A History of Platform Mound Ceremonialism: Finding Meaning in Elevated Ground. MEGAN C. KASSABAUM. 2021. University Press of Florida, Gainesville. xv + 253 pp. $95.00 (hardcover), ISBN 978-1-6834-0207-7. - Volume 87 Issue 3

The transition to an agricultural economy hinges on both the presence of domestic plants, and the reorganization of labor and storage practices so that crops play ever-larger roles in human subsistence. Examining agricultural origins through the lens of changing storage practices offers novel insights about possible motives for early farming, and a clearer focus on how some of the “consequences” of agriculture – e.g. sedentarization, intensification of resource use, occupational specialization, and social differentiation – unfolded in specific times and places depending on management of physical storage facilities. In the Sahara and Nile, people prioritized different kinds of storage (social, physical, and environmental) in response to the changing opportunities and constraints they faced during early and middle Holocene times. Environmental storage (herding) held sway across much of northeast Africa until environmental deterioration pushed human populations into a small area near the Nile, where they developed physical storage facilities in the Fayum and Nile from the Delta south to Kerma. Discovery of wheat/barley in Sudan cemeteries predating these storage facilities suggests that herders were aware of southwest Asian crops for centuries before large-scale physical storage and regular farming took hold. Analysis of site 8-B-52A on Sai Island shows the gradual development of a major storage facility that was used for centuries by local people who produced and processed southwest Asian crops, and undertook construction and maintenance without external input or control by a centralized authority. Sai's record contrasts with other areas along the Nile, where large-scale facilities quickly triggered profound social changes. Although food security needs motivated northeast Africans to undertake farming of southwest Asian crops and invest in physical storage facilities, people managed storage in locally distinctive ways. Only in a few places did they rapidly translate the practice of storage into new social and economic spheres that fostered social differentiation, long-distance trade and, ultimately, the centralized polities of Ancient Egypt and Kerma.

Flotation-recovered plant remains from a series of 11 sod block samples, 7 features, a limestone concentration, and a mass of organic debris provide insights into the construction of Monks Mound. The presence of uncarbonized seeds exclusively of annuals (other than those of perennial elderberry and wild grape, which probably represent food remains) indicates that the construction of Monks Mound was relatively continuous. The presence of quillwort megaspores and other indicators of wetlands provide additional data on how Monks Mound was constructed and where some borrow and/or sod blocks were likely obtained to construct at least part of this monument.

Effigy mounds occur across the midcontinent of North America but their cultural purposes and construction chronologies are rarely known and often controversial. Determining the age and construction history of monuments is important to relate religious symbolism, scientific knowledge, and cultural continuity to groups within a region. Based mainly on circumstantial evidence, researchers have long held that Serpent Mound in Ohio, USA, was constructed 2000-3000 years ago during the Early Woodland (Adena) or Middle Woodland (Hopewell) periods. Excavations in 1991 recovered charcoal buried at shallow depths (35-45 cm) in fill units of the mound and the C-14 ages from two of these units indicated that Serpent Mound was built similar to 900 years ago, during the Late Prehistoric (Fort Ancient) period, much later than originally thought. Our recent multidisciplinary work provides a more complex, robust construction history of Serpent Mound. We used geophysics to map the mound, and solid-earth cores to provide accurate stratigraphy and organic samples for C-14 age estimates from the base of the mound. Bayesian statistical analyses of the seven C-14 ages from Serpent Mound suggest that it was first constructed similar to 2300 years ago during the Early Woodland (Adena) period but was renovated 1400 years later during the Late Prehistoric (Fort Ancient) period, probably to repair eroded portions of the mound. Modification of the mound is also indicated by a possible abandoned coil that is located near the head of the Serpent and visible only in the magnetometer survey. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Monks Mound is the largest single Native American construction in North America. The mound sits at the center of the Cahokia site, and interpretations of its construction and use are fundamental for understanding how Mississippian peoples created mounds and landscapes. In the past, researchers speculated that Monks Mound was both one of the oldest and longest-lived monuments at Cahokia. Using a Bayesian computer model that incorporates both archaeological information and radiocarbon dates, I argue the mound is younger and was built more rapidly than previously thought. The mound likely was built in two very rapid efforts spanning fewer than twenty years. This analysis shows Cahokian society could mobilize vast quantities of labor for short periods, which may have inhibited institutionalized, transgenerational sociopolitical hierarchies.

Mound F was the second-largest platform mound at Angel Mounds (12Vg1), a Mississippian town in southwestern Indiana. It consisted of a simple truncated pyramid shape, but excavations in 1939-1942 and 1964-1965 revealed at least two platforms that once contained buildings buried within it. Each of these mounds and buildings were successively larger than the preceding. The first platform mound (informally known as the inner mound) was < 1 m high and include at least two buildings. Thatch from one building yielded a C-14 age of 900 B.P. Other C-14 ages indicated that the inner mound was buried ca. 750 B.P. when a second ca. 2 m high platform (informally known as the primary mound) was built. Features and structural elements from a large, multichambered building on this surface yield C-14 ages between 680 and 530 B.P. A final ca. 3-4 m mound (informally known as the secondary mound) was built over the Primary Mound soon after 530 B.P. No building was found on the secondary mound's upper platform.Compared to other earthworks at Angel Mounds, the building on the inner mound platform is among the earliest recorded. It also corresponds with the initial construction of Mound A, which implies that earthwork construction was among the first community tasks undertaken after the site was founded. Unlike Mound A, the vast majority of which was constructed during one episode, Mound F indicates multiple construction and use phases. Each of these probably reflected a significant ceremonial or community event, the final of which may have been part of a "ceremonial closing" of the site.

Toltec Mounds: Archeology of the Mound-and-Plaza Complex. Martha Ann Rolingson (with a contribution by Lucretia S. Kelly). 2012. Arkansas Archeological Survey, Fayetteville. 293 pp. $42.00 (paperback), ISBN-978-156349-104-7. - Volume 78 Issue 4

Angel Mounds was a heavily fortified Mississippian settlement with several discrete palisades. Although the palisades were identified early on, the construction sequence has remained elusive because the construction episodes do not have stratigraphic relationships with one another. Recent work at the site reexamined old test excavations and collected new material for radiocarbon dating. AMS dating yielded a suite of new dates from palisade contexts. To refine the construction sequence, five Bayesian chronological models were constructed for palisade building. These models indicate that palisades were first built at Angel Mounds sometime between A. D. 1278 and A. D. 1410, which precedes or coincides with regional depopulation in the lower Ohio River valley. These results further indicate that palisade building at Angel Mounds may be a consequence of external competition and conflict caused by resource-induced stress resulting from deteriorating climatic conditions.

Cahokia (A.D. 800-1400), located near the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, was the largest settlement in ancient North America. Monks Mound occupies the center of Cahokia and provides both a modern and ancient focal point for the site. Past investigations of Monks Mound explored issues of mound chronology and use. Recent soil coring around the perimeter clarifies the geological context and degree of preparation necessary before the mound was built. The results suggest that the mound is not optimally positioned for stability and its location may ultimately accelerate deterioration. Moreover, evaluation of the mound features and fill indicates that maximization of the geotechnical potential of sediments was not a primary concern for the Cahokians. Although poorly engineered relative to modern standards, the suitability of the mound as a platform may have been secondary to other design choices made while building the largest single mound in ancient North America.

Traditionally overlooked because it lacks hallmarks of material and cultural complexity, Early Woodland in the Southeast is an interval of significant transformation in material culture, settlement, and social organization. Investigations at four sites in northeast Louisiana provide insights into changes taking place at this time. These sites are situated on a crevasse splay created by flooding at the end of the Archaic. This flooding is associated with an occupation hiatus ca. 3000–2500 cal B.P. Evidence suggests a rapid colonization of the crevasse splay by people using Tchefuncte pottery, and there is no evidence at these sites of stratigraphic or cultural continuity from Poverty Point. The Early Woodland occupation in the study area dates ca. 2400–2100 cal B.P., which is later than dates associated with Early Woodland in the Pontchartrain Basin and contemporary with Lake Cormorant culture sites farther north. Early Woodland in northeast Louisiana is marked by a diagnostic Tchefuncte ceramic assemblage and the presence of a settlement system composed of small villages or hamlets nucleated around a conical mound that presumably served as a ceremonial/ritual center. This mound was erected very rapidly; radiocarbon dates suggest it was constructed in no more than 10 years. Although mound building has been suspected, this is the first conclusive evidence it was an aspect of Tchefuncte settlement and ceremonial practices. Data from these sites bear on the question of cultural and demographic continuity and change at the Archaic to Woodland transition. Previous models emphasize continuity of populations with ceramic technology and styles diffusing into the lower Mississippi Valley. In contrast, our data support a model of Early Woodland repopulation of the lower Mississippi Valley from the south and east following a prolonged period of regional abandonment.

Large river valleys integrate hydroclimatic change differently than smaller ones. Whereas sedimentary deposits in smaller valleys serve to record temporally short-lived and/or low-amplitude hydrological and geomorphic responses, larger valleys are relatively insensitive to changes at these scales. However, because of their size, larger valleys archive sedimentary records of longer-term, geographically extensive flooding and climate-related landscape evolution. Recent work in the Upper Tensas Basin of the lower Mississippi River Valley, USA, demonstrates the utility of analyzing sediments from a large, geomorphically and fluvially complex river basin as a proxy for significant climatic and landscape changes and their relation to human history. A ∼6000 year sedimentary archive is used to explore the interplay between climate change, landscape evolution, and human responses to changing environmental parameters. Once the Mississippi River basin stabilized following glacial retreat and deceleration of sea-level rise, the history of the river and its inhabitants was dominated by long periods of landscape stability punctuated by episodes of significant landform alteration. Modifications of the landscape are correlated with intervals of rapid climate change recorded in globally distributed multiproxy data sets. Periods of significant landscape instability and fluvial re-adjustment are recorded for the periods ca 4800–3800, 3000–2500, and 1000–800 cal BP. These punctuations in the history of the lower Mississippi Valley are related to periods of major cultural transformation and suggest climate change plays a significant role in the long-term history of human occupation in this river valley. This research demonstrates how geoarcheology can provide information on human–environmental relationships and long-term landscape histories at temporal and spatial scales relevant to understanding cultural responses to climate change.