Cellar Dwellers: Historic Feature Sampling Strategies in Ontario Commercial Archaeology

This study will explore the logics of a particular practice in the commercial archaeology industry in Ontario. This practice is embodied within the standards and guidelines the provincial governing body released in 2011 for commercial archaeology in Ontario. One specific standard directs excavation methodologies for larger cellar features found on nineteenth century domestic sites. This standard stipulates that consultant archaeologists are only required to excavate a minimum of two opposing quadrants of the feature, or 50 percent of the contents. A best practice guideline, alternatively, gives the consultant the option to excavate the feature wholly. As a document governing cultural resource management across Ontario, the Standards and Guidelines for Consultant Archaeologists (2011) effectively codifies excavating 50 percent of a cellar feature as sufficient for analysis and retention for future research. This study examined a sample of consultant reports detailing the full excavation of cellar features to counterfactually test the assumptions behind the notion that 50 percent recovery is sufficient for conservation and future research purposes. The findings of this study demonstrated that the excavation of opposing quadrants does not accurately sample cellar contents or depositional history. Instead, this standard reflects stereotypes about cellar feature uniformity, assumptions about commercial expediencies realized when only recovering half of such features, and the legacy of a lesser value held for this part of the record in Ontario archaeology