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(Re) Constructing a Lost Community: “Little Lon,” Melbourne, Australia

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Abstract

The reanalysis of archaeological and documentary evidence of a vanished community (that of Casselden Place in the heart of the area known as “Little Lon” in central Melbourne) has fostered a more thoroughgoing exploration of the nature of the urban slum in Australia. There are significant questions raised by the interpretation of Casselden Place (and Little Lon) as a community during the 19th century (some of the most important of which center on the nature of assemblage composition among poor households of the period). This paper also touches on the means by which new and more complex histories of such vanished communities can be written. As such, the discussion builds on earlier methodological statements and more detailed discussions of the life histories of individuals who lived in Casselden Place (Mayne and Lawrence 1998; Mayne and Murray 1999; Mayne et al. 2000; Murray and Mayne 2002) to provide a more specific discussion of the archaeological elements of the project. The analysis of the assemblage reported here is very much a work in progress. Analysis of assemblages drawn from Casselden Place and those from the rest of Little Lon continues, reaching beyond the level of establishing artifact frequencies and exploring the meaning of the counter-intuitive patterns that are discussed in the paper.

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Murray, T., Mayne, A. (Re) Constructing a Lost Community: “Little Lon,” Melbourne, Australia. Hist Arch 37, 87–101 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03376594

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03376594

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