The Mississippian Community at Town Creek

Summary

Archaeological uses of the term “community” incorporate elements of the physical environment, which often include a particular place on the landscape, and elements of the built environment, such as the structures and spaces that people created there. In addition to being a place, the concept of “community” also entails the social, economic, and political relationships that existed among the individuals and groups that lived there. This paper presents an overview of the Mississippian community at the Town Creek site in central North Carolina. Architectural elements of the Town Creek community—which include several public buildings, a platform mound, a central plaza, and a domestic area containing a number of houses—have been fairly well established based on the distribution of archaeological features across the site. This paper will explore the Town Creek community regarding the social groups that created and used these spaces. In particular, individual households appear to have been important groups that persisted throughout the existence of this community, even though the community itself changed significantly throughout its history.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Reconsidering Mississippian Households and Communities

Keywords

Spatial Coverage