Pottery

The Glades culture is defined almost entirely on the basis of pottery. Much of the pottery throughout the Glades culture period was undecorated. It is identified as Glades primarily by the character of the sand and grit included in the clay used to form the pottery. Most Glades pottery was produced by coiling. Some bowls were decorated with puncture marks and/or incisions. A late development was "tooling", in which the rims of pots were decorated by pinching (resembling the edge of a pie crust), folding, or pressing a dowel into the rim. Glades Tooled pots were otherwise undecorated carinated bowls. ^[5] Most Glades pots were "open mouthed hemispherical bowl[s]". ^[6]

In 1939, John Goggin decribed two types of pottery as indicative of the Glades culture, Glades Gritty, made of a hard paste with a quartz sand temper, and Biscayne Chalky, made of a soft paste with either no temper or a very fine fiber temper. The Biscayne Chalky ware was eventually synonymized to the St. Johns series of northern Florida. In 1944, Goggin described the Glades series, based on the Glades Gritty ware. ^[7]

Pottery types of the Glades series include:

• Glades Plain is the plain form of the Glades series. It was in use throughout the extent and duration of the Glades culture. Many archaeologists do not believe that it can be reliably distinguished from plain, sand-tempered ware found elsewhere in southern Florida. ^[8]
• Glades Red is Glades Plain ware with red paint. ^[9]
• Glades Tooled has a thickened lip modified by pressing the damp clay with a small round rod. The rest of the vessel was undecorated. There are two types of Glades Tooled ware. One type was a hemispherical bowl with the rim turned slightly inward and the lip crimped or scalloped, creating gadrooning. The second type was almost globular with a small mouth and the lip marked with grooves, notches, or gougings. ^[10]
• Surfside Incised has with smoother sides than most Glades ware, and with one to three (commonly two) straight lines around the body of the bowl parallel to the lip. The lines were incised with a square-ended or pointed tool. This is the only type of Glades ware that had lugs and handles. ^[11]
• Plantation Pinched has pinch marks, ranging from a band around the rim to large areas, and in some cases, on the bottom. ^[12]
• Key Largo Incised has one or more rows of downward opening loops or arches surrounding the rim. The lips of later vessels of this type may be decorated by crimping or incised arcs. ^[13]
• Matecumbe Incised has cross-hatching forming a diamond pattern. Line spacing varies from 10 to 70 millimetres. ^[14]
• Miami Incised has equally spaced diagonal groups of two to six parallel lines around the rims. ^[15]
• Dade Incised is a rare type with three concentric upward-opening curved incised lines repeated around the rim. ^[15]
• Arch Creek Incised has paired Incised zigzags repeated around the rim. ^[15]
• Natural Bridge Incised has a pair of incised intertwined lines that form a guilloché surrounding the rim. ^[15]
• Opa Locka Incised has vertical rows of downward-facing arcs or semicircles surrounding the rim. In some cases the arcs appear to have been made by thumbnail impressions. ^[16]
• Fort Drum Incised has "a pattern of vertical or diagonal ticking on the lip, or extending from the lip onto the rim." ^[17]
• Fort Drum Punctuate has two or three rows of punched holes, sometimes forming semicircles, surrounding the rim. ^[18]
• Sanibel Incised has small ticks or gashes in one or more lines, forming running "v"s resembling chevrons. ^[19]
• Gordon's Pass Incised has lines and ticking often resembling feathers. ^[20]
• Cane Patch Incised has meandering lines or running linked "v"s made by a "drag and jab" technique using a tool with a rough end. ^[20]

Pottery of the St. Johns series, originally described in southern Florida as "Biscayne Chalky" ware, has been found in Glades culture sites. Griffin, while admitting that the presence of St. Johns ware in southern Florida presents a problem, rejects the idea that "chalky" ware was produced in the Glades culture area because there is no commonality in the decorative motifs used in the two series. ^[21] It has been assumed that St. Johns ware is "chalky" because it is made with clay from the St. Johns River valley that includes fresh water sponge spicules. Bloch et al. found that muck, which is common in southern Florida, can serve as a temper that produces "chalky" ware. They conclude that St. Johns ware was produced over much of the Florida peninsula, and not just in the St. Johns valley. ^[22]

Pottery types of the St. Johns series found in the Glades culture area include:

• St. Johns Plain (earlier called Biscayne Plain) has a smooth, chalky, soft surface. The surface is grey to buff, while the core is dark grey to black. ^[23]
• St. Johns Checked Stamped (earlier called Biscayne Checked Stamp) has check stamping produced by pressing a carved paddle over most of all of the outside of the vessel. The pattern can consist of squares, rectangles, or diamonds. ^[23]
• Dunns Creek Red (earlier called Biscayne Red) was St. Johns Plain ware covered with red ocher paint. ^[24]
• St. Johns Incised had incised designs derived from Orange Incised ware of the Orange period. ^[25]

A Goodland series has been defined based on pottery found on Marco Island. It has a fine grit as temper and is somewhat chalky. Goodland Plain and Goodland Red, with red paint, have been defined as types. Belle Glade Plain ware has a surface that has been compacted by a tool that dragged grains of sand across the surface, leaving it scratched and pitted. ^[26]

Pottery types from outside of southern Florida have been found in Glades culture sites, and are generally assumed to have been traded into the area. Leon-Jefferson and San Marcos pottery types found at Glades culture sites may be due to people who moved from northern Florida after the aboriginal peoples of the Glades culture died out or left the area. ^[27]

Shell

Most tools found in Glades culture sites are made of bone or shell. Tools made from the shells of large sea snails ( Busycon , Pleuroploca , and Strombus ) included picks, hammers, adzes, celts, gouges, chisels, awls, knives, scrapers, cups, and dippers. Clam shells were used as anvils. ^[28]

Sea snail shells were often modified by removing the columella, the tightly coiled "pillar" running along the axis of the shell. Such modified shells have been described as dippers and bowls. Pieces of the large outer whorls of sea snail shells were fashioned into vessels described as cups, saucers, and spoons. Whole sea snail shells were fashioned into picks by grinding the lower end of the shell into a chisel-shaped point. Picks usually had holes that would take a wooden handle. Cushing found some specimens at Key Marco in 1896 that still had lashings holding a handle in place. ^[29]

Whole sea snail shells were also used as hammers, with a pounding surface on the lower end. While some may been fashioned as hammers from the start, archaeologists believe most began as picks, and then were used as hammers after the chisel-point had worn down. Some hammers appear to have been hafted, while others had much of the outer whorls cut away so that the columella could be used as a handle. Both ends of some shells had been used as pounding surfaces. ^[30]

Pieces of shell were fashioned into small blades that were set in sockets in antlers. Celts and chisels were fashioned from larger pieces of shell. Celts were probably used to work wood. Small columellas were sharpened at one end and used as awls. Shells of Macrocallista nimbosa , the sunray venus clam, were used as knives or scrapers. ^[31]

Other artifacts of shell include pierced bivalve shells, gorgets, pendants, beads, and rings. Goggin noted that there were "surprisingly few" shell beads found at Glades culture sites, considering how much use the culture made of shell. Cushing found earplugs at Marco Island that were made from wood, shell rings, and tortoise shell. ^[32]

Stone

Chert is not found in southern Florida, and tools made from that mineral are rare in the Glades culture area. Tools such as hones or abraders and pounders or hammers were made from sedimentary rocks such as limestone and sandstone. plummets were made from limestone and grooved pebbles, and may have been used as weights for fishing nets, or as personal decorations. ^[33]

Other artifacts

Other objects of the Glades culture include shell beads and ornaments made from fish vertebrate and carnivore teeth. Limestone, shell, and bone were carved into small figurines, particularly of birds. Objects made from wood include canoe paddles, pounders shaped like a dumbbell, anthropomorphic figurines, and bowls. ^[34] Tools made from deer bones and antlers included awls, fids, and pins. Fish spines and the tail spines of stingrays were used to make holes. Shark teeth were used for cutting and engraving. Animal jaws and barracuda teeth were also used as tools. Fishing net gauges were made from turtle bones and shell.