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54-483: Weeden Island cultures are defined by ceramics, which fall into two categories, sometimes called secular and sacred. Sacred ceramics are found primarily in mounds , while secular ceramics are found primarily in middens and house sites. The two types of ceramics have separate histories, and the secular ceramics show considerable variation between regions. Milanich, et al. compare the Weeden Island sacred complex to

108-415: A base there in 1567 called Fort San Juan . Expedition documentation and archaeological evidence of the fort and Native American culture both exist. The soldiers were at the fort about 18 months (1567–1568) before the natives killed them and destroyed the fort. (They killed soldiers stationed at five other forts as well; only one man of 120 survived.) Sixteenth-century Spanish artifacts have been recovered from

162-446: A charnel house where bundled bones, typically a skull and limb bones, were stored. After some period of time, the bundles were buried around the periphery of the mound. In about 475, approximately 36 bone bundles were removed from the charnel house and buried. The charnel house was burned, then a fire was built of top of it for a feast. A large bowl with animal heads on its rim, which may have been used for serving ceremonial drinks such as

216-565: A few in Wisconsin , have rock formations, or petroforms within them, on them, or near them. While these mounds are perhaps not as famous as burial mounds, like their European analogs, Native American mounds also have a variety of other uses. While some prehistoric cultures, like the Adena culture , used mounds preferentially for burial, others used mounds for other ritual and sacred acts, as well as for secular functions. The platform mounds of

270-434: A number of burial pits from the village. Posts up to two feet in diameter apparently were used to mark graves. The decomposed bodies were later removed, and bones were bundled and moved to mound 'C'. Numerous potsherds and many small fire pits are interpreted as evidence of ceremonies connected with processing the bodies. In 354 the wall of posts and other posts were piled up over the empty grave pits and burned. Mound 'C' held

324-482: A regional ceramic style in the southeast involving surface decorations applied with a carved wooden paddle. By the late 1960s, archaeological investigations had shown the similarity of the culture that produced the pottery and the midwestern Mississippian pattern defined in 1937 by the Midwestern Taxonomic System. In 1967, James B. Griffin coined South Appalachian Mississippian to describe

378-508: A technical term in archaeology, is not generally in favor in the rest of the world. More specific local terminology is preferred, and each of these terms has its own article (see below). Mississippian culture The Mississippian culture were collections of Native American societies that flourished in what is now the Midwestern , Eastern , and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 to 1600, varying regionally. It

432-585: A tool or ally in long-standing native feuds. In one example, de Soto negotiated a truce between the Pacaha and the Casqui . De Soto's later encounters left about half of the Spaniards and perhaps many hundreds of Native Americans dead. The chronicles of de Soto are among the first documents written about Mississippian peoples and are an invaluable source of information on their cultural practices. The chronicles of

486-457: A variety of functions. Villages with single platform mounds were more typical of the river valley settlements throughout the mountainous area of southwest North and South Carolina and southeastern Tennessee that were known as the historic Cherokee homelands. In Western North Carolina for example, some 50 such mound sites in the eleven westernmost counties have been identified since the late 20th century, following increased research in this area of

540-515: Is a heaped pile of earth , gravel , sand , rocks , or debris . Most commonly, mounds are earthen formations such as hills and mountains , particularly if they appear artificial. A mound may be any rounded area of topographically higher elevation on any surface. Artificial mounds have been created for a variety of reasons throughout history, including habitation (see Tell and Terp ), ceremonial ( platform mound ), burial ( tumulus ), and commemorative purposes (e.g. Kościuszko Mound ). In

594-487: Is believed that the peoples of this area adopted Mississippian traits from their northwestern neighbors. Typical settlements were located on riverine floodplains and included villages with defensive palisades enclosing platform mounds and residential areas. Etowah and Ocmulgee in Georgia are both prominent examples of major South Appalachian Mississippian settlements. Both include multiple large earthwork mounds serving

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648-437: Is named). Cultures in the tributary Tennessee River Valley may have also begun to develop Mississippian characteristics at this point. Almost all dated Mississippian sites predate 1539–1540 (when Hernando de Soto explored the area), with notable exceptions being Natchez communities. These maintained Mississippian cultural practices into the 18th century. A number of cultural traits are recognized as being characteristic of

702-710: Is the chronological stage, while Mississippian culture refers to the cultural similarities that characterize this society. The term Middle Mississippian is also used to describe the core of the classic Mississippian culture area. This area covers the central Mississippi River Valley, the lower Ohio River Valley, and most of the Mid-South area, including western and central Kentucky, western Tennessee, and northern Alabama and Mississippi. Sites in this area often contain large ceremonial platform mounds, residential complexes and are often encircled by earthen ditches and ramparts or palisades . Middle Mississippian cultures, especially

756-400: Is usually divided into three or more chronological periods. Each period is an arbitrary historical distinction varying regionally. At a particular site, each period may be considered to begin earlier or later, depending on the speed of adoption or development of given Mississippian traits. The "Mississippian period" should not be confused with the "Mississippian culture". The Mississippian period

810-689: The Alachua culture , which developed out of the Cades Pond variant of the Weeden Island culture. Later sites in the southern part of the region show influence from the Safety Harbor culture . Primary habitation sites were concentrated along the coast, with smaller sites adjacent to inland waterways. The inhabitants left numerous shell middens, composed primarily of oyster shells, but also including clam , scallop , whelk and conch shells. Fish of various kinds were another important component of

864-764: The Cove of the Withlacoochee (in Citrus County ) and Gulf Hammock (in southern Levy County ), as well as coastal sites such as the Crystal River site . This region has not received as much attention from archeologists as have other variants of the Weeden Island culture. While a number of sites have been surveyed, most of the mounds and shell middens in the area have been disturbed or destroyed by artifact hunters and "borrowing" for road-building material, and there have been no major excavations of sites in

918-693: The Deptford culture , from which the Swift Creek culture had also developed. The sacred or ceremonial component of Weeden Island developed out of the Hopewell tradition -based Yent and Green Point traditions. It persisted in some areas until the end of the Woodland period ca. 1200. Weeden Island sites have been found from Mobile Bay to the Okefenokee Swamp , and from south of Tampa Bay to

972-790: The Hasinai , Kadohadacho , and Natchitoches , which were all linked by their similar languages. The Plaquemine culture was an archaeological culture in the lower Mississippi River Valley in western Mississippi and eastern Louisiana . Good examples of this culture are the Medora site (the type site for the culture and period) in West Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana , and the Anna , Emerald Mound , Winterville and Holly Bluff sites located in Mississippi. Plaquemine culture

1026-675: The Mississippian culture , for example, may have supported temples , the houses of chiefs , council houses , and may have also acted as a platform for public speaking. Other mounds would have been part of defensive walls to protect a certain area. The Hopewell culture used mounds as markers of complex astronomical alignments related to ceremonies. Mounds and related earthworks are the only significant monumental construction in pre-Columbian Eastern and Central North America. peoples. Mounds are given different names depending on which culture they strive from. They can be located all across

1080-753: The Narváez expedition were written before the de Soto expedition; the Narváez expedition informed the Court of de Soto about the New World. After the destruction and flight of the de Soto expedition, the Mississippian peoples continued their way of life with little direct European influence. Indirectly, however, European introductions dramatically changed these native societies. Because the natives lacked immunity to infectious diseases unknowingly carried by

1134-492: The archaeology of the United States and Canada , a mound is a deliberately constructed elevated earthen structure or earthwork , intended for a range of potential uses. In European and Asian archaeology, the word " tumulus " may be used as a synonym for an artificial hill, particularly if the hill is related to particular burial customs. While the term "mound" may be applied to historic constructions, most mounds in

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1188-542: The black drink , was left on the remains of the fire after its bottom was knocked out. At least 17 ceramic vessels, including hollow figurines of animals, were broken and left atop the graves of the bone bundles. The whole mound was then covered with a six-foot layer of earth. Pottery at the McKeithen site has been classified as secular, prestige, and sacred. Secular pots were undecorated, or had minimal decoration, and were all made with clay from local sources. Prestige ware

1242-637: The fall line on the Chattahoochee River at Columbus, Georgia . Although the multiple geographic variants of Weeden Island groups used slightly different subsistence strategies dictated by local environment (including small-scale agriculture in some areas), a trend toward the semi- sedentary hunter-gatherer exploitation of hardwood hammock areas and coastal/ riverine marine resources accurately characterizes Weeden Island subsistence activities in general. The site on Weedon Island where Weeden Island sacred ceramics were first described

1296-561: The Cahokia polity located near East St. Louis, Illinois , were very influential on neighboring societies. High-status artifacts, including stone statuary and elite pottery associated with Cahokia, have been found far outside of the Middle Mississippian area. These items, especially the pottery, were also copied by local artists. The term South Appalachian Province was originally used by W. H. Holmes in 1903 to describe

1350-598: The Cherokee homeland. The Caddoan Mississippian area, a regional variant of the Mississippian culture, covered a large territory, including what is now eastern Oklahoma , western Arkansas , northeastern Texas , and northwestern Louisiana . Archaeological evidence has led to a scholarly consensus that the cultural continuity is unbroken from prehistory to the present, and that the Caddo and related Caddo language speakers in prehistoric times and at first European contact are

1404-540: The Europeans, such as measles and smallpox , epidemics caused so many fatalities that they undermined the social order of many chiefdoms. Some groups adopted European horses and changed to nomadism . Political structures collapsed in many places. At Joara , near Morganton, North Carolina , Native Americans of the Mississippian culture interacted with Spanish colonizers of the Juan Pardo expedition, who built

1458-660: The Hopewell and Mississippian complexes, i.e., a ceremonial complex practiced by several cultures. Scholars believe that the secular components of Weeden Island cultures emerged from the Swift Creek culture during the Middle Woodland Period (ca. 200 - 500 CE ) in the lower Chattahoochee - Apalachicola river drainage , where Alabama , Florida and Georgia meet. To the east of this Weeden Island heartland, Weeden Island secular components developed out of

1512-487: The Manasota culture had no connection with the secular components of heartland Weeden Island cultures. Recent efforts have refined the Weeden Island culture concept so that the term "Weeden Island" includes several distinct regional manifestations which exhibited the same basic ceremonial complex (most likely associated with shared sociopolitical patterns), but that exhibited significant geographic variations. These include:

1566-750: The McKeithen Weeden Island culture was north of the Santa Fe River , extending east from the Aucilla River to the western edge of the St. Johns River drainage basin. It lasted about 500 years, from 200 to 700. It was succeeded by the Suwannee Valley culture . The McKeithen culture is named after a landowner who invited archaeologists to excavate some mounds on his property before vandals destroyed them. The McKeithen site

1620-573: The Mississippians. Although not all Mississippian peoples practiced all of the following activities, they were distinct from their ancestors in the adoption of some or all of these traits. The Mississippians had no writing system or stone architecture. They worked naturally occurring metal deposits, such as hammering and annealing copper for ritual objects such as Mississippian copper plates and other decorations, but did not smelt iron or practice bronze metallurgy . The Mississippian stage

1674-779: The North peninsular Gulf Coast variant, found along the Gulf coast from Pasco County to the Aucilla River ; the Cades Pond culture in north-central Florida; the McKeithen Weeden Island culture in northernmost inland Florida; the Manasota culture located within the central Peninsular Gulf Coast; the Northwest culture, extending from the Aucilla River through the Florida Panhandle to Mobile, Alabama ;

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1728-462: The United States are pre-Columbian earthworks, built by Native American peoples. Native Americans built a variety of mounds, including flat-topped pyramids or cones known as platform mounds, rounded cones, and ridge or loaf-shaped mounds. Some mounds took on unusual shapes, such as the outline of cosmologically significant animals. These are known as effigy mounds . Some mounds, such as

1782-469: The body was exposed for a while after death before burial. A tomb of wood and earth was erected over the grave. The tomb and building were then burned, and the ashes scattered. After a ceramic bird head was pushed into the ground at the foot of the grave, a layer of dirt was spread over all of the mound. Three radiocarbon dates for this event average to 354. Mound 'A' was a charnel area where bodies were cleaned and buried temporarily. A wall of posts screened

1836-404: The diet. Sea turtles , tortoises , alligators and deer were also consumed. Horticulture was absent or a late introduction, although the inhabitants of the southern end of the region (Pasco and Hernando counties) were growing maize at the time of first European contact. The McKeithen Weeden Island culture was a regional variant of early Weeden Island culture in north Florida. The area of

1890-557: The direct ancestors of the modern Caddo Nation of Oklahoma . The climate in this area was drier than areas in the eastern woodlands, hindering maize production, and the lower population on the plains to the west may have meant fewer neighboring competing chiefdoms to contend with. Major sites such as Spiro and the Battle Mound Site are in the Arkansas River and Red River Valleys, the largest and most fertile of

1944-760: The early Kolomoki culture, located in the lower Chattahoochee Valley; the later Wakulla Weeden Island culture, in the lower Chattahoochee Valley, the lower Flint River valley, in southwestern Georgia, and the upper Choctawhatchee River valley in southeastern Alabama. Undefined Weeden Island culture variants are found in southeastern Alabama and southwestern Georgia outside the Kolomoki/Wakulla Weeden Island areas. Several attempts have been made to segregate Weeden Island components into chronological phases based on temporal changes in settlement patterns, artifact assemblage, and ceremonial activities, all of which recognize an inherent distinction between

1998-477: The evolving understanding of the peoples of the Southeast. South Appalachian Mississippian area sites are distributed across a contiguous area including Alabama, Georgia, northern Florida, South Carolina, central and western North Carolina, and Tennessee. Chronologically this area became influenced by Mississippian culture later than the Middle Mississippian area (about 1000 as compared to 800) to its northwest. It

2052-750: The majority of the American Indian nations living in this region when European trade began. The historic and modern day American Indian nations believed to have descended from the overarching Mississippian culture include: the Alabama , Apalachee , Arikara , Caddo , Chickasaw , Catawba , Choctaw , Muscogee Creek , Guale , Hitchiti , Ho-Chunk , Houma , Iowa , Kansa , Koroas , Missouria , Mobilian , Natchez , Omaha , Osage (possibly), Otoe , Pawnee , Ponca , Quapaw (possibly), Seminole (broad origins), Taensas , Tunicas , Yamasee , Yazoos , and Yuchi . Scholars have studied

2106-512: The many Caddoan languages . These languages once had a broad geographic distribution, but many are now extinct. The modern languages in the Caddoan family include Caddo and Pawnee . Hernando de Soto led an expedition into the area in the early 1540s, he encountered several native groups now thought to have been Caddoan. Composed of many tribes, the Caddo were organized into three confederacies,

2160-493: The material culture of earlier and later Weedon Island manifestations. It is most widely accepted that the Weeden Island culture be split into two time periods: the Weeden Island I Period (200 AD - 700 AD) and Weeden Island II Period (700 AD - 1200 AD). Some Weeden Island II cultures later developed into local variants of the Mississippian culture , collectively known as proto-Mississippian . The Weeden Island culture

2214-509: The records of Hernando de Soto 's expedition of 1539–1543 to learn of his contacts with Mississippians, as he traveled through their villages of the Southeast. He visited many villages, in some cases staying for a month or longer. The list of sites and peoples visited by the Hernando de Soto Expedition chronicles those villages. Some encounters were violent, while others were relatively peaceful. In some cases, de Soto seems to have been used as

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2268-423: The region. As in other Weeden Island areas, there is a difference between ceremonial/prestige pottery , found primarily in burial mounds, and the utilitarian pottery found in village sites and shell middens. The prevalence of undecorated pottery and the lack of major excavations means that the chronology of the Weeden Island culture in the north peninsular Gulf coast is poorly understood. The Weeden Island culture

2322-477: The site, marking the first European colonization in the interior of what became the United States. By the time more documentary accounts were being written, the Mississippian way of life had changed irrevocably. Some groups maintained an oral tradition link to their mound-building past, such as the late 19th-century Cherokee . Other Native American groups, having migrated many hundreds of miles and lost their elders to diseases, did not know their ancestors had built

2376-401: The village have yielded radiocarbon dates of AD 200 to 750. The mounds served different purposes. The one named (arbitrarily) 'B' had a rectangular building on it that has been interpreted to be a temple or the residence of the priest who conducted ceremonies for the dead. The presumed holder of that office was buried inside the building. Evidence of animals chewing on some bones indicate that

2430-525: The waterways in the Caddoan region, where maize agriculture would have been the most productive. The sites generally lacked wooden palisade fortifications often found in the major Middle Mississippian towns. Living on the western edge of the Mississippian world, the Caddoans may have faced fewer military threats from their neighbors. Their societies may also have had a somewhat lower level of social stratification . The Caddoan people were speakers of one of

2484-539: The world in spots such as Asia, Europe and the Americas. "Mound builders" have more commonly been associated with the mounds in the Americas. They all have different meanings and sometimes are constructed as animals and can be clearly seen from aerial views. Kankali Tila is a famous mound located at Mathura in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh . A Jain stupa was excavated here in 1890-91 by Dr. Fuhrer. Mound, as

2538-474: Was a sharp dichotomy between sacred and the secular" artifacts (particularly ceramics) within the Weeden Island culture, though this pattern has not been observed west of the Aucilla River. The north peninsular Gulf coast variant of the Weeden Island culture existed along the Gulf of Mexico coast of Florida from the Aucilla River southward to what is now Pasco County . It also included such inland wetland areas as

2592-441: Was a village next to a stream with three mounds. These three mounds were created in an isosceles triangle, with the main axis of the triangle pointing towards the summer solstice sunrise. The mounds were likely built between 350-475 CE. Abundant evidence of occupation was found in a crescent around a presumed plaza , which was essentially bare of artifacts . The three mounds flanked the plaza on three sides. Wood and charcoal found in

2646-557: Was contemporaneous with the Middle Mississippian culture at the Cahokia site near St. Louis , Missouri. It is considered ancestral to the Natchez and Taensa Peoples. Although the Mississippian culture was heavily disrupted before a complete understanding of the political landscape was written down, many Mississippian political bodies were documented and others have been discovered by research. Mississippian peoples were ancestral to

2700-445: Was decorated with lines and dots and sometimes 'painted' with red clay. This prestige ware was found most often in the mounds, but occasionally elsewhere in the village. The sacred vessels, which were found only in the mounds, were elaborately decorated and sometimes were in the shape of animals. Some of the sacred vessels apparently were imported, but the ones with animal shapes usually were made from local clay. Mound A mound

2754-576: Was excavated by Smithsonian Institution archaeologist J. Walter Fewkes in 1923 and 1924. Archaeologists now recognize that the Weedon Island site is well outside the heartland of the Weeden Island culture. The Weedon Island site was part of the Weeden Island-related late Manasota culture . The Manasota culture developed around 500 BCE, 700 years before the development of the Weeden Island sacred complex. The secular component of

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2808-513: Was known for building large, earthen platform mounds , and often other shaped mounds as well. It was composed of a series of urban settlements and satellite villages linked together by loose trading networks. The largest city was Cahokia , believed to be a major religious center, located in what is present-day southern Illinois . The Mississippian way of life began to develop in the Mississippi River Valley (for which it

2862-592: Was not uniform over the north peninsular Gulf coast. Ceramics related to the Swift Creek culture are found scattered at early sites throughout the area, but particularly so in Taylor County , the northernmost part of the region. Later sites in Taylor County show some influence from the Fort Walton culture. In Dixie County , to the south of Taylor County, later sites appear to have been influenced by

2916-533: Was preceded by the Deptford culture (and the later Swift Creek and Santa Rosa-Swift Creek cultures in the panhandle). It was followed by the Alachua culture in the Cades Pond culture area, by the Suwannee Valley culture in the McKeithen culture area and by the Fort Walton Culture in the Northwest area (the panhandle). Several archaeologists including William Sears indicate "that there

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