ignition and particle size methods in the laboratory. Ridgetop profiles were primarily erosional, while upper and mid-slope profiles have thick sedimentary deposits at the surface. On the upper slope location, colluvium containing Holocene cultural material overlies saprolite approaching bedrock. The mismatch between very old saprolite and what appears to be Holocene colluvium would seem to suggest that bare bedrock or saprolite may have been exposed during the Pleistocene as no Pleistocene sediments are observed in the field area. Although CRM firms have found Native American artifacts in the form of hammerstones and quartz flakes, we observe no significant landscape change that would be attributed to heavy quarrying on the ridge. Further geologic and/or geomorphic mapping may provide additional insights or expose better evidence of quarrying in the area.