The Hidden Valley Rockshelter ( 44-BA-31) is a significant

archaeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology a ...

located near the community of Warm Springs in Bath County,

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. A large rockshelter located near the Jackson River, it has been occupied by humans for thousands of years, and it has been named a

historic site A historic site or heritage site is an official location where pieces of political, military, cultural, or social history have been preserved due to their cultural heritage value. Historic sites are usually protected by law, and many have been rec ...

Geography

Hidden Valley is a tall formation with a nearly vertical rear wall; trees grow below the roof at the shelter's edge. The stone is Oriskany sandstone, located in an outcrop near the western side of the Jackson River, but it is generally safe from flooding due to its location approximately higher than the river's normal surface. Measuring approximately from end to end, and from the drip line to the base of the rear wall, the shelter is irregular in its shape; vertical striations and deep holes are found on the rear wall.Loth, Calder, ed. ''The Virginia Landmarks Register''. 4th ed.

Charlottesville Charlottesville, colloquially known as C'ville, is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is the county seat of Albemarle County, which surrounds the city, though the two are separate legal entities. It is named after Queen Ch ...

and

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

: U of Virginia P, 1999, 58.

Human presence

Hidden Valley is known to have been occupied for the last several thousand years. The site's good stratigraphy has enabled archaeologists to demonstrate its occupation since the Late Archaic, three millennia before Christ, while

Late Woodland In the classification of archaeological cultures of North America, the Woodland period of North American pre-Columbian cultures spanned a period from roughly 1000 BCE to European contact in the eastern part of North America, with some archaeolog ...

cultural materials are also present. It remained in use into the historic period, as evidence of interactions between Indians and whites is likewise present. However, the site's significance depends on the wide variety of cultural materials dating between these extremes: simple artifacts such as common

projectile point In North American archaeological terminology, a projectile point is an object that was hafted to a weapon that was capable of being thrown or projected, such as a javelin, dart, or arrow. They are thus different from weapons presumed to have ...

s and

potsherds This page is a glossary of archaeology, the study of the human past from material remains. A B C D E F ...

are found at all locations in the midden, and the continuity of the deposits demonstrates gradual transitions in ceramic and

lithic technology In archaeology, lithic technology includes a broad array of techniques used to produce usable tools from various types of stone. The earliest stone tools were recovered from modern Ethiopia and were dated to between two-million and three-million ...

from generation to generation of the shelter's occupants. Moreover, the shelter is significant for more than just its pottery and stone tools: both faunal and floral materials are exceptionally well preserved at Hidden Valley, thus enabling scholars to trace the site's environment over the last several thousand years. Human remains have also been found at the site: one human burial, an infant less than a year old, was found with a pair of canine skulls, and the bones of another dog were found mixed with those of an adolescent human. The appearance of canine skeletons may be an indication of the shelter's ritual significance, as ritual burials of dogs are known from numerous Archaic sites;Claassen, Cheryl, and Mary Elizabeth Compton.
Rock Features of Western North Carolina
.

', ch. 14. N.p.: North Carolina Archaeological Council, 2011, 14-3. one such site, the Carlston Annis Shell Mound in western Kentucky, produced the remains of nearly thirty intentionally buried dogs.Webb, William S. "The Carlson Annis Mound: Site 5 Butler County Kentucky". ''University of Kentucky Reports in Anthropology'' 7.4 (1950): 265-354: 272. Scholar Cheryl Claassen argues that dog-burial sites were considered places of renewal, a belief that persisted into the historic

Cherokee The Cherokee (; chr, ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯᎢ, translit=Aniyvwiyaʔi or Anigiduwagi, or chr, ᏣᎳᎩ, links=no, translit=Tsalagi) are one of the indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, t ...

Preservation

In mid-1986, the Hidden Valley Rock shelter was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

because of its archaeological significance. It is one of twenty-one Bath County locations with this distinction, although none of the others are significant primarily on archaeological grounds.

Geography

Human presence

Preservation

References

Further reading