Builders Began Digging for a New Development--and Accidentally Found an Ancient Lost Village

The astonishing discovery has ignited a fierce controversy.

BY TIM NEWCOMB
PUBLISHED: JUN 17, 2024 10:41 AM EDT

• A development project on a North Carolina intercoastal waterway was paused when construction crews found bones.
  
  
• A subsequent archaeological dig at the site turned up over 2,000 artifacts, including remnants of longhouses and evidence of a Native American village.
  
  
• The location has turned into a political debate, with the modern housing project at odds with the historical nature of the site.
  
  
  An archaeologist’s dream can be a developer’s nightmare. That’s definitely been the case in North Carolina, as the builders of the new Bridge View neighborhood along the intercostal waterway near Cedar Point uncovered ancient bones while trying to construct a new housing development.
  
  Now, the fate of what the acting state archeologist calls the most significant find he’s seen in the state in the past 30 years sits in a political battle, according to the television station WRAL.
  
  The crews first found bones. But as archeologists took over the site, they uncovered an additional 2,000 artifacts, including evidence of longhouses, fish drying racks, and ritual sites that all point to an early Native American village.
  
  “In the [European] contact period, it could have been a part of the Powhatan Confederation—the Indians that were met by the Jamestown settlers,” Chris Southerly, acting state archeologist, told WRAL, adding that the site has a rich history of multiple Native American groups converging for cross-cultural interactions.
  
  More:
  https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/archaeology/a61112171/north-carolina-ancient-village-discovered-development/