Abstract
As interpretive landscape archaeologists, we practice a form of historical ethnography. We strive for holism and seek to decenter master narratives through attention to the multilocality of places and the multivocality histories must embrace. Interpretation implies revelation and insight, and so we view landscapes as resource, stages, and surfaces manipulated for aesthetic and other expressive ends. In this essay, we apply these landscape concepts to understand the estates, farms, gardens, and buildings of northern Delaware. In particular, we explored the present and pasts of two duPont estates, Mt. Cuba and Coverdale Farm.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Beaudry, M. C., Cook, L. J., and Mrozowski, S. A., 1991, Artifacts and Active Voices: Material Culture as Social Discourse. In The Archaeology of Inequality, edited by R. H. McGuire and R. Paynter, pp. 150–191. Blackwell, Oxford.
Casella, E. C., 2001, Landscapes of Punishment and Resistance: A Female Convict Settlement in Tasmania, Australia. In Contested Landscapes: Movement, Exile and Place, edited by B. Bender and M. Winer, pp. 103–120. Berg, Oxford.
Casella, E. C., 2002, Archaeology of the Ross Female Factory: Female Incarceration in Van Diemen’s Land, Australia. Records of the Queen Victoria Museum No. 108. Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, Launceston, Tasmania.
Casey, E. S., 1996, How to Get from Space to Place in a Fairly Short Stretch of Time: Phenomenological Prologomena. In Senses of Place, edited by S. Feld and K. Basso, pp. 13–52. School of American Research Press, Santa Fe, NM.
Copeland, L. du Pont, 1943, Letter to Pamela Copeland, 14 July 1943. Mt. Cuba Archives, Mt. Cuba Center, Inc., Greenville, DE.
Copeland, P., 1939–1949, Transcribed Diary, 1 February 1939–31 December 1949. Mt. Cuba Archives, Mt. Cuba Center, Inc., Greenville, DE.
Copeland, P., 1984, The Garden of Pamela Copeland, Mount Cuba, Greenville, Delaware. In The American Woman’s Garden, edited by R. Verey and E. Samuels, pp. 74–79. Little, Brown & Co., Boston, MA.
Copeland, P., 1994, Colonial Dames Oral History Interview, Interviewed by Jo Osbun and Jeanne Shields. Copeland Family Papers, Series I, Hagley Museum and Library, Greenville, DE.
Cross, J. E., 2002, Archival Research on Lammot du Pont and Pamela Cunningham Copeland’s Mt. Cuba Estate: 1935–2002. Mt. Cuba Historical Archaeology Project, Report No. 7. Prepared for the Mt. Cuba Center, Inc., Department of Anthropology, University of Delaware, Newark.
Cross, J. E. and Moqtaderi, N. E., 2004, A Landscape History of Mt. Cuba. Mt. Cuba Historical Archaeology Project, Report No. 10. Prepared for Mt. Cuba Center, Inc., Department of Anthropology, University of Delaware, Newark.
De Cunzo, L. A., and Ernstein, J., 2006, Landscapes, Ideology, and Experience in Historical Archaeology. In The Cambridge Companion to Historical Archaeology, edited by D. Hicks and M. C. Beaudry, pp. 255–270. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Douglas, M., 1982, In the Active Voice. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London.
Eversmann, P. K., and Lidz, M., 2005, Guide to Winterthur Museum & Country Estate. The Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, Inc., Winterthur, DE.
Everson, P., and Williamson, T., 1998, The Archaeology of Landscape: Studies Presented to Christopher Taylor. Manchester University Press, Manchester.
Garman, J., 2005, Detention Castles of Stone and Steel: Landscape, Labor, and the Urban Penitentiary. University of Tennessee Press, Knoxville.
Hall, M., 2000, Archaeology and the Modern World: Colonial Transcripts in South Africa and the Chesapeake. Routledge, London.
Hodder, I., 1999, The Archaeological Process: An Introduction. Blackwell, Oxford.
Joyce, R., 2002, The Languages of Archaeology. Blackwell, Oxford.
King, J. A., 1994, Rural Landscape in the Mid-Nineteenth-Century Chesapeake. In Historical Archaeology of the Chesapeake, edited by P. A. Shackel and B. J. Little, pp. 283–299. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.
Marshall, K. S., 2002, The American Country House in the Greater Brandywine Valley: A Love Affair with the Land. M.A. Thesis, University of Delaware, Newark.
Moqtaderi, N., and De Cunzo, L. A., 2003, Interpreting History at Mt. Cuba. In Oral History, Historical Databases, and Public Interpretation at Mt. Cuba. Mt. Cuba History and Historical Archaeology Project, Report 9. Prepared for the Mt. Cuba Center, Inc., Department of Anthropology, University of Delaware, Newark.
Pauls, E. P., 2006, The Place of Space: Architecture, Landscape, and Social Life. In Historical Archaeology, edited by M. Hall and S. Silliman, pp. 65–83. Blackwell, Oxford.
Rodman, M. C., 1992, Empowering Place: Multilocality and Multivocality. American Anthropologist 94(3):640–656.
Rotman, D. L., and Savulis, E., editors, 2003, Shared Spaces and Divided Places: Material Dimensions of Gender Relations and the American Historical Experience. University of Tennessee Press, Knoxville.
Schama, S., 1995, Landscape and Memory. HarperCollins, London.
Shackel, P. A., 2001, Myth, Memory, and the Making of the American Landscape. University of Florida Press, Gainesville.
Shanks, M., 1992, Experiencing the Past: On the Character of Archaeology. Routledge, London.
Siders, R. J., Quimby, S., Hickman, K., and van den Hurk, J., 1999, Coverdale Farm. Center for Historic Architecture and Design, University of Delaware, Newark.
Soja, E. W., 1989, Postmodern Geographies: The Reassertion of Space in Critical Social Theory. Verso, London.
Stine, L. F., Zierden, M., Drucker, L. M., and Judge, C., editors, 1997, Carolina’s Historical Landscapes: Archaeological Perspectives. University of Tennessee Press, Knoxville.
Teski, M. C., and Climo, J. J., editors, 1995, The Labyrinth of Memory: Ethnographic Journeys. Bergin and Garvey, Westport, CT.
Thomas, J. H., 1990, Archaeology and the Notion of Ideology. In Writing the Past in the Present, edited by F. Baker and J. Thomas, pp. 63–68. St. David’s University College, Lampeter.
Thomas, J. H., 2000, Introduction: The Polarities of Post-processual Archaeology. In Interpretive Archaeology: A Reader, edited by J. Thomas, pp. 1–20. Leicester University Press, London.
Yamin, R., editor, 2001, Becoming New York: The Five Points Neighborhood. Historical Archaeology 35(3).
Yamin, R., and Metheny, K. B., editors, 1996, Landscape Archaeology: Studies in Reading and Interpreting the American Historical Landscape. University of Tennessee Press, Knoxville.
Acknowledgments
The authors thank the Board of Managers and staff of the Mt. Cuba Center, Inc., the staff of the Delaware Nature Society at Coverdale Farm, and the Board of Trustees of the Red Clay Reservation. Their visions and support made this research possible, and transformed the authors’ perspectives on the past and present of northern Delaware; for this especially, we are grateful. At Mt. Cuba, we owe special thanks to Executive Director Rick Lewandowski, and to Jeanne Frett, Ann Holloway, Bonnie Murray, and Gregory Wuthnow for their gracious assistance and support throughout our research. Researchers Jody Cross and Jason Smith assembled and organized volumes of documentary, graphic, and oral history at Mt. Cuba, and their insights have informed our presentation. At Coverdale Farm, we acknowledge the assistance kindly offered by Jim White, Michele Wales, and Jim Wolfer. Grants from Pamela du Pont Copeland and the Delaware Nature Society supported the research reported here; the interpretations are ours, as they must be. During her lifetime, Pamela Copeland inspired many with her passion for horticulture, native plants, and history. We are grateful to have had the opportunity to work with her, and experience her gardens.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2011 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
De Cunzo, L.A., Moqtaderi, N. (2011). An American Landscape Conversation. In: Beaudry, M., Symonds, J. (eds) Interpreting the Early Modern World. Contributions To Global Historical Archaeology. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-70759-4_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-70759-4_1
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
Print ISBN: 978-0-387-70758-7
Online ISBN: 978-0-387-70759-4
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawSocial Sciences (R0)