Above: "The birthplace of Virginia and of the United States" 13 May 1607 "To the glory of God, and in grateful memory of those early settlers, the founders of the nation, who died at Jamestown during the first perilous years of the colony."

I took a guided archaeology tour with this terrific ex-Marine volunteer. There wasn't very much about the site he didn't know. Construction techniques changed very little from 1000 to 1600, it seems. A lot of what I saw looked like an early medieval site in Denmark.

Reconstruction of the original barracks

Some 25 of the original settlers died in August 1607. Their stay in the new world was a short one.