News

Paper presented at the 2026 Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference. Monticello’s North Yard, excavated between 1985 and 1989 and encompassing the area directly north of Thomas Jefferson’s mansion house, represents one of the last major legacy projects in Monticello’s collection to undergo comprehensive reanalysis. Using new data, this paper investigates the chronology of the North Yard and the complex processes of site formation that shaped it.

Paper presented at the 2026 Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference. This paper highlights the importance of comparing reanalyzed coarse earthenware assemblages from different Monticello sites to identify variation in type frequency. This type of analysis is the first step in learning about different patterns of trade and acquisition within the plantation community.

Paper presented at the 2026 Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference. This paper explores the advantages, and challenges, of using gastroliths in the archaeological record as evidence of foodways and enslaved people’s participation in local economies at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.

Paper presented at the 2026 Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference. The Monticello Archaeology Department has focused efforts to create standardized and reproducible methods for assessing chronological boundaries. Using Building s (constructed c. mid-1790s) as our next pilot study, we aim to further test the reproducibility of our methods and what they can reveal about how life changed over time for enslaved laborers on the mountaintop.

Archaeologists at Monticello have recently discovered a brick kiln on the East Lawn of the Monticello mountaintop. This is an exciting development and a reminder that we are still actively learning about Monticello, its built environment, and the people who lived and labored here.

Recent archaeological excavations at Monticello have exposed a 10-foot section of the privy tunnel, installed for the second phase of the Monticello house (Monticello II) in order to mitigate the smell of newly built indoor privies. This project has provided an opportunity for us to collaborate with our Geology and Restoration colleagues to better understand the craftsmanship and materials that went into the privy vent construction.

Paper presented at the 2025 Archaeological Society of Virginia Conference. Beginning in January 2025, Monticello archaeologists began mitigation efforts for a new pathway on Monticello’s East Lawn. Using information from one test square, this paper aims to discuss preliminary findings regarding the creation of the East Lawn landscape and when/how it has changed, using both stratigraphic and artifact analysis.

In collaboration with geoarchaeologist Howard Cyr, archaeologists at Monticello continue to analyze the micromorphology - or the microscopic analysis of blocks of sediment - at Home Farm Quarter Site 30. Monticello archaeologists carried out an initial round of excavations at this site from 2022-2024, during which time they uncovered a subfloor pit, used for storage of foodstuffs and other goods. Samples were taken from this feature and sent for specialized analysis.

Check out some cool artifact research coming out of our latest excavations on the mountaintop! Analyst Miranda Leclerc dives into an investigation of an interesting decorative technique found on a British creamware sherd from a likely teaware vessel. Using the Monticello Archaeology study collection, she discusses this vessel in comparison with other excavated sites on the mountaintop.

Paper presented at the 2025 Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference. This paper discusses how recent efforts to interpret the coarse earthenware assemblage at Site 30, an enslaved quarter site at Monticello, highlighted the need to reanalyze the coarse earthenware assemblage from Building o, an enslaved quarter site excavated during the early 1980s. It shows how reanalyzing legacy data using updated type descriptions and standardized terminology developed by the DAACS project allows for a more fine-grained and accurate comparative analysis of coarse earthenware assemblages at different sites.

The DAACS team is in the final stages of cataloging over 50,000 artifacts and accompanying fields records from three urban house lots in historic St. Augustine – Fatio, de la Cruz, and de Leon – as part of the Digitizing St. Augustine Project, a collaboration with colleagues at the Florida Museum of Natural History, funded by NEH. In their most recent work, they discovered a remarkable artifact: a pipe bowl carved from the broken rim of an Iberian storage jar!

Paper presented at the 2024 Southeastern Archaeological Conference. Like many archaeological sites once occupied by free and enslaved members of the slave society that expanded into the Virginia Piedmont in the eighteenth century, Site 7 at Monticello presents a difficult analytical challenge. This paper describes two of the methods we have developed to provide an answer.

Paper presented at the 2024 Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference. Recent excavations at Site 30, a late 18th-century quarter site for enslaved agricultural workers at Monticello, have uncovered various types of American coarse earthenware, including a distinctive lead-glazed variety currently unaffiliated with any regional workshop. This paper presents a preliminary analysis of this coarse earthenware type.

Paper presented at the 2024 Southeastern Archaeological Conference. Updated approaches to dating can help reassess legacy assemblages. This paper discusses ways to parse out stratified deposits to define chronological boundaries. We apply this preliminary research to the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Mulberry Row dwellings and working structures. Identifying the most accurate variables for occupational phasing will expand our understanding of how Mulberry Row changed over time.

The Monticello Archaeology and DAACS team will be heading to Williamsburg, VA in November for the 80th annual Southeastern Archaeological Conference. We have a wide range of papers, posters, and workshops planned to share our some of our recent archaeological work. We have a wide range of papers, posters, and workshops planned to share our some of our recent archaeological work. Get the full description of paper and workshop abstracts here.

Scroll through this image gallery to see examples of vessels so far recovered and analyzed from our current excavation at Site 30. These lead-glazed coarse earthenwares vary significantly in their physical attributes, providing a glimpse into the level of experimentation occurring in American potteries during the late-18th century.

Paper presented at the 2024 Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference. In 1957 and 1958, two Harvard graduate students—Oriol Pi-Sunyer and Vladimir Markotic—undertook respective archaeological investigations at Monticello. This paper will outline the history of these excavations, the methods by which we parsed out their resulting artifacts, and the ways these assemblages will contribute to our historical interpretation.