A Re-evaluation of Oneota Cultural Phases in the La Crosse Locality

Summary

The Oneota culture has dated in La Crosse Wisconsin to between AD 1300-1625 (Boszhardt 1994). Single component sites have allowed for definition of specific ceramic types and attributes as diagnostic of each of three phases. Previous excavations and analysis of materials recovered from the Tremaine site (47-LC-95) by the Wisconsin Historical Society revealed pottery and radiocarbon dates corresponding to all of the phases (O’Gorman 1995). During the summers of 2011 to 2014, new excavations by the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse have taken place at the site allowing for more evidence to be collected. Rim sherds from these excavations show attributes that are intermediate between the last two phases. This has created a need for refined criteria for each of the phases and, perhaps, an additional transitional phase. Two specific measurements that are indicators of each phases, rim notching and rim height, were not systematically quantified from the earlier excavations. Therefore, a sample of sherds from the original and more recent work have been measured and the data analyzed to evaluate the pattern of change. The original 42 radiocarbon dates and two new dates will also be recalibrated and have Bayesian analysis performed on them to help refine the three phases.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage