Fortifications in the Eastern Woodlands of Pre-Columbian North America: An Examination of Organized Warfare during the Mississippian Period

Summary

The prevalence and ubiquity of warfare have long been recognized by scholars studying the Mississippian Era in the Eastern Woodlands. These data point to a culture(s) that often found itself in periods of conflict between competing regional polities, which is reflected in skeletal trauma rates, fortified settlements, and conflagrated villages. Our collective understanding of the geopolitical interactions and causes for this strife is subject to substantial interpretation and debate, rendering the topic suitable for additional exploration. Likewise, archaeologists have infrequently focused on how Mississippian warfare was conducted with relatively unorganized raiding often invoked as a plausible scenario.

In this study, we examine the protohistoric accounts, ethnographic data on small-scale warfare, geophysical and archaeological data for fortifications, and the prevalence and patterning of warfare-related skeletal trauma to better define the organizational nature of both aggressors and defenders within and around Mississippian period villages. Building upon our research during Indiana University’s 2015 NSF REU program at Lawrenz Gun Club (11Cs4), a heavily fortified community in the Illinois Valley, we examine the likelihood that smaller raiding parties could have effectively breached larger palisades with bastions spaced at regular intervals.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage