Kenneth E. Lewis

Functional Variation among Settlements on the South Carolina Frontier: An Archaeological Perspective

Publisher Summary The expansion of British settlement in 18th-century South Carolina involved a series of events and changes that reflect the operation of a developmental process common to areas undergoing agricultural colonization. As human behavior is revealed in the material record of the society in which it took place, evidence of this process of colonization is likely to be discernible in the archaeological remains of frontier settlements. This chapter describes the way in which archaeological methodology may be employed in observing aspects of frontier change on the basis of material data obtained from the sites of settlements in a former colonial area. The investigation of settlement distribution and composition involves two aspects of settlement patterning and must be carried out using two different types of material data. The study of form involves the settlement system as a whole and its changes through time; therefore, it must be examined on a regional basis at various points in its development. The study of settlement composition focuses attention on specific loci of activity as they existed at the peak of their development during the colonial period. The chapter focuses only on particular aspects of insular frontier colonization. Archaeological data can provide a detailed account of past processes of sociocultural change and, in many cases, may supply the most complete record of the past.

The Metropolis and the Backcountry: The Making of a Colonial Landscape on the South Carolina Frontier

The colonial settlement of South Carolina in the 18th century resulted in the emergence of two largely separate economies, the organization of which gave rise to distinctive frontier landscapes. The commercial rice economy of the Lowcountry was characterized by dispersed plantation production facilitated by riverine transportation. The urban functions of this largely rural landscape were centered on entrepôt of Charleston, a city whose size and material wealth reflected the region’s commercial success. The Backcountry initially lacked access to the entrepôt’s urban and export markets and its regional isolation fostered insular economic institutions dispersed among smaller nucleated settlements linked by overland routes. Commercial investment by Charleston interests eventually established the infrastructure of specialized production in the Backcountry and incorporated its resources in the larger export economy. The settlement system that emerged in the interior reflected these changes, but did not emulate the Lowcountry. Rather, it bore the imprint of the frontier landscape, components of which merely acquired new roles as regional nodes in South Carolina’s expanding economy, the focus of which remained the older entrepôt that emerged as the South’s major port in the post-frontier period.

Examining the Insular Frontier in South Carolina: Research Directions and Archaeological Hypotheses

This chapter highlights the frontier process in terms of the subsystemic organization of 18th century British colonial culture. Eleven archaeological hypotheses have been formulated to present the characteristics of the frontier process in terms of the subsystemic organization of 18th century British colonial culture. Each hypothesis specifies the types of activities that are likely to be associated with the various aspects of insular frontier change. Each hypothesis indicates expected changes in one or more of the three subsystems that play important roles in the organization of colonial societies. These hypotheses describe the insular frontier process as a cross-cultural phenomenon, applicable generally to the study of overseas agricultural colonization. To define this process in terms of the particular case of the South Carolina frontier, it is necessary to further deduce a series of test implications for each hypothesis.

Beyond the Insular Frontier

This chapter highlights insular frontier colonization, which is one of the dominant processes associated with the expansion of Europe and has potential usefulness in analyzing the development of most areas occupied by intrusive Old World populations. The insular frontier model is not intended to describe other types of colonization that accompanied European expansion. Cosmopolitan frontiers are regions of specialized economic activity that exhibit little of the fundamental change associated with insular frontiers. Instead they reflect the variability inherent in their specific functions. The need to describe and explain the range of variation encompassed by this phenomenon requires the creation of an additional frontier model or models. Unlike their agricultural counterparts, cosmopolitan frontiers arise to accommodate specialized, extractive economic activities in peripheral areas of the world economy. Because of their limited interests, these frontiers are often short term and impermanent. Their close economic ties with the homeland result in an absence of the insularity found in frontiers characterized by permanent settlement. Therefore, cosmopolitan frontiers experience little indigenous change. Cosmopolitan frontier change is an adaptation to the economic system in which it plays a major role rather than an adaptation to the economic and social milieu of peripheral areas. As a consequence, cosmopolitan frontiers exhibit a greater degree of cultural uniformity despite their varied environments.

Examining Hypotheses for Settlement Pattern and the Distribution of Activities

This chapter examines hypotheses for settlement pattern and the distribution of activities derived from the characteristics of the frontier model. The sequential occupation of sites in South Carolina has permitted to observe the development of English settlement in this colonial region. These data imply a general expansion outward from the entrepot of Charleston along the coast and then inland along the major river drainages. The distribution of structures, archaeological sites, and cemeteries show a settlement system tied together by a dendritic network of transport routes focused on the principal port. The overall pattern of settlement alone, however, reveals little about the systems organization. To investigate this aspect of insular frontier colonization, it is necessary to examine the remains of individual settlements themselves according to their position within the trade and communications network and their form and content. The function of a frontier settlement is linked largely to the economic activities associated with it. Such activities reflect its role in the production of staple commodities, which is related, in turn, to the settlements position in the network of trade and communications. Settlements may be ranked according to their relative economic function into three basic categories, namely, frontier towns, nucleated settlements, and dispersed settlements.

The Development of a Frontier Model

Frontiers associated with European expansion are the most intensively studied examples of colonization. The grand scale on which European colonization occurred between the 15th and the 19th centuries marked a departure from earlier expansion and paralleled the economic revolution that propelled the nation states of Europe into positions of world dominance. Processes that accompanied this expansion reflected the role played by colonization in the capitalist economic milieu of this period. This chapter explains European overseas expansion to isolate those economic and ecological variables associated with capitalist frontier colonization. On the basis of comparative evidence, it should be possible to recognize general processes of change associated with the settlement of colonial regions and construct models of frontier change capable of describing and explaining the development of such areas.

Examining Hypotheses for the Colony's Establishment

Eleven archaeological hypotheses for insular frontier change have been set forth from the characteristics of the frontier model. Each hypothesis deals with a different aspect of this process as it is likely to affect intrusive colonial societies. The hypotheses derived from the characteristics of the frontier model specify conditions that are expected as a result of the operation of the process of insular frontier change on the systemic structure of the intrusive British society that colonized South Carolina in the late 17th and 18th centuries. This chapter explains the hypotheses for the colonys establishment as a permanent area of settlement. Establishment is crucial to the existence of insular frontier colonization and must occur if the other characteristics of this process are to take place. The chapter highlights material data from an insular frontier region as evidence in support of the hypotheses for the colonys establishment. The first hypothesis for the colonys establishment predicts that archaeological data will provide evidence for the establishment of a British colony in South Carolina and the continued maintenance of economic and social ties between the colonial society and the parent state throughout the period of colonization. Evidence for establishment must reveal both cultural affiliation between the colonial population and that of the homeland and its continuation over a sustained period.

The Development of South Carolina as an Insular Frontier

Colonial South Carolina exhibited formal and organizational characteristics similar to those described in the model of insular frontier settlement. Although its history represents an adaptation to conditions particular in time and space, the form these adaptations took reflects a strategy employed by other agricultural societies of colonial Europe. Such a strategy is linked to the process of insular frontier change described in the model. This chapter describes the aspects of this process revealed in historical sources. Colonial South Carolina underwent intensive settlement of the type described in the model of insular frontier colonization. Characteristics of change associated with this colonization process are evident in the historical sources relating to the early development of the region. These sources reveal not only the broad economic, social, and political changes that occurred on a regional basis but also the form these changes took in individual settlements on the frontier.

Examining Hypotheses for Spatial Patterning

Archaeological analysis has permitted to recognize an English colonial presence in late 17th- and 18th-century South Carolina. To investigate this region further, it is necessary to define it as a spatial entity possessing a pattern of settlement reflecting the organization of an insular frontier economy. Two main elements of spatial patterning should be recognizable here. The first is the presence of a centrally placed entrepot with direct access to the metropolitan area. As the social, political, and economic focus of the area of colonization, the entrepot should lie at the hub of a dendritic network of trade and communications that affects the distribution of pioneer settlement. The establishment of a dendritic settlement system is the second element of spatial patterning crucial to the recognition of an insular frontier region. This chapter explains both of these elements through an analysis of archaeological evidence from South Carolina.

Examining Hypotheses for Expansion

An examination of the spatial patterning of settlement in colonial South Carolina has revealed that the region was characterized by a dendritic settlement distribution centered on the coastal entrepot of Charleston. One implication of this patterning is that settlement occurred first on the coast in the vicinity of the entrepot and then spread inland along a series of overland routes. Expansion is the dynamic aspect of insular frontier colonization and through it the evolution of settlement systems may be observed. The hypotheses to be addressed for expansion deal with colonial expansion and the changes it is likely to have brought about in settlement patterns and the organization of transport. The anticipated changes are integral to the insular frontier process and material evidence of their occurrence should be discernible. The recognition of change will document South Carolinas development as a spatial entity and provide a framework in which the organization of frontier activities may subsequently be examined.