Negotiating Migration and Violence in the Pre-Columbian Mid-Continent

A remarkable level of indigenous violence consisting of prolonged, intermittent, small-scale warfare documented at the Norris Farms 36 cemetery in Fulton County, Illinois impacts perspectives on relative levels of violence in the Mid-continent of North America. Understanding the larger social context for violence in the Norris Farms Oneota skeletal population and the attributed social stress has been the over-arching goal guiding research and excavation at the associated Morton Village for the past seven years. Building on prior research in the cemetery and village, current work positions the issue of social context within a migration framework. At A.D. 1300 there is clear evidence that a small group of Oneota migrated into the Central Illinois River Valley encountering a resident Middle Mississippian population. It is also clear that the migrants were engaged in a significant level of conflict. What is not clear is how migrant and resident populations negotiated their new, post-migration situation. New evidence points to co-habitation of the village site and ensuing cultural changes for both groups. Posters in this symposium present different lines of evidence addressing the negotiation of space and material culture to assess post-migration interaction thereby informing the particular social context for violence.