Abstract
Historic upland farmstead sites, common to the cultural landscape of the Green Mountains of Vermont, constitute a rich source of data for the historical archaeologist. Although most structures are now in ruin amid regenerating northern hardwood forest, they still retain integrity in terms of physical location. Environmental variables such as elevation, slope, aspect, and soils, all important determinants to a predominantly 19th-century agrarian settlement, are still associated with site location. This article examines the role of one important physical factor, aspect, in the selection of 200 historic farmstead locations. Viewed from the position of ecological anthropology, it appears that farmers in Vermont’s Green Mountains possessed a folk wisdom about solar energy and put it into practice with respect to the location of their farmhouses, fields, and pastures.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Allan, Nigel J.R., Gregory W. Knapp, and Christoph Stadel (editors) 1988 Human Impact on Mountains. Rowman and Little-field, Totowa, New Jersey.
Beckley, Hosea 1846 The History of Vermont; with Descriptions, Physical and Topographical. George H. Salisbury, Brattleboro, Vermont.
Beers, Fredrick W. 1869a Atlas of Rutland County, Vermont. F.W. Beers, A.D. Ellis, and G.G. Soule, n.p.
1869b Atlas of Windsor County, Vermont. F.W. Beers, A.D. Ellis, and G.G. Soule, n.p.
1871 Atlas of Addison County, Vermont. F.W. Beers, A.D. Ellis, and G.G. Soule, n.p.
1873 Atlas of Washington County, Vermont. F.W. Beers, A.D. Ellis, and G.G. Soule, n.p.
Black, John D. 1950 The Rural Economy of New England. Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
Blalock, Hubert M., Jr. 1979 Social Statistics. McGraw-Hill, New York.
Butzer, Karl W. 1990 A Human Ecosystem Framework for Archaeology. In The Ecosystem Approach in Anthropology: From Concept to Practice, edited by E.F. Moran pp. 91–130. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor.
Child, Hamilton 1882 Gazetteer and Business Directory of Addison County, Vermont. The Journal Office, Syracuse.
Danhof, Clarence H. 1969 Change in Agriculture: The Northern United States, 1820–1870. Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
Fisher, Dorothy C. 1953 Vermont Tradition: The Biography of an Outlook on Life. Little, Brown, Boston.
Frost, Robert 1923 New Hampshire. Henry Holt, New York.
Garnett, Alice 1935 Insolation, Topography and Settlement in the Alps. Geographical Review 25:601–617.
Gibbons, Jean D. 1976 Nonparametric Methods for Quantitative Analysis. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York.
Goudie, Andrew S. 1987 Geography and Archaeology: The Growth of a Relationship. In Landscape and Culture: Geographical and Archaeological Perspectives, edited by J.M. Wagstaff pp. 11–25. Basil Blackwell, New York.
Graffagnino, J. Kevin 1983 The Shaping of Vermont: From the Wilderness to the Centennial, 1749–1877. Vermont Heritage Press, Rutland, Vermont, and Bennington Museum, Bennington, Vermont.
Griggs, John E. 1971 Soil Survey, Addison County, Vermont. Soil Conservation Service and Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Washington, D.C.
Grossman, Larry 1977 Man-Environment Relationships in Anthropology and Geography. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 67(1):126–144.
Hardesty, Donald L. 1977 Ecological Anthropology. John Wiley & Sons, New York.
Henderson, Martha L., and Peter B. Mires 1992 Physical Geography Laboratory Manual. West, St. Paul, Minnesota.
Holbrook, Stuart H. 1955 Why Did They Go Away? American Heritage 6(4): 26–35.
Johnson, Charles W. 1980 The Nature of Vermont. The University Press of New England, Hanover, New Hampshire.
Jordan, Holman D., Jr. 1968 The Value of Census Data in the Writing of Vermont Town Histories. Vermont History 36(1): 19–25.
Joyce, Jane S. 1981 A Settlement Pattern Study of the War Eagle Creek Region, Madison County, Arkansas, During the Pioneer Period. Unpublished M.A. thesis, Department of Anthropology, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.
Lamson, Genieve 1922 Geographic Influences in the Early History of Vermont. Vermont Historical Society Papers, 1921–1923:75–138. Montpelier.
Lautzenheiser, Robert E. 1959 The Climate of Vermont. Climatography of the United States, Series 60, No. 43. Weather Bureau, U.S. Department of Commerce, Washington, D.C.
Lewis, Pierce F. 1990 The Northeast and the Making of American Geographical Habits. In The Making of the American Landscape, edited by M.P. Conzen pp. 80–103. Unwin Hyman, Boston, Massachusetts.
McManis, Douglas R. 1975 Colonial New England: A Historical Geography. Oxford University Press, New York.
Meeks, Harold A. 1970 An Isochronic Map of Vermont Settlement. Vermont History 38(2):95–102.
1975 The Geographic Regions of Vermont: A Study in Maps. Geography Publications at Dartmouth No. 10. Department of Geography, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire.
Merchant, Carolyn 1989 Ecological Revolutions: Nature, Gender, and Science in New England. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill.
Mires, Peter B. 1982 The David Sawyer Site: A Mid-Nineteenth Century Upland Farmstead in Vermont. Paper presented at the 15th Annual Meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
1984 Historic Green Mountain Farmstead Adaptation. Paper presented at the 17th Annual Meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology, Williamsburg, Virginia.
Moran, Emilio F. (editor) 1990 The Ecosystem Approach in Anthropology: From Concept to Practice. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor.
Morrissey, Charles T. 1981 Vermont: A Bicentennial History. W.W. Norton, New York.
Orlove, Benjamin S. 1980 Ecological Anthropology. Annual Review of Anthropology 9:235–273. Palo Alto, California.
Peattie, Roderick 1936 Mountain Geography. Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
Pettengill, Samuel B. 1971 The Yankee Pioneers. C.E. Turtle, Rutland, Vermont.
Price, Larry W. 1981 Mountains and Man. University of California Press, Berkeley.
Russell, Howard S. 1976 A Long Deep Furrow: Three Centuries of Farming in New England. University Press of New England, Hanover, New Hampshire.
Scott, J.D., J. Chace, Jr., C.E. Isaac, W. Moore, and C.E. Own McLeran 1854 Scott’s Map of Rutland County, Vermont. Privately published, Philadelphia.
Thompson, Zadock 1842 History of Vermont, Natural, Civil, and Statistical. Chauncy Goodrich, Burlington, Vermont.
Town of Rochester 1975 Rochester, Vermont: Its History, 1780–1975. Queen City, Burlington, Vermont.
United States Geological Survey 1944 East Middlebury, Vermont, Quadrangle Map. 7.5 minute series. U.S. Geological Survey, Washington, D.C.
1970a Breadloaf Vermont, Quadrangle Map. 7.5 minute series. U.S. Geological Survey, Washington, D.C.
1970b Hancock, Vermont, Quadrangle Map. 7.5 minute series. U.S. Geological Survey, Washington, D.C.
Walling, H.F. 1857 Map of Addison County, Vermont. W.E. Baker, Boston.
1858 Map of Washington County, Vermont. W.E. Baker, Boston.
Wilson, Harold F. 1936 The Hill Country of Northern New England: Its Social and Economic History, 1790–1930. Columbia University Press, New York
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Mires, P.B. The importance of aspect to historic farmstead site location in the green mountains of vermont. Hist Arch 27, 82–91 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03373575
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03373575