Introduction

This chapter introduces the book with a discussion of culture contact dynamics and the need to investigate these questions in complex non-state societies. The spread of Cahokia’s influence through both direct and indirect interaction across the Midcontinent, had diverse outcomes in different regions. Mississippianization was a historical process whereby Woodland peoples had the agency to resist or participate in Cahokian practices and did so with reference to their own identities and traditions. Within this framework, the chapter lays out the following research questions: 1) did the Lower Illinois River Valley’s (LIRV) proximity to Cahokia enable certain social, political, and economic interactions with American Bottom groups that did not transpire with more distant groups; and 2) how did these interactions impact the social organization and daily practices of groups in the LIRV?

Making Mississippian

This chapter synthesizes the patterns presented in the book to reconstruct what life was like for Audrey Mississippians. It discusses the implications of these findings for the limits of Cahokia’s economic control and political influence and the nature of culture contact dynamics north of the American Bottom. The Lower Illinois River Valley’s proximity to Cahokia did in fact result in more changes to social organization at Audrey than observed in the northern hinterland. Audrey inhabitants nevertheless maintained certain Woodland-era conventions and hybridized others, generating new Mississippian traditions in the process. Finally, a discussion of exotic materials north of Cahokia characterizes a spirit of exchange and interaction between and among these diverse regions that likely fueled the Mississippianization of the north.

Isotopic Confirmation of the Timing and Intensity of Maize Consumption in Greater Cahokia

The history of maize (Zea mays L.) in the eastern Woodlands remains an important study topic. As currently understood, these histories appear to vary regionally and include scenarios positing an early introduction and an increase in use over hundreds of, if not a thousand, years. In this article, we address the history of maize in the American Bottom region of Illinois and its importance in the development of regional Mississippian societies, specifically in the Cahokian polity located in the central Mississippi River valley. We present new lines of evidence that confirm subsistence-level maize use at Cahokia was introduced rather abruptly at about AD 900 and increased rapidly over the following centuries. Directly dated archaeobotanical maize remains, human and dog skeletal carbon isotope values, and a revised interpretation of the archaeological record support this interpretation. Our results suggest that population increases and the nucleation associated with Cahokia were facilitated by the newly introduced practices of maize cultivation and consumption. Maize should be recognized as having had a key role in providing subsistence security that—combined with social, political, and religious changes—fueled the emergence of Cahokia in AD 1050.

Cahokians and the Circulation of Ritual Goods in the Middle Cumberland Region

This chapter addresses the influence of human migration into the Middle Cumberland Region by examining the circulation of ritual goods as represented by four groups of objects: ceramics, shell cups and gorgets, stone tablets, and symbolic weaponry. While the presence of Ramey Incised and Cahokia Cordmarked ceramics in the MCR demonstrates the arrival of a community from the American Bottom in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, the manufacture, use, and deposition of negative-painted ceramics in the MCR between A.D. 1250 and 1400 represents the adoption of motifs in contemporary use at Cahokia and the sustained interaction between a group of polities, including those in the American Bottom. The adoption of Braden-style imagery on marine shell and its association with female effigy vessels in an MCR mortuary practice centered on the graves of children reveals a pronounced ritual dedication to an Earth Mother deity in the MCR that is an important focus of our research. Furthermore, the sharing of iconography intimately associated with the Hero Twins in ceramics, marine shell, and stone tablets, and their association with symbolic weaponry, links these culture heroes with the female deity as the central figures in the religious practices of the MCR devoted to reincarnation and rebirth.

Mississippian Origins as Viewed from the Shiloh Indian Mound Group, Western Tennessee

The Shiloh Indian Mound Group has produced a number of artifacts that appear to derive from the American Bottom area. Radiocarbon and TL dating indicates the site was occupied from the late tenth through early 14th centuries AD, with construction activity at Mound A occurring between approximately AD 1100 and 1340, with major stages erected during the early and mid-13th century. The Shiloh center was thus emerging during Cahokia’s Stirling phase, from ca. AD 1100–1200, and reached its peak during the subsequent Morehead Phase, from AD 1200–1300. Shiloh, like Cahokia itself, was abandoned sometime around AD 1300. Shiloh’s Mississippian center apparently emerged amid local Late Woodland peoples who apparently made little prior use of the location, suggesting an amalgamation of differing populations or social groups, much as Cahokia itself was likely formed.

Vestiges of the Braden Corridor

The widespread exchange of masterful artworks in the Mississippian period has long been a topic of interest among North American archaeologists. The Braden Style, an artistic tradition whose origin has been placed at Cahokia, is recognizable on objects unearthed from locales that are remarkably distant from the American Bottom. In the Tallahassee Red Hills of Florida, the Lake Jackson site hosted burials in Mound 3 that contained a variety of these examples. While the contents of Mound 3’s burials have been investigated to explore ties to other major ceremonial centers in the Greater Southeast, the nature of those ties and their timing have not been fully investigated, especially in consideration of Cahokia. This chapter offers an assemblage based exploration of exchange between these two different and distant sites.

The Cahokia Connection at the Lake Providence Mounds, Louisiana

Several hundred potentially exotic sherds were recovered from late Coles Creek period (ca. A.D. 1150 to 1260) contexts at the Lake Providence Mounds in northeast Louisiana. A number of these sherds appeared to represent the remains of vessels from Cahokia or sites in the American Bottom region of southern Illinois, while others likely were local copies of Cahokia vessels. A selected sample of these “exotic” sherds, along with recognized local specimens, were subjected to petrographic thin sectioning (petrographic analysis) and instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA). These analyses suggested that some of the potentially exotic sherds were, indeed, from the American Bottom area, while others could not be sources to a specific region. Possible reasons for the exotic vessels at Lake Providence are discussed.

The Cahokian Crucible: Burning Ritual and the Emergence of Cahokian Power in the Mississippian Midwest

Much of what is known about the Indigenous city of Cahokia, located in and influential on the North American midcontinent during the eleventh through fourteenth centuries AD, derives from decades of salvage, research, and CRM excavations in the surrounding American Bottom region. We use this robust dataset to explore patterns of building conflagration that suggest these practices of burning were part of pre-Mississippian traditions that were bundled into new Cahokian landscapes during the early consolidation of the city. These bundled practices entangled sources of power that were at once political and religious, thus transforming the practices and meanings associated with terminating building use via fire.