Monticello archaeologists focused on slave life

Thomas Jefferson is known as one of the great architects of independence, but largely out of sight of his esteemed guests at Monticello was a world of enslavement, which archaeologists are gradually bringing to life through excavations.

“We want to be able to show what life was like then,” said Thomas Jefferson Foundation spokeswoman Lisa Stites, adding that a true picture would show the world of Jefferson’s slaves. Jefferson had as many as 200 slaves at any given time.

“That’s one of the things we do with archaeology, is try to get it back to what it would have been like in Jefferson’s time,” Stites said....