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Lesson Plan 2: Pre-Revolution Activity 2A - It’s in the Garbage Discussion The unusable or unwanted remnants of everyday life end up in the garbage. By studying what people have thrown away, archaeologists can learn a great deal about a culture. This is true not only of prehistoric peoples who left no written record about their lives, but also of people today. Many things can be learned by studying garbage about the relationships of human behavior and trash disposal, information useful in studying people of the past and the present. People will often tell an interviewer what they believe is appropriate behavior, but their garbage tells another story. For instance, people frequently say they eat lots of fruits and vegetables, yet their garbage shows they do not. Another example is that people say they recycle more than they actually do. Just as we do not throw our trash in any old place, neither did prehistoric people. Archaeologists call their garbage heaps middens, and middens are a rich source of archaeological information about ancient people’s lifeways. Layers of trash also tell a story over time. Archaeologists excavate middens slowly and carefully, recording the location of artifacts and samples they recover. They analyze the tiny fragments of prehistoric meals (bone slivers, seed hulls, plant parts) and charcoal from cooking fires. The animals and plants from which the bits of evidence came can be identified, and archaeologists can learn very precise information about the economy of past people. How would a midden found near the Pamlico differ from one found inshore? Why would there be a difference? If a midden is disturbed and the layers mixed, chronology and context are lost; it then becomes impossible to interpret the lifeways of past people. Vandals looking for artifacts dig in middens, and they destroy irreplaceable information about the past. They tear pages from the history book of time. Everyone can help by not digging archaeological sites or co