Results from the 2009 Tar River Geoarchaeological Survey

o 25 50 100 150 200 *_-CJl--=__-===___Kilome ers s Fig. 1: Study area within the Tar River drainage basin, Pitt and Edgecombe Counties, North Carolina. (Figure produced in ArcGIS by Christopher Moore) Fieldwork along the Tar River in North Carolina continued in the summer of 2009 with collaborative research on archaeologically stratified aeolian and fluvial landforms (Fig. 1). This work is a collaborative effort betvveen the authors and involves ongoing archaeological and geoarchaeological investigations at Barber Creek (31PT259), Squires Ridge (31ED365), and Owens Ridge (31ED369). The later two sites were identified during the doctoral dissertation research of the senior author (Moore 2009b). The primary objectives of this research include: 1) the refinement of cultural chronologies and artifact typologies for the North Carolina Coastal Plain, 2) the development of a radiocarbon and luminescence (OSL) geochronology for stratified sites along the Tar River, and 3) examining linkages between paleo-environmental change (i.e., rapid climate change or RCC events)