The Orange period or Orange culture was a late- Archaic

archaeological culture An archaeological culture is a recurring assemblage of types of artifacts, buildings and monuments from a specific period and region that may constitute the material culture remains of a particular past human society. The connection between thes ...

along the eastern side of the

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

peninsula A peninsula (; ) is a landform that extends from a mainland and is surrounded by water on most, but not all of its borders. A peninsula is also sometimes defined as a piece of land bordered by water on three of its sides. Peninsulas exist on all ...

, from about 4,000 years ago to about 2,500 or 3,000 years ago. The Orange period is largely defined by the presence of Orange-series fiber- tempered pottery. During the middle to late Archaic period,

sea level rise Globally, sea levels are rising due to human-caused climate change. Between 1901 and 2018, the globally averaged sea level rose by , or 1–2 mm per year on average.IPCC, 2019Summary for Policymakers InIPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cry ...

slowed and approached contemporary levels.

Barrier island Barrier islands are coastal landforms and a type of Dune, dune system that are exceptionally flat or lumpy areas of sand that form by wave and tidal action parallel to the mainland coast. They usually occur in chains, consisting of anything fro ...

s and

lagoon A lagoon is a shallow body of water separated from a larger body of water by a narrow landform, such as reefs, barrier islands, barrier peninsulas, or isthmuses. Lagoons are commonly divided into ''coastal lagoons'' (or ''barrier lagoons'') a ...

s formed along much of the coast of

, and the gradient of the

St. Johns River The St. Johns River ( es, Río San Juan) is the longest river in the U.S. state of Florida and its most significant one for commercial and recreational use. At long, it flows north and winds through or borders twelve counties. The drop in eleva ...

decreased, creating a string of

wetlands A wetland is a distinct ecosystem that is flooded or saturated by water, either permanently (for years or decades) or seasonally (for weeks or months). Flooding results in oxygen-free (anoxic) processes prevailing, especially in the soils. The ...

in its valley. Relatively large sedentary populations exploited the resources of these new coastal and riverine wetlands in

, while drier regions were only lightly exploited. Distinguishable regional culture varieties began developing in the

wetland A wetland is a distinct ecosystem that is flooded or saturated by water, either permanently (for years or decades) or seasonally (for weeks or months). Flooding results in oxygen-free (anoxic) processes prevailing, especially in the soils. The ...

areas. The pre-ceramic

Mount Taylor period The Mount Taylor period or Mount Taylor culture was a pre-ceramic archaeological culture in northeastern Florida in the middle to late Archaic period. The Mount Taylor period lasted from approximately 5000 or 4000 BCE to 2000 BCE. Most archaeologi ...

emerged along the east coast of

and in the drainage of the

around 5000 to 4000

BCE Common Era (CE) and Before the Common Era (BCE) are year notations for the Gregorian calendar (and its predecessor, the Julian calendar), the world's most widely used calendar era. Common Era and Before the Common Era are alternatives to the or ...

. Fiber-tempered pottery, which had developed in the Stallings culture area of

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

and

South Carolina )''Animis opibusque parati'' ( for, , Latin, Prepared in mind and resources, links=no) , anthem = " Carolina";" South Carolina On My Mind" , Former = Province of South Carolina , seat = Columbia , LargestCity = Charleston , LargestMetro = ...

around 2500 BCE, appeared in Florida around 2000 BCE, marking the beginning of the Orange period. The Orange culture area extended throughout the St.Johns River watershed, and along the Florida coast from north of the mouth of the St. Johns River to the vicinity of

Sebastian, Florida Sebastian is a city in Indian River County, Florida, United States at the confluence of the St. Sebastian River and the Indian River. It is two miles away from the Atlantic Ocean. It is the largest city in Indian River County and the biggest pop ...

. After 1,000 to 1,500 years, the Orange culture developed into the St. Johns culture. The sequence of Mount Taylor-Orange-St. Johns cultures in northeastern Florida developed in place. The division into cultures is based on the lack of ceramics in the

, the presence of fiber- tempered ceramics in the Orange period, and the presence of sand- and/or

sponge spicule Spicules are structural elements found in most sponges. The meshing of many spicules serves as the sponge's skeleton and thus it provides structural support and potentially defense against predators. Sponge spicules are made of calcium carbon ...

-tempered ceramics in the St. Johns period.

Orange-series pottery

The Orange period or culture is defined by the presence of Orange-series

ceramics A ceramic is any of the various hard, brittle, heat-resistant and corrosion-resistant materials made by shaping and then firing an inorganic, nonmetallic material, such as clay, at a high temperature. Common examples are earthenware, porcelain ...

Ripley P. Bullen Ripley Pierce Bullen (1902–1976) was Curator Emeritus at the Florida Museum of Natural History at the University of Florida, where he was the Department Chair of Social Sciences for a period of seventeen years (1956–1973). He was an archaeolog ...

classified Orange-series

pottery Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other ceramic materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. Major types include earthenware, stoneware and por ...

into five chronological periods, based on shape, decoration, method of construction (hand-shaped or coiled), and the presence of other tempers besides fiber. Discoveries such as additional

radiocarbon dating Radiocarbon dating (also referred to as carbon dating or carbon-14 dating) is a method for determining the age of an object containing organic material by using the properties of radiocarbon, a radioactive isotope of carbon. The method was dev ...

and analysis of Orange-series that were made since the early 1990s support an alternative interpretation, in which variations between vessels represent regional variations rather than a temporal sequence. Kenneth Sassaman suggests that St. Johns pottery may have appeared along the middle

near the beginning of the Orange period, 3,500 ¹⁴C years

Before Present Before Present (BP) years, or "years before present", is a time scale used mainly in archaeology, geology and other scientific disciplines to specify when events occurred relative to the origin of practical radiocarbon dating in the 1950s. Becaus ...

, well before the previously accepted date of 1000 to 500 BCE.Sassaman: 7, 9, 11

Notes

References

* * * * Archaic period in North America Native American history of Florida Archaeological cultures of North America {{US-archaeology-stub