UCL in the News: Dig opens window to the past

For the past three years, archaeologists from the University of Maryland have been working to uncover and reconstruct the community that once existed there, to determine what buildings stood there and what the daily life of slaves was like. …

The project will help fill in the missing history on the Long Green, explained Matt Cochran [UCL Anthropology], a Ph.D. student at UCL and associate director of this summer's dig. He emphasized the stark contrast between the histories existing on either side of the road at Wye House farm.

"The frustrating thing about this is we have a good understanding of the Long Green - it was the economic heart of the whole plantation," he said.

"Every corner was chock full of people. The basic question is to understand the composition of this area; to piece together the daily lives of the people enslaved here. …

"On the left you have the Long Green, all the quarters for enslaved individuals; on the right you have a very formalized landscape ... The symbolic split played out right in front of you - how do you start looking at this landscape?" …

Last summer, the archaeologists unearthed a brick slave quarters that would likely have been standing in the 1820s. …

They also uncovered two other buildings, and returned to those sites this summer to identify the structures. …

Joy La Prade, 'The Star Democrat' (Maryland, USA)