Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas

Part of: Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Participants in this session recognize the need to emancipate sites and events dating to the later fifteenth through early eighteenth centuries from outdated culture-historical taxa. Terms such as Mississippian, Woodland, protohistoric, and periodization based on ceramic types and European-manufactured objects have little relevance to contemporary descendant communities and collaborative research agendas focused on this crucial period in Indigenous and early colonial history. Advances in radiocarbon dating, including sampling strategies, laboratory methods, and statistical modelling incorporating informative priors are allowing researchers to overcome previous challenges associated with the calibration curve. Enhanced chronologies are transforming understandings of settlement patterns, population movement, the circulation of material goods, and permitting the articulation of historical and traditional knowledge in ways that are providing new insights about Indigenous agency, the timing and pace of cultural transformations, and processes of accommodation and resistance to colonial incursions. The aim of this session is to highlight research involving contact-era chronology-building in the eastern Woodlands of North America, collectively evaluate the current coverage of radiocarbon dated sites and components, and take steps towards developing collaborative research agendas that consider continental- to local-scale questions about Indigenous and early colonial transformations in eastern North America.

Other Keywords
Chronology • Dating Techniques: Radiometric • North America: Northeast and Midatlantic • North America: Southeast United States

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  • Documents (10)
Documents
  • 1606: Chronology Construction in the Native Chesapeake (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Martin Gallivan.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Constructing a chronology for the Native Chesapeake on the eve of the colonial era presents several challenges. These include a predominant focus on European settlement, fluctuations in the radiocarbon calibration curve, a scarcity of...

  • Dating the Berry Site in Western North Carolina: Problems, Prospects, Potential (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Christopher Rodning.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Berry site, located in the upper Catawba River Valley of western North Carolina, is the location of the principal town of the Native American province and polity of Joara, and the location of the mid-sixteenth-century Spanish outpost of...

  • Evaluating Sixteenth-century Population Movement in the St. Lawrence River Valley: A Radiocarbon and Huron-Wendat Based Perspective (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jennifer Birch.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Between Cartier journeying down the St. Lawrence Valley in 1535 and Champlain travelling the same route in 1604, the Iroquoian populations inhabiting those shores relocated elsewhere. The apparent disappearance of the St. Lawrence Iroquoians...

  • Expanding the Chronology of a North Carolina Chiefly Landscape using AMS Radiocarbon Data (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Michelle Pigott.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Recent implementations of Bayesian chronological modeling of Indigenous North American archaeological sites have demonstrated the feasibility of this approach when encountering calibration plateaus and reversals, such as the series which...

  • <html>Taking Shelter: Exploring a 16<sup>th</sup> to 18<sup>th</sup> Century Chronology on the Northern Cumberland Plateau</html> (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Brandon Ritchison.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In this paper we describe our initial chronological reexamination of a portion of the central Ohio River Valley during the transition from pre- to post-European contact and colonialism. The post-16th century diaspora of the Shawnee people...

  • <html>The Fur Trade in 16<sup>th</sup>-century Iroquoia: Results and Implications from Radiocarbon Dating at Two Tionontate Sites</html> (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Megan Conger.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. <html> This paper presents the results of radiocarbon dating and Bayesian chronological modeling at Sidey-Mackay and McQueen-McConnell, two Tionontate villages in southern Ontario, Canada, which demonstrate early-16<sup>th</sup> century...

  • A Microhistory of an Ancestral Muskogean Town and Narratives of Early Indigenous-Colonizer Dynamics in Southern Appalachia (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jacob Holland-Lulewicz.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. <html> The King site in northwestern Georgia is one of the most fully excavated 16<sup>th</sup> century Indigenous towns in the southeastern United States. Home to ancestors of the Muscogee (Creek) peoples, King serves as an analytical...

  • Reframing Chronologies: Collaborative Approaches to Fifteenth- through Eighteenth-century Indigenous and Colonial Archaeology (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Stefan Brannan.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The proliferation and sophisticated use of radiocarbon-forward research designs in eastern Woodlands archaeology are challenging outdated culture-historical classifications and outmoded chronological constructs, particularly as they relate to...

  • Time and Temporality in Tombigbee River drainage during the AD 1300s–1600s (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Anthony Krus.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Advances in radiocarbon dating and the widespread use of Bayesian modeling are providing increased resolution to our dating of archaeological sites and assemblages. This trend has been important for achieving greater refinements in...

  • Village Events and Mound Chronologies at Lamar in the Ocmulgee River Basin, Georgia (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Victor Thompson.

    This is an abstract from the "Building a Better Chronology for Fifteenth–Eighteenth-Century Eastern North America through Radiocarbon Dating and Collaborative Research Agendas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. <html> Here we report on our radiocarbon dating program at the Lamar Mound and Village in the Ocmulgee River Basin of central Georgia. Based on its ceramic assemblage, Lamar has long been thought to have been occupied intensively during the...