Associate Professor Matthew Purtill
Associate Professor Matthew Purtill recently had an article published in the international Journal of Field Archaeology.
In “Dirty Evidence: Multi-Method Identification of Daub, Animal Dung, or Human Excrement at Angel Mounds,” Dr. Purtill used the Department of Geology and Environmental Sciences’ SEM-EDS, along with micromorphology and geochemistry, to evaluate the origin of unusual microscopic aggregates from a 500-year-old Native American house basin located at the Angel Mounds State Park in Indiana.
Results indicated that villagers used the abandoned house basin to occasionally dispose of human waste, offering a rare insight into sanitation practices in pre-European Native American villages.
