York archaeologist David Pendergast made a rare find in Cuba this spring. As part of a joint Canadian-Cuban archaeological team, he was among a group of researchers who discovered the first almost perfectly preserved Taino house at an underwater site near Los Buchillones. (Pendergast, a York adjunct professor, acted as coordinator for the Royal Ontario Museum part of the expedition.)

    The house is believed to be between 400-700 years old. Pendergast, vice-president of collections and research at the ROM, says the preservation of the pieces of wood are "so good they look almost like they were made recently."

    The astonishing condition of the house may be due to the natural preservatives in the clay sediments of the lagoon near where the house is located. It's a discovery unmatched in the tropical West Indies, he says.

    "Complete remains of houses made of perishable materials aren't commonplace in any context, but preservation is especially poor in the tropics."

    Pendergast and his wife, York anthropology professor and archaeologist Elizabeth Graham, will be working together excavating and documenting the site. Graham, whose own work has been primarily with the Maya culture in Belize, says the Cuban site may give new clues to the pan-Caribbean nature of coastal cultures.

    The Taino were agricultural people who inhabited the coast of the Caribbean islands from approximately AD500 until the early 17th century. European disease and slaughter by the Spanish greatly reduced their numbers. Little is known of them because they left no written records.

    Says Graham, "It's more pieces of the puzzle."

    Zemi deity figure, probably mid-13th to 15th century AD. One of 200 wooden objects collected at Los Buchillones that led adjunct York professor David Pendergast to an important archaelogical find.

Photo: Ruth Kaplan
Images courtesy of: the Royal Ontario Museum