Topic 5
Earthlodge Features — Decorated Ceiling Plaster

Another unusual type of architectural artifact has been identified from Drover’s House. It is small fragments of ceiling plaster that appear to have been intentionally decorated.  

The thin pieces of baked clay illustrated below are identified as plain specimens of ceiling plaster. They were found suspended within the thermally altered roof fall sediment that filled Drover’s house-pit. These pieces are composed of a clay-sand mix that was compressed onto the interior of the roof while it was still wet, then wiped down to create a smooth but slightly undulating surface. Tiny striations on the plaster suggest that a trowel-like tool or a spatula was used, and that it was flexible. One possibility is that the ceiling plaster was smoothed with a wet piece of leather.

Examples of ceiling plaster found in the earthen roof fill of Drover’s House. The image on the left shows the finished exterior surfaces (i.e., the bottom side of the ceiling plaster), while the image on the right shows the rough interior surfaces of the same specimens.

In contrast the large amounts of ceiling plaster that had smoothed surfaces, we were surprised to find two separate clusters of ceiling plaster fragments that contained intentional surface decorations.

These two units contained pieces of plaster with impressed designs similar to the decorations applied to shoulders, necks, and rims of pottery vessels found in the West Pasture sites. The decorations on the plaster fragments include finger pinched, incised, punctated, and fingertip indentions. Other samples contain designs we have not encountered in West Pasture pottery: deep penetration with a round pointed object, and markings recognized as “finger grooved.” 

Comparison of a fragment of ceiling plaster with parallel fingernail impressions (Left) with a rimsherd of fingernail-impressed pottery (Right) found in the West Pasture.

Comparison of incised plaster fragment (Left) with an incised pottery sherd (Right) from West Pasture.

Comparison a decorated fragments of ceiling plaster with fingertip and fingernail impressions (center) with ceramic sherds that have similar decorations (Left, punctated rim sherd; right, fingertip impressed rim sherd).

The most common surface treatment of plaster that was collected near the house entryway was the fingernail indention motif.

Fingertip indentions observed on ceiling plaster fragments (Left) are similar to fingertip impressions seen on this plainware sherd (right) found in the West Pasture.

The examples below show ceiling plaster decorations we have not found in West Pasture pottery. The “finger-grooved” design is created by pulling a finger through moist clay and leaving a trail or groove in the plaster. The “stick-hole” design was formed by inserting a pointed circular object, probably a stick, to create a hole in the plaster.

Finger-grooved ceiling plaster fragment.

Ceiling plaster with “stick-hole” design. The clay was penetrated with circular, pointed object, most likely the blunt end of a stick.

This finding decorated ceiling plaster at a burned, fourteenth-century Plains Village earthlodge in the Texas Panhandle is something new and unique. It definitely raises some intriguing questions. This appears to be some form of artistic expression, but what? A simple form of written language in symbolism? Do these designs tell stories, mark events in someone’s life, or represent the identity of some group?  Are there some symbolic links between the designs inscribed in ceiling plaster and the motifs on decorated pottery found nearby or elsewhere in the region?

The samples from Drover’s house alone will probably never answer these questions. But who knows? If future excavations of burned houses in the Texas Panhandle are done thoughtfully, and all the small pieces of fire clay are collected and analyzed carefully, perhaps patterns will emerge to hint at the symbolic meaning of symbols pressed into the clay plaster of earthlodge ceilings.

It’s worth remembering that clay has served as a medium of expression through thousands of years of human history, going back at least five thousand years to the Epic of Gilgamesh (an epic poem from ancient Mesopotamia inscribed on a clay tablet).