Climate change has taken a toll on Virginia coasts, but property owners aren’t the only ones losing ground. Archaeologists say clues to Virginia’s early history are rapidly disappearing.
That’s the sound of volunteers uncovering Virginia’s early history – taking part in an annual dig that draws people from around the country to explore what remains of early European settlements and the places where native Americans lived and worked. State archaeologist Mike Barber says sea level rise and catastrophic storms have taken a toll on about 200 historic spots along Virginia’s coast.
“We recently did a study that compared the sites as they are now with the survey of 15 years ago, and we found that 35 of the sites have completely disappeared – eroded away," he says. “A lot of these are early 17th century historic sites. In fact we’ll be working on one that we think dates back to as early as 1637 this spring, but also a lot of pre-historic sites, which include villate sites, camping sites, etc., so we’ve got the whole story there. It’s just that we’re losing it right now.”
Varna Boyd is with AEComm – a large engineering and consulting company. She says it may be possible in some cases to protect historically significant areas.
“There are engineered options, rip rap, plantings along the shore, groins, seawalls, but obviously those tend to be a little more costly,” she explains.
So Barber is calling on the state to prioritize the most important sites and begin digs as quickly as possible. On the eastern shore, he says, we’ve lost 60-feet on average over the past 15 years, Barber hopes Virginia to prioritize the most important places and begin digging soon for arrowheads, shards of pottery, shells and other evidence of how native Americans and early European settlers lived. This week, he’s overseeing a team of volunteers doing just that on the Eastern Shore.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from theVirginia Education Association.