The Petrographic Analysis of Sherds from the Craig Mound at the Spiro site (34Lf40), the Moore #3/Ainsworth site (34Lf31), and the Geren site (34Lf36), LeFlore County, Oklahoma

Abstract

James A. Brown commissioned James W. Porter to carry out a preliminary assessment of the paste of sherds from the Spiro site (34Lf40), as well as sherds from the nearby Geren (34Lf36) and Moore (34Lf31) sites. According to Brown, Porter’s goal was to “make assessments of the clay mineralogy and petrography of thin sections,” specifically with an “interest in discriminating between (1) grog and grit temper and (2) shell and grog temper with shell inclusions.” Twenty-nine thin sections were prepared, 27 from sherds from the Craig Mound, and one sherd each from the Moore/ Ainsworth and Geren sites, both not far from Spiro. Shortly after Ferring and Perttula completed petrographic studies of red-slipped pottery from sites in Oklahoma and Texas, Brown offered to send the thin-sections from his Spiro area studies to Ferring for more detailed petrographic studies. This he did sometime in 1987, but the 29 thin-sections were never fully studied, and they languished for years at the University of North Texas. In 2012, Ferring relocated the thin-sections and corresponding sherds and sent them to Perttula to complete the petrographic analysis of the Spiro area sherd series. The results of the petrographic analysis of a total of 23 of the 29 thin-sections are discussed in this article; there are provenience issues with the other six thin-sections.