The Belcher Mound, A Stratified Caddoan Site in Caddo Parish, Louisiana. Webb Clarence H., Memoirs of the Society for American Archaeology, No. 16, Salt Lake City, 1959. 212 pp., 142 figs., 4 tables. $3.00.

1960 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 621-621 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles R. McGimsey III
Keyword(s):  
Salt Lake ◽  
Salt Lake City ◽  
American Archaeology ◽  
Lake City

Nels C. Nelson and Chronological Archaeology

1960 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 400-401 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard B. Woodbury
Keyword(s):  
New Mexico ◽  
Statistical Analysis ◽  
Normal Distribution ◽  
Annual Meeting ◽  
Salt Lake ◽  
Salt Lake City ◽  
American Archaeology ◽  
Chronological Change ◽  
Lake City ◽  
Galisteo Basin

AbstractA series of papers at the 24th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, in Salt Lake City in 1959, was devoted to Developments in Dating Techniques, and dedicated to Nels C. Nelson in recognition of his pioneering role in establishing the technique of stratigraphic excavation in America. During his work in the Galisteo Basin of New Mexico in 1914 he dug a series of ten 1-foot levels, classified all the sherds found in them into seven types, and calculated their frequencies by levels. These resembled sections of normal distribution curves, and demonstrated that statistical analysis of data from arbitrary levels could reveal chronological change just as could data from physically distinct strata. Within a few years this technique was employed by several other archaeologists and it continues to the present to be an indispensable technique of investigation.

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