The background image visually illustrates the theme heading, and is a "fun" image. It shows a section through a portion of the privy in great detail, and an archaeologist literally reaching into the past, down the drain.

The star artifact graphic represents what we believe to be pieces of a wheelbarrow found in the privy. This is a reproduction based on the pieces found on-site, and details from similar fisheries barrows found elsewhere.

Other inset images show work in the privy, and seed remains representing the wide variety of seeds found.

Theme Text
In 1986, archaeologists working on the Waterfront Premises discovered a mysterious deep rectangular stone-lined pit. Its function became clear when further excavation uncovered two drains into the Pool, located below high tide level, while microscopic examination of the contents identified human intestinal parasites. This was a stone Privy, flushed twice a day by tidal action —the earliest known flush toilet in North America.

Wet conditions in the Privy helped to preserve organic remains, including cloth, leather, seeds, the bones of fish, mammals and birds, as well as most of a wheelbarrow! The style of clay tobacco pipes found here suggest the Privy was built as part of the original Colony of Avalon in the 1620s and buried under the rubble created by the Dutch raid of 1673.

Star Artifact
The wheelbarrow retrieved from the Waterfront Privy resembles a fishery handbarrow. It was carefully fitted together using traditional mortise and tenon techniques, probably out of local spruce. The replica shown in the panel above incorporates a wheel based on contemporary illustrations. (CgAf-2: 78000-78016, Privy, about 1673)

Display Case
See Artifact List.

Lobster Shells - CgAf-2: 78478a-h 83836a-c, Privy, before 1673

Case Bottle Mouth - CgAf-2: 5156a - Privy, before 1673

Coarse Earthenware Drug Jar - CgAf-2: 118644 - Privy, before 1673

Seeds are carefully sorted for analysis -- Among the finds so far: raspberry, pin cherry and grape (probably consumed as a raisin). Botantical Samples from Event 111 (Privy).

Drawer 1

Silk Velvet Stitched onto Larger Garment - CgAf-2: 90000 - Privy, before 1673

Textile History - The cold, damp, sealed environment of the Privy helped to preserve some of the scraps of cloth used as toilet paper in the period. These fragile fragments are rare samples of 17th century textiles.
See Artifact List.

Drawer 2

Bird and other bone fragments - CgAf-2: sample, Privy, before 1673

Food and Other Remains - Scientific analysis of specimens from the Privy and other areas continue to yield information not only about diet, but also about insects and other parasites.
See Artifact List.

Drawer 3

Ornate Buckle - CgAf-2: 170035, Street, date uncertain

Buttons, Buckles and Beads - Often a button or a buckle is all that survives of a dress or a shoe; a single excavated bead must represent many others. These hints about historic dress and ornament were recovered from excavations at the Privy and other areas.
See Artifact List.

© 1999, Colony of Avalon Foundation.

Revised March 2002.