Farmers of the Little Ice Age: Paradox or Enigma?

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Late Prehistoric Oneota subsistence in the North American Upper Mississippi River Valley has been described using many different and sometimes incompatible perspectives. For example, Oneota maize agriculture could be less intensive than Middle Mississippian agriculture, or more intensive. In a similar fashion, the use of wild resources, especially aquatic ones, has been interpreted as evidence for diversification or intensification. The Middle Grant Creek site (11 Wi 2739), an early 17th century Huber-phase village in northeastern Illinois, provides evidence for heavy investment in maize agriculture and the cultivation of wetland soils, the exploitation of wild terrestrial plants, and the use of a wide variety of terrestrial and aquatic animals. The site was shows an unusual level of maize storage and was occupied during the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, an era where upper Midwestern agriculture was seen as climate-limited. Did the inhabitants of Middle Grant Creek paradoxically increase their investment in agriculture? Or is our current knowledge of local climate and Oneota subsistence so limited that food production activities remain enigmatic?

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 36221.0