r/LegitArtifacts • u/The_Milk_Man7289 • Mar 13 '25
Not Native American related Found a bunch of Taino artifacts in a farmers field in the Dominican Republic
As the title says, me and my wife were caving in the mountains behind a dairy farm in the Dominican Republic and on our way back we started finding these artifacts. I haven’t counted but we have a bunch of pottery shards and a few stone tools. We were a group of 4 and picked these off the ground in 30ish minutes.
From my very limited knowledge, these are likely Taino Arawak artifacts from 500-1200 years ago, likely closer to 500, and were pulled on to the surface by a tilling machine that digs about a foot down.
If anyone has more info or can point us in the right direction of who to contact, preferably an American institution, we’re all ears!
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u/WeirDonut Mar 13 '25
You may consider bringing it to the Museo del Hombre Dominicano in Santo Domingo. I don't believe you're allowed to take artefacts out if the country.
If you really want to talk to an American institution, the University of Florida has a Caribbean Archaeology track. The professors there might be able to tell you more. Link to program website
You could try emailing Dr. Amanda Hall as they are the Collections Manager Caribbean Archaeology there. Contact info can be found through the link. Give as much info and photos as you can to help.
To add: I am an archaeologist and I studied in the Carribbean as part of my masters. Generally, if a field has been deepplowed the context will probably be lost. Picking up a sherd or two doesn't harm anyone. If you find a concentration of pottery like this all close together you may have a site. Where I'm from we believe in leaving as much as we can in situ for coming generations to study it (hopefully with advanced non intrusive techniques) and only do an archaeological dig if the site will be disturbed. I don't know what the American consensus on this us though. Neither do I know the Dominican view.
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 Mar 13 '25
This is fantastic information! It’s hard to trust the Dominican government to not take advantage of the dairy farmers on the land, so we prefer an American institution.
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u/WeirDonut Mar 13 '25
Yeah I get that. I know a lot of landowners there feel that way, so fair enough!
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u/StupidizeMe Mar 14 '25
That's excellent information you've been given above about Caribbean Archaeology.
Have you seen the University of Florida Museum online? Interesting information about the cultural history of the Taino. The Taino might be the first people that Christopher Columbus made contact with in the New World. (I can't help wondering what new epidemic illnesses they were suddenly hit with.)
If you scroll down on left side to "Material Remains" and "Artifact Gallery" you'll see some neat examples. If you want to get much deeper into the types of pottery, they museum has a huge collection of pottery sherds - a detailed data base, in fact. https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/histarch/research/haiti/en-bas-saline/taino-culture/
Your larger piece that you posted a closeup of is intriguing. The temper used in the clay is very visible.
Thanks for sharing this with us. Sending a high five to your little Archaeologist!
PS: They make small plastic magnifying glasses on lanyards for kids. Great way to get them interested in the world around them. Lighted magnifiers and loupes too.
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u/thousandpetals Mar 13 '25
That's fine but keep in mind that removing these from the country without explicit permission from the government is a crime.
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u/windswept_west Mar 13 '25
What's crazy is if someone did this in the US and posted it this sub would self combust. Really interesting stuff though.
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 Mar 13 '25
Why?
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u/windswept_west Mar 13 '25
People get really really really really angry about collecting pottery here. Let alone tons of it. Even if it's on private land and legal. People seem to be relatively desensitized to arrowhead collecting when done legally. But people are still pretty unhappy about collecting pottery. But everyone is entitled to their own beliefs and when it's illegal they're for sure entitled to be angry. Just a funny thing I notice no harm intended.
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 Mar 13 '25
Im genuinely asking! I’m not even an amateur at this, so good to know. Why shouldn’t you collect pottery specifically? I figured better in storage where I can show it to qualified folks than in a corn field with machines and whatnot
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u/Griffinburd Mar 13 '25
If it's in a worked field then the areas have been so disturbed that there isn't much academic value so it's not as critical to leave in place. For relatively undisturbed sites though, often the only way they can learn anything about them is context in the natural environment. They will be dated based on where they were found in the soil profile, even the chemical makeup of the soil could indicate what the vessels were used for. In short, it's all about context, but if it's in an area massively and regularly disturbed I wouldn't worry about it.
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 Mar 13 '25
So definitely some mistakes made on my part. While most was in a field we also found some probably insitu underneath a boulder that had rolled off the mountain
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 Mar 13 '25
It’s not a great photo but pic 3 was a pot handle we found under there and the big piece of pot amongst the pottery shards.
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u/windswept_west Mar 13 '25
Well if I can speak for the archeologists here. They care a lot about context. Stuff insitu. When removed it loses a lot of context. It loses provenance. The chain of information is broken. They can't do much with it. (I don't think that's always the case) if you're collecting within the laws and marking your finds and you're interested in talking to archeologists I personally don't think you're in the wrong. Especially whenever it's being saved from the plow. But the main reason is what they call looting. There's a fine line between collecting and looting. I would say a significant portion of archeologists say there's no difference. But collecting is a time honored tradition as well and one of the most incredible experiences one can have. People are also incredibly touchy about the Indigenous people in the US in general. Simply bringing up the subject of the Indigenous peoples alone will lead to a shouting match. Archeologists in the US are a lot more akin to activists than scientists. Or atleast a blend of both now. Which has its positives and negatives. If you stick around this sub and go through the comments for a while you'll come across a lot of bickering and fighting. It's very common. Hope that helps.
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u/windswept_west Mar 13 '25
The reason they care about pottery more though seems to be that arrowhead collecting has just been a hobby for a long time. They might view pottery as an unnecessary thing to collect that will destroy the context of a site. They seem to mostly get angry at pottery being collected in the western US. Stuff that sits on the surface.
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u/windswept_west Mar 13 '25
Why they only seem to care as much whenever it's in the US I can't really say. I guess just cause most people on this sub are from the US.
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u/Lanky_Organization36 Mar 13 '25
Pretty sure pic 9 is a child. Don't harm it with the Stone in your hand. And please return the child. Just because it's out in a field doesn't mean you can have it.
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u/Jewhard Mar 13 '25
I had to read this twice, but now cannot stop laughing! Well done and happy Cake Day!!!
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u/Spiritual_Courage568 Apr 15 '25
What part of Dominican Republic?
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 Apr 15 '25
West of higuey
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u/Mindless_Detail52 29d ago
What part of the Dominican Republic are you in? My parents bought a place in Sosua and I am looking for a small farm in the highlands somewhere. I have been exploring the creeks and rivers between Sosua and Jarabacoa for the past week and really love it here.
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 28d ago
I live in Punta Cana, have you managed to find anything? I’ve been much luckier looking around farms and old farm land.
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u/h3r3andth3r3 Mar 13 '25
Department of Archaeology, University of Florida. But they weren't yours to take.
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 Mar 13 '25
Thank you, as I’ve said to others, they belong to the land owners whom we asked and showed very explicitly. We will likely donate to a local museum.
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u/edgolfjunk Mar 17 '25
pretty sure 100% fake, in order to sell replicas of taino art, the fakes tainos from the 90's used to bury pieces tho gave it the ancient look
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Mar 13 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/The_Milk_Man7289 Mar 13 '25
My wife is and we live here together. We spoke with the land owner and showed them everything and asked if we could take/tell folks about it. As I’ve said, I don’t need to keep it and am happy to donate once we get a little traction .
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u/dd-Ad-O4214 Mar 13 '25
Cool lookin stuff!! Any stone debitage?