From Bluffs to Floodplain: A Spatial Approach to Mississippian Communities in the Ozarks of Arkansas

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Adventures in Spatial Archaeometry: A Survey of Recent High-Resolution Survey and Measurement Applications" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Mississippian (ca. AD 1000–1500) occupation of the Ozarks in Northwest Arkansas is known through few multiple-mound ceremonial centers in river valleys and from rockshelters along limestone bluff lines. Few permanent habitation sites are recorded, and understanding how sites articulate in a larger settlement system is a major research question for the area. Using a combination of spatial datasets, including aerial imagery, lidar, and near-surface remote-sensing, characteristics such as site location, size, proximity, and layout are examined. Based on these variables, settlement appears largely unchanged from the preceding Woodland period indicating the strong influence of tradition in shaping Mississippian lifeways, despite the introduction of mound ceremonialism and major changes in subsistence.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Adventures in Spatial Archaeometry: A Survey of Recent High-Resolution Survey and Measurement Applications   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 36346.0