Horr's Island facts for kids
Horr's Island is a very important archaeological site in Southwest Florida. It's a place where scientists study how people lived a long, long time ago. This island, now called Key Marco, is just south of Marco Island in Collier County, Florida.
At Horr's Island, you can find four large mounds and a special shell ring. One of the mounds holds one of the oldest known burials in the eastern United States. This burial is about 3,400 years old! Another mound is even older, dating back around 6,700 years. Horr's Island was the biggest known community in the southeastern United States where people lived all year round during the Archaic period (from about 8000 BCE to 1000 BCE).
The island got its name from Capt. John Foley Horr. He grew pineapples there in the late 1800s. His house, the Capt. John Foley Horr House, is now a protected historic place. In the late 1980s, a company wanted to build on Horr's Island. Before they could, state law said they had to check the island for old artifacts. So, the company paid for a team of scientists to dig and study the island for three months.
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Ancient Mounds of Horr's Island
Scientists found four large mounds on Horr's Island. Two of them, Mounds B and C, were mostly simple piles of old trash, called middens. A burial was found in Mound B. The other two mounds, Mound A and Mound D, were built on purpose.
Mound A: A Special Burial Place
Mound A was the biggest mound, standing about 20 feet tall. It had a huge pile of shells at its center. There was no sign that people lived on the ground before the shells were piled up. Over the shells, several layers of sand were added. One layer even had charcoal mixed in. Scientists could see how individual baskets of sand were added by looking at the charcoal. The top layer of sand had shells mixed in, and the mound was finished with another layer of shells.
Two burials were found at the top of Mound A. These graves were dug after the mound was finished. One of these burials is about 3,400 years old. This makes it the oldest known mound burial in the eastern United States! Scientists didn't dig into the very center of Mound A, so there might be more burials hidden inside.
Scientists used special tests to find out how old the mounds are. Samples from Mound A are between 3,620 and 4,760 years old. Mound D, another purpose-built mound, is about 4,450 years old. Mound C is around 4,870 to 4,860 years old. The oldest parts of Mound B are between 6,730 and 4,030 years old.
The Horr's Island Shell Ring
The Horr's Island site also has a unique shell ring. This is a large circle or horseshoe shape made from piles of shells, with an open space in the middle. Many shell rings from the Late Archaic period are found along the coasts of South Carolina and Georgia. A few others are found along the Florida coast and the Gulf of Mexico. Shell rings are often linked to the first places where people lived all year round along the coasts of the southeastern United States.
The shell ring at Horr's Island was shaped like a long horseshoe. It's one of the few places where a shell ring is clearly connected to special ceremonial mounds. The ring was about 160 meters long and 100 meters wide. The open space in the middle, called a plaza, was 125 meters wide at its widest point. The shell piles that made up the ring were up to three meters high. Scientists believe the shell ring was built between 4,800 and 4,200 years ago.
Tools and Homes of Ancient People
Scientists didn't find any pottery at Horr's Island. Things made of wood, plant fibers, or animal hides didn't survive in the sandy soil. However, animal bones were very well preserved! The only tools that lasted were made from stone and shell.
Since there wasn't much good stone nearby, the people made many tools from shells. They found only one stone point, which was probably traded from another area. They also found grooved stone slabs and small round stones. These might have been used to sharpen shell tools or grind seeds and dried fish. Shells were used as hammers, sharp awls, celts (like axes), and digging tools. People also used shells as bowls, dippers, and spoons.
Scientists found more than 600 postholes, which are holes where wooden posts once stood. The way these holes were arranged showed that people built small, round homes. They likely used young trees as upright posts, bending the tops to meet in the middle. These homes were probably covered with palm leaves for thatching.
What Did They Eat?
The bones found during the digs showed that the people ate 74 different kinds of fish and shellfish. They ate only eight kinds of land animals. Oysters were the most common food. Other shellfish included quahogs, surf clams, scallops, whelks, and conchs.
Scientists studied the many fish bones in detail. Most of the fish were small and about the same size. Archaeologists think the fish were caught in nets with very small holes, about 1/4 inch. Since the nets were pulled by hand, bigger fish could escape by jumping over the net or swimming away.
They also found burnt plant seeds in old cooking areas and living spaces. These included tiny seeds from a type of grass, along with seeds from sea grape, cocoplum, prickly pear, and wild grape.
Living on Horr's Island All Year Round
The types of fish and shellfish found gave clues about when they were caught. The three most common fish eaten were catfish, threadfin herring, and pinfish. These were caught when they were young. Their average size showed the time of year they were caught.
Bay scallops disappear from the area every winter and start growing again in the spring. So, the size of scallop shells also helped tell the time of year they were gathered. Finally, quahog shells have seasonal growth bands, like tree rings. These bands can show what season, or even what month, a quahog was collected.
By studying the bones and shells, scientists learned that quahogs were gathered in winter and spring. Scallops were gathered in the summer. Fish were caught mostly in the fall, but also in winter and summer. This evidence led archaeologists to believe that Horr's Island was lived in all year round during the late Archaic period. It was the largest known community in the southeastern United States to be permanently occupied during that time.
