The two dozen or more illustrations here are taken of a plaster, block-diagram style model at a scale of 1:30, of the Miami Circle archeological site (8/DA/12) in downtown Miami, FL. The Circle was discovered and exposed by excavation during the latter half of 1998 and early part of 1999. It is attributed to the Tequesta and possibly other early prehistoric inhabitants, and a date of 2000 YBP has been associated with it.

     The “Circle” at this location is a ring of basins, about 26 in all, with an overall diameter of approximately 38 ft. They had presumptively been percusively pecked and otherwise incised into the basal Miami Oolitic limestone at this spot. Their actual function (still) remains unknown, but a hypothesis that they are analogous to post holes in soil layers on some archeological sites is not unreasonable.

     As one of the original excavating team here, I was much interested in the site and what we determined (and even moreso perhaps, in what we did not determine) about it. In a field marked by acrimony (archaeology), views about the “Circle” and its origin and meaning were probably more contentious than usual - and ultimately involved politicians, developers, activists, Native Persons, some scientists, and indeed many people from all walks of life. Partly because of this, and partly from other concerns, the site was closed and filled in. Its future, to the best of my knowledge at this date (7/03/01), is yet undecided.

     For the model, I cast a 2x2 ft. block of Plaster of Paris about 6 in. thick. Upon the flat surface of this when set, I projected an aerial photo view of the “Circle” near the closing days of the dig. This placed every one of the more than 700 “solution pits,” (so called), cavities, basins, earth banks and other features, in proper “map location” and relation. It remained then to hand-carve the many individual cavities into the block using woodcarvers skews, chisels, a power drill and other tools. The surrounding elevated original land surface was then built up with additional plaster, paper mache’, and other materials. The model was then painted with acrylics, as near to original colors as personal recall and existing color photos would permit. Elevations for the site were ignored as not significant on the scale selected (it was also inordinately difficult to come by “official” data both onsite and later after the dig closed, as the “Directors” were most uncooperative about this). The model surface, as that of the Circle itself, slopes slightly up to the south.

Detailing…

The Basins

     Details are the key to lifelike models. (I am a onetime rigged-ship modeler…), so am familiar with the “how to” of much of this work. Local resources , model shops, advisors, associates, budgeting, workspace, etc. being virtually non-existent at the time I undertook the project, I had to improvise extensively. With but one exception (the shredded cellular sponge and green-dyed human hair for the weeds) no professional modelmakers supplies were used.

     First, the cavities of the model were darkened with India ink to emulate the shadow-fill in the field - and to emphasize them for viewers (many!), who often do not know yet what the “Circle” is or was, or rightly refers to! The cleared limestone surface shows alternately gray-black tones and scrape marks and scratches - simulating the appearance of the cleared interior of the Circle in the field (compare the “aerial” side-by-side shots in the index). Fish tank gravel was used to suggest the broken cobbles often found in some basins. Two of the basins in the NW ring quadrant received green-stained, frosted plastic inserts, trimmed by hand (from a margerine tub lid!) to the basins’ irregular contours and closely simulate water-filled holes - which the basins often were after the frequent tropical rains which drenched us! If you look carefully, you can see blurred cobbles on the bottom of one such basin. (In the field, we would laboriously dip the basins dry again and again in the field during our muddy, wet work).

     Many basins contained portions of the large native marine whelks: Busycon, Strombus, etc. A stroll on our local beach turned up a trove one day: a deposit of very tiny (right scale!) whelks of either juvenile or even a different species altogether, but whose sizes and shapes were just right to suggest how the originals looked in the field. So I sifted them out with hand lens and kitchen sifter… and you can see them here and there about the model. Further, many of the tiny shells had been rolled and tumbled in the surf so that they were worn down to their columellae (central spirals) just as were their larger counterparts at the dig. (Whelk columellae were prime tool stock for the aborigines in a relatively stone-free land. In many cases they were used direct as tools or hammers themselves as evidenced by wear and battering marks). Some of the more suggestive of these tiny shells have been included in and around the Sifter Station (and in the actual sifter!) where they would first come to light.

     As to the basin shapes, it has been common for the newspaper writers and others who have written on the site (many of whom never visited it) to quote one another as to the basins all being “ovoid” or again, being “rectanguloid,” etc. And while many are indeed ovoid and at least “semi-rectanguloid,” a great many more are not. Some are amorphous at best, and many grade to really elongated, very narrow “slot-basins” as I have called them, and many of the ovoid types show one or more “necked” extensions or “tails” at one or the other or both ends. (A good “run” of necked types can be seen in the NE ring quadrant). As to the significance, if any, of these shape variations there can be (and has been!) dispute. Let it be further known that some basins have depressions and dips not always easily seen between them, that on massive flooding after heavy rains, allow one or more basins to drain into one another as one large filled “superbasin” or concatenation of basins. Again, how much of this may have been deliberate is debatable.

     The basin shapes in the model have been held as close as possible to original configurations and sizes as the often limited field data (available to me, at least), and other records, plus the bottom constraint of scale, permit.

“Eyeball Stone”

     One otherwise not too distinguished basin occurs at the E point of the Circle - recognizeable as a rather elliptical shallow basin containing a large unmodified cobble jammed into it. This was early-on dubbed the “Eyeball Stone” by the surveyor and dig authorities and by degrees came to be the “Mayan Glyph for Zero”, the “eye-of-the-sun-rising-in-the-morning” and other fanciful concepts. Writers described the cobble as a “pupil” and an “iris.” To me (and many others who dug here) it is but an unmodified cobble jammed, whether by accident or design, into this basin, and no convincing case for these latter interpretations has ever been made. It is shown on the model much as it appeared in the field.

Chaotic Zone

     An area on the SE rim of the ring, extending interiorally to it, consists of a quite large part natural/part modified (?) irregular opening into the basement limestone, and has both deliberate and natural pits down its sloping side and at bottom, where an odd apparently “natural” fenestration perhaps from ancient karstic activities, has left a portal through to an adjacent cavity. This area provided the deepest sounding (and cultural materials) on site; I have suggested this on the model as best I could. I designated it in my own fieldnotes at the time, and here too, as the “chaotic zone.”

Problematical

     Closely associated with it just to the west is a peculiar “problematical” in situ in one basin and showing a sort of “head” with a hole in it (see). In the field it was first thought this might be a portable fetish or “mobile art”, but at termination of the dig, I believe it was found to be still attached at depth to the underlying limestone.

Trench Extensions

     Originally started as probes to find “sighting-pole holes” at a specified distance east and west from the Circle’s perimeter (one radius out), these evolved into exploratory hand dug trenches (East and West) to search for “alignment” runs of holes and other esoterica in the stone basement exterior to the Circle perimeter. Space did not let me include the Trench Extensions (my designation) in the model, but they are clearly visible in the several aerial photos of the site. On the model their headward part, or where they began at the circle’s edge, shows as “gaps” or openings in the surrounding bank on the E and W sides. The “Eyeball Stone” lies just in front of the opening to the East Trench Extension, for instance. They were not precisely aligned across the Circle, though some later published drawings (i.e., Wheeler) and commentary, suggest they were.

Stratigraphy

     At the most basic, it can be said the Site consisted of the basement Oolite, overlain by a black earth aboriginal midden, upon which was incumbent a stratum - the uppermost - consisting of very disturbed local and nonlocal soils and materials - notably building trash attendant the demolition of the apartment complex that once rose above the site. A more detailed stratigraphic profile would reveal horizontal discontinuities to the midden stratum and most notably certain components of the top layer everywhere over the site, with lenses, churning, and “fill dumps” frequent in the latter. The midden, often said to be “intact,” might better be characterized as (charitably) “mostly intact” for there were anomalies (younger under older materials) some Colonia, and possibly some more recent intrusions here and there. Presumably, if the dig authorities ever publish careful vertical profiles for this dig, this will help clarify some issues here. In the model, the uppermost layer is shown as tannish yellow to suggest the same soil at the Site, the faces of the exposed midden are shown as black with white specks emulating the many shell fragments entrained therein. (A “hypothetical” shell lens is shown on the interior N face wall of the model - such as were infrequently noted in the midden itself elsewhere, but arbitrarily shown here for purposes of making it most visible). The lens in the model shows parallel long axes of shell columellae and other fragments: presumptive clues to either “trampling layers” of the earlier inhabitants or possibly just rough sorting and reworking by wind and weather after periodic site abandonments.

Surface

     The surface of the model reflects the disturbed nature of this upper stratum. I have included tiny discarded “tin cans” of actual metal (several say “beer” on their exteriors!). Perhaps they were tossed out by the archeologists: digging a site in Florida in summer is hot work! For scale, the tiny cans measure but 3/8 in. in length. Waste paper, plastic scrap, twisted metal, a section of brick wall (the tiny bricks only ½ in. long and ground down by hand by me from fragments of real bricks!), glass, plaster, even buried electric cable and TV wires as we frequently encountered, are all shown on the model (the latter in the SE bank side). Through it all the ever-present weeds poke forth.

Sifter Station

     Although the rebar-mounted rocker-sifters were easily moved and set up, we mostly maintained our Sifter Station at the NE side of the Circle. I have indicated it thus on the model. In the field we often had 3 or 4 sifters set up simultaneously and we water-washed most material. The model suggests how these wood frame sifters were set up on their flexible rebars (the sifting action is sort of a continous whipping motion…). Beneath the sifter is a pile of water-washed black fines, rivuleted and muddy just as in the field. (Sifters never have dry feet!). A couple of columellae fragments are showing in the sifter and on the ground just as they occurred in the field. Down the slope to the Circle (note there has been a dirt slide here you can see - caused by the constant foot traffic back and forth), someone has left a shovel, and two empty buckets have been tossed back into the Circle for the excavators…

Unit Under Removal

     A 5x5 unit in the black earth layer, appears off the NW corner of the N end of the footer wall. It is delineated by the several white level lines from corner stakes, upon one of which is a sliding line level. Other visible tools are the exacavator’s kit: whiskbroom, trowel and dustpan. A bucket stands nearby. In the center of the unit the semicircular arc of a just-exposed marine turtle carapace is visible.

Footer Wall

     A footing from the earlier building activities was left intact, running N/S in the E half of the Circle. On its surface is a b&w painted scale board: the large rectangles are 1 ft., the small rectangles are .5ft. The scaleboard was to register scale in overhead and helicopter shots…

Septic Tank

     One of the most controversial elements in early interpretations of the site was the putative role assigned the intrusive septic tank on the S edge of the basins ring. A prominent state anthropologist (Milanich), who first visited the site after it was closed, raised an issue that the basins themselves might relate to some kind of drainage plan for this tank, dating to about 50 years ago when an apartment complex was built here. He never said this was “so,” but couched his caveats in language such that many got that opinion from them. Though few of us who dug on site believed the basins related in any way to the tank, it was a very long time before resort was made to testimony of professional septic installers and to existing blueprints of the septic installations for the vanished apartments, and other evidences were marshaled to quell this demurrer (not before an article on same had been published by the authority in a leading coffee-table archeology magazine, it remains to add). As the model shows, the tank sits in a sharp rectangular cavity that was excavated by machine for it when installed…and required only back then for one to “look” to behold this fact… just as now, in the model…

Materials, Methods…

     The block was cast, as noted, in a wooden jacket. A print-out of the aerial photo was pasted to the surface and features were cut into the plaster by carving right through their images on the photo. There is some margin of error: at the scales selected anything less than 2 in. was not really plottable and some things at that size range may be photo artifacts of shadow and hue (this is borne out by photos of the same areas taken at different times of day where minor features can be seen to appear and then vanish). The various manmade tools and objects are to provide suggestion of relative scale on the model.. The transit is 2.5 in. tall, made from kitchen toothpicks, and features a sighting tube and level cut from tiny wire brads; a tiny brass bushing provided a fortuitous instrument base. It also has a plumb bob on a thread (the “bob” is the tiny point of a 6-penny nail cut off and glued to the thread). The sifter is made from individually hand cut wood planks, assembled separately, and vinyl screen to simulate real appearance. The “rebar rods” are cut from paper clip stock. The cans are formed from rolled aluminum beer can stock (I drank a number of them before I was through here, believe me!). By good fortune I found that the 8-oz size of Bud Light has the word “beer” printed in very small type in its label plus other tiny design elements, and by snipping them out carefully, I was able to work the pieces up as labeled beer cans!

     The crushed “cardboard boxes” are real fiberboard stock; the tape likewise. The scrap plastic is from cut up black vinyl garbage bags. (The real McCoy. Lol!). The cables are electric bellwire. Bricks and mortar scrap are ground down from real materials. Weeds, as noted, are shredded cellular sponge plus green-dyed human hair…

    If you take up modeling, I have one word of advice: learn to sneeze sideways! 

Enjoy!

© 2001 by B. W. Powell - All rights reserved.