2011 Field Season Summary
A combination of backhoe trenching and hand excavation units (2 x 2 m) has conclusively revealed that the Eveland site was not a village but a small, specialized settlement consisting of several Cahokian-style ceremonial buildings. This finding supports the argument that the Eveland site represents a site unit intrusion from the American Bottom. Moreover, it can now be argued more conclusively that there were no large, nucleated villages in the CIRV in the early 12th century AD. Thus, early Mississippian inhabitants in the CIRV do not appear to have been greatly concerned with the threat of inter-group violence
Two weeks into the project the field school moved to the C.W. Cooper site where we opened up a series of 2 x 2 m units oriented north/south along a fence row. These units uncovered a dense area of early Mississippian domestic occupation. About 15 early Mississippian pit features and portions of two wall trench structures were excavated. We recovered large samples of early Mississippian paleobotanical, faunal, and artifactual remains. We also gathered important information about the spatial organization of early Mississippian households and communities. Such information is providing new insight into the pace and timing of the escalation of inter-group violence in the region. It was a great first year for this NSF funded project and we plan to return to C.W. Cooper next year.
Thank you for your ongoing interest!
Features
Finding numerous pit features and structure foundations beneath the midden at the C.W Cooper site
Field Screens Constructed
The field crew is already hard at work, gathering supplies and assembling screens for the excavation.
On our Way
The field supervisors boarded a plane this morning in Santa Barbara and will arrive at Peoria Illinois tonight. Equipment purchasing will take place tomorrow.
Field Crew Selected
After a few tough choices the field crew for the 2011 UCSB field project “Living with Warfare” has been finalized.
Living with Warfare Archaeological Project
This three year project will explore the catastrophic and wide-ranging consequences of war on Mississippian period (A.D. 1100-1425) communities in the Central Illinois River Valley (CIRV). Archaeological data linking escalating violence with both population nucleation and declining health in the Central Illinois River Valley from A.D. 1200 to 1425 reveal that the causal dimensions of warfare were not restricted to political centralization and collapse but reshaped other, more mundane aspects of life. Determining the impacts of this violence on the Mississippian groups subject to these hostilities will help explain the historical trajectory of conflict culminating in the abandonment of the region around A.D. 1425
A geophysical survey, combined with three seasons of excavation targeting residential groups at the Eveland site adjacent to the Dickson Mounds Museum will identify subsistence practices and household/community organizational patterns that predate the period of escalating violence in this region. Laboratory analysis of collections from a previously excavated site (Orendorf) that post-dates the increase in violent attacks will also be conducted, enabling the documentation of domestic changes occurring as a result of the intensification of warfare. Project goals include determining (1) if and how people altered their subsistence pursuits in response to the increased risk of attack while foraging, fishing, and farming, and (2) if and how people altered the size and arrangement of their households and communities as a result of nucleation into fortified villages
