Cayo Pelau Archaeological Site
Cayo Pelau Archaeological Site is a multi-period aboriginal archaeological site in Charlotte Harbor on the west peninsular Gulf coast of the United States. The island is 3.5 miles directly south of the Big Mound Key-Boggess Ridge Archeological District. It is the only site that lies within two counties, Lee County in the south and Charlotte County, Florida to the north. Neither county has taken responsibility for identifying, protecting or preserving the prehistoric and historical cultural resources on the island.
It is known from the literature that the site consists of a large sand burial mound and a midden. Based on the ceramics taken from the midden, the burial mound and midden date from 800 BC - 500 BC, the Glades I Period, due to the Orange ceramics and early Glades and St. Johns ceramics found there.[1] Several Calusa metal tablets, one silver and one copper, examples of 16th-century post-colonial artifacts, were extracted from the site.[2][full citation needed] Use of the site into the early 19th century has been recorded, including use as a fishing camp by Cuban fishermen.
According to archaeologist Jeffrey McClain Mitchem,[1] the burial mound and midden have been excavated by numerous persons, beginning with prominent Florida looter Montague Tallant, who donated some of his finds to the Florida Museum of Natural History.
Gordon R. Willey gives a concise account of the site in his Archaeology of the Gulf Coast Florida[full citation needed] for the Smithsonian Institution. Prior to his research, the burial mound was 27.4 m by 1.8 - 2.5 m high and contained both Glades Plain and Weeden Island pottery. In the 1950s the shell midden was excavated by John Goggin and William Plowden. They dated the midden to be much later, 800 AD - 1000 AD.
References
- ^ a b Mitchem, Jeffery McClain (1989). Redefining Safety Harbor (PhD). University of Florida.
- ^ Allerton, David, The Florida Anthropologist 1984, 36-38
- v
- t
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cultures
- Alachua
- Belle Glade
- Cades Pond
- Caloosahatchee
- Clovis
- Deptford
- Fort Walton
- Glades
- Leon-Jefferson
- Manasota
- Mount Taylor
- Norwood
- Orange period
- Paleo-Indians
- Pensacola
- Safety Harbor
- Santa Rosa-Swift Creek
- St. Johns
- Suwannee Valley
- Swift Creek
- Weeden Island
sites
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/61/KMMaskPointedNose.jpg/110px-KMMaskPointedNose.jpg)
- Apalachee Bay
- Aqui Esta Burial Mound
- Bay Pines
- Bear Lake Mounds
- Big Heart West
- Big Mound City
- Big Mound Key-Boggess Ridge
- Bird Hammock
- Blueberry
- Bowers Bluff Middens
- Bubba Midden
- Burns Lake
- Butcherpen Mound
- Cayo Pelau
- Cayson Mound and Village
- C. J. Ostl
- Crystal River
- Cutler
- Demere Key
- Devil's Den Cave
- Dismal Key
- Douglass Beach
- Fort Center
- Fort Walton Mound
- Galt Island
- Garden Patch
- Green Mound
- Halfway Creek
- Helen Blazes
- Hickory Ridge Cemetery
- Hinson Mounds
- Horr's Island
- Indian Fields
- J&J Hunt
- Josslyn Island
- Jungle Prada
- Key Marco
- Kimball Island Midden
- Lake Jackson Mounds
- Lake Pithlachocco
- Letchworth-Love Mounds
- Little Salt Spring
- Madira Bickel Mound
- Mark Pardo Shellworks
- Miami Circle
- Mill Cove
- Monroe Lake
- Mound Key
- Mount Elizabeth
- Mount Royal
- Mount Taylor
- Mullet Key
- Myakkahatchee Creek
- Naval Live Oaks Cemetery
- Nocoroco
- Ormond Mound
- Ortona Prehistoric Village
- Otis Hare
- Page-Ladson
- Persimmon Mound
- Pierce
- Pineland
- Platt Island
- Plaza
- Pompano Beach Mound
- Portavant Mound
- Porter's Bar
- Princess Mound
- River Styx
- Roberts Island
- Rock Mound
- Rookery Mound
- Ross Hammock
- Safety Harbor
- Shark River Slough
- Shell Bluff Landing
- Spruce Creek
- Third Gulf Breeze
- Thomas Creek
- Turner River
- Turtle Mound
- Twin Mounds
- Upper Tampa Bay
- Useppa Island
- Velda Mound
- Waddells Mill Pond
- Wakulla Springs
- Yent Mound
- Yon Mound and Village
remains
- Related
- Pre-Columbian era