"We now realize that to understand the origin of the state, we must first understand the development of the chiefdom. And nowhere in the world is the study of chiefdoms being pursued as vigorously as in the Southeast. Combining tantalizing bits of ethnohistory with painstaking archaeology, the scholars of this region are adding greatly to our understanding of the chiefdom as a political form. The present volume, which is the work of outstanding specialists in the region, is a striking example of the rich fruit being yielded by this research."--Robert L. Carneiro, Curator of Anthropology, American Museum of Natural History "A major step forward in the history of work on Mississippian culture. . . . This book is a must for those interested in the period--and highly recommended for archaeologists who are not southeasterners."--James A. Brown, Northwestern University "will do blurb after seeing page proofs"--Robert Carneiro, American Museum of Natural History The great societies that flourished during the late Precolumbian period--called Mississippian chiefdoms--disappeared shortly after European contact, leaving a legacy across the southeastern United States. This book presents up-to-date information about their political structures, offering new perspectives on "cycling"--the growth, collapse, and reappearance of chiefdoms. Using archaeological discoveries and historical documents, the book documents the dynamic and varied nature of chiefdoms and explains why they evolved the way they did. It illustrates the value of studies of the Mississippian societies for addressing general anthropological questions. Contents Part I. Introduction 1. Looking for and at Mississippian Political Change, by John F. Scarry 2. The Nature of Mississippian Societies, by John F. Scarry Part II. Structure and Change in Mississippian Societies 3. Development and Dissolution of a Mississippian Society in the American Bottom, Illinois, by George R. Milner 4. Markers of Social Integration: The Development of Centralized Authority in the Spiro Region, by J. Daniel Rogers 5. Control over Goods and the Political Stability of the Moundville Chiefdom, by Paul D. Welch 6. Platform-Mound Construction and the Instability of Mississippian Chiefdoms, by David J. Hally 7. Mississippian Political Dynamics in the Oconee Valley, Georgia, by Mark Williams and Gary Shapiro 8. Chiefly Cycling and Large-Scale Abandonments as Viewed from the Savannah River Basin, by David G. Anderson 9. Stability and Change in the Apalachee Chiefdom, by John F. Scarry Part III. Chiefly Politics and the Mississippian Societies 10. Fluctuations Between Simple and Complex Chiefdoms: Cycling in the Late Prehistoric Southeast, by David G. Anderson John F. Scarry is research associate and research assistant professor of anthropology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He is the coauthor of San Pedro y San Pablo de Patale: A Seventeenth-Century Spanish Mission in Leon County, Florida, and has written numerous book chapters and articles for publications such as The Florida Anthropologist, Southeastern Archaeology, and Southeastern Archaeological Conference Bulletin.

The most current thought on Native Americans of the colonial South

The years AD 1500–1700 were a time of dramatic change for the indigenous inhabitants of southeastern North America, yet Native histories during this era have been difficult to reconstruct due to a scarcity of written records before the eighteenth century. Using archaeology to enhance our knowledge of the period, Contact, Colonialism, and Native Communities in the Southeastern United States presents new research on the ways Native societies responded to early contact with Europeans. Featuring sites from Kentucky to Mississippi to Florida, these case studies investigate how indigenous groups were affected by the expeditions of explorers such as Hernando de Soto, Pánfilo de Narváez, and Juan Pardo. Contributors re-create the social geography of the Southeast during this time, trace the ways Native institutions changed as a result of colonial encounters, and emphasize the agency of indigenous populations in situations of contact. They demonstrate the importance of understanding the economic, political, and social variability that existed between Native and European groups. Bridging the gap between historical records and material artifacts, this volume answers many questions and opens up further avenues for exploring these transformative centuries, pushing the field of early contact studies in new theoretical and methodological directions. A volume in the Florida Museum of Natural History: Ripley P. Bullen Series

Using research at the Pevey (22Lw510) and Lowe-Steen (22Lw511) mound sites on the Pearl River in Lawrence County, Mississippi, this book explores the social and political mechanisms by which these polities may have interacted with each other and the geographic limit to the effects of inter-polity competition.

How certain Southern indigenous viewed themselves from prehistory to decimation by Europeans was already a significant subject of study fifty years ago, but more recent scholarship has proven that what was once considered a single cult was actually a complex of cults, with myriad adaptations of myths and artifacts. This collection of 12 articles details archeological findings and analysis of how this warrior-based set of precepts and practices developed and grew into elaborate ceremonial places and burial grounds. Topics include the implications of recent analysis of sites, early evidence of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (SECC) and its contexts, the role of time in development of the SECC, material and iconographic evidence of the SECC in Erowah culture, evidence from Moundville potsherds, SECC ritual regalia in the southern Appalachians and other regions, the role of sex in SECC, and future directions of research.

"This volume demonstrates how archaeologists working in the Southern Appalachian region over the past 40 years have developed rich interpretations of prehistoric and historic Southeastern Native societies by examining them from multiple scales of analysis. The end results of these examinations demonstrate both the uses and the constraints of multiscalar approaches in reconstructing various lifeways across the Southeast"--

The residents of Mississippian towns principally located in the southeastern and midwestern United States from 900 to1500 A.D. made many beautiful objects, which included elaborate and well-crafted copper and shell ornaments, pottery vessels, and stonework. Some of these objects were socially valued goods and often were placed in ritual context, such as graves. The funerary context of these artifacts has sparked considerable study and debate among archaeologists, raising questions about the place in society of the individuals interred with such items, as well as the nature of the societies in which these people lived. By focusing on how mortuary practices serve as symbols of beliefs and values for the living, the contributors to Mississippian Mortuary Practices explore how burial of the dead reflects and reinforces the cosmology of specific cultures, the status of living participants in the burial ceremony, ongoing kin relationships, and other aspects of social organization.