The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file. Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on March 15, 2010.) Thesis advisor: Dr. Larry Brown. Includes bibliographical references.

University Indian Ruin is a Classic Period Hohokam platform mound village located in the eastern Tucson Basin. Although portions of the site are well understand, the spatial and social community of the village has not been thoroughly documented. This report seeks to define the community of UIR through archival research, public outreach, and spatial analysis using geographic information systems. The result is a conception of a dynamic community with considerable time depth, which was reliant on certain environmental features, and one that also conforms to the phenomenon of pan-Southwestern abandonment and aggregation in late prehistory.

This study provides an examination of landscape perceptions, specifically geopiety or sacred landscape perceptions, at Mounds State Park. Through archival analysis I traced 2000 years of landscape perceptions at the park and found that geopiety has been an underlying influence in shaping perceptions. I further examine contemporary perceptions at Mounds state Park through participant observation and ethnographic interviewing and have determined that geopiety continues at the park in the form of nature-centered, historical/cultural and recreational perceptions. Finally, I examined the influence of modernity on geopiety and have determined that the level of geopiety is determined by the degree an individual is influenced by modernity. Modernity exists in varying degrees from traditional to progressive with the majority of individuals couched within the “inbetweeness” of modernity. / Department of Geography

No description available.

The aim of this study is to investigate the ways in which actions involving the construction of funerary mounds facilitated the continuity of Beaker and Bronze Age society in South-West Britain by creating and renewing meaningful traditions of knowledge. Following a brief introduction (Chapter 1) which reviews the character and contents of the study, the second chapter considers some theoretical issues arising from the practice of interpretative archaeology, and concludes with a discussion of death rituals and their archaeological appropriation. Chapter 3 is a critical review of the modem tradition of barrow study, and proposes an alternative perspective pursued in later chapters. Chapter 4 involves an examination of the environmental and social context surrounding later third and second millennium burial practices in the South-West in terms of its implications for community regionalization, social structure, and funerary function. Chapter 5 contains an overview of the funerary sites, a discussion of the analysis employed in their examination, and a contextual history of Bronze Age funerary practices, integrating the results into a general view of social and ritual development. Chapter 6 elaborates upon Beaker/Bronze Age traditions of knowledge by detailing the form and content of the meaningful taxonomies which structured perception, and how such taxonomies were forwarded and reproduced through tomb construction and related ritual actions. The chapter concludes by considering the results of the analysis against the current approaches to the subject. The picture of Bronze Age ceremonial burial which emerges differs from that produced by traditional and current perspectives, in that local contingent circumstances and cosmological constructs are shown to have been of equal importance to both power relations and large scale economic structures in influencing site location, monument appearance, material culture use, and funerary action. Appendices and tables summarise individual site histories and supporting data.

This work is all about things. It is about the role that those things play in the human experience, and what they offer to us as archaeologists, whose job is to provide a glimpse into the lives of past peoples. I discuss the things of the past from the theoretical stance of materiality, which assures us that the past is accessible despite the fragmentary nature of its physical remains. This is so because the physical world - objects, landscapes, and space - are imbued with meaning through our interactions with and experiences of them, be they overt and intentional or subconscious and in the background of our active lives. Repeated engagement with the physical world creates habits, memories, and histories and inscribes the social processes that created them upon the tangible world in ways that allow us to interpret the lives of the people with whom we have no direct interaction or accounts. I use this theory to explore the southern Illinois site of Kincaid Mounds during the latter portion of its Mississippian period occupation, with a focus on how community was constructed and maintained within and through time. I do so using evidence from the non-discursive aspects of ceramic and architectural manufacture under the assumption that the methods of producing these items are habituated and thus reveal communities of learning. I consider contextual evidence to determine what other factors may have been at play in the production of these goods. With statistical analyses, I explore the variation in the way things were made between several spatially discrete neighborhoods at Kincaid Mounds, and discuss those results in terms of the making and manipulation or maintenance of community at this pre-Columbian center, followed by a narrative history of the Middle and Late Kincaid phases. I contrast these finds with those of communities within two other Middle Mississippian regions, Greater Cahokia and the Central Illinois River Valley, in order to discuss the variable processes that led diverse and unique communities to participate in a much broader, imagined Mississippian community.

Yes / Uses new C14 chronology to chart the burial sequence within and the development of the iconic round barrow.

Pimple mounds are circular to elliptical domes with basal diameters ranging from 3 to more than 30 m, and heights of 30 cm to more than 2 m above intermound levels. For almost two centuries, the origin of these features has been speculated upon by scientists without general consensus as to one of over 30 different mechanisms suggested for their origin. These soil microfeatures can be observed throughout portions of East Texas as well as Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Missouri. Pimple mounds have been extensively mapped throughout East Texas as complexes covering over 1.0 million ha in 47 soil survey areas. About 600,000 ha are on Pleistocene-age geological formations. This study focused on 5,500 ha in Leon County, Texas, mapped as Rader-Derly complex and Derly-Rader complex. Rader (Aquic Paleustalfs) is on mounds and Derly (Typic Glossaqualfs) in the low intermounds. These soils are mapped primarily on terraces of the Trinity River system within the survey area. Using elevation levels published for the various fluviatile terrace deposits of the Trinity River, six groups (five terrace level groups and an upland group) were identified for analysis of mounds within the study area. Processes and factors of soil formation during the life of these features were considered using two methods ? remotely sensed elevation data and sampling data collected in the field. Size, shape, and relief of mounds were analyzed using airborne-based, remotely sensed LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) elevation data. Particle size distributions and pedon descriptions of mounds formed on materials of various ages were compared across the study area with special emphasis given to spatial trends. Analyses indicate a fluvial origin with pimple mound orientation corresponding to surrounding ridge and swale features of the paleoriver. Pimple mounds within the study area formed in the presence of sandy to loamy alluvial sediments and require the presence of accretionary ridge microtopography over point bar deposits. This alluvial parent material and topography were further developed by fluctuations in climate and vegetation over time. The erosional influence of bioturbation by animals and the intense rainfall and flood events which frequent the study area provided an environment in which these soil microfeatures have developed and over time exhibit increased levels of pedogenesis.

The aim for this bachelor thesis is to find an answer for the placement of Migration and Vendel period graves on preexisting house constructions in Sweden. The reason behind these graves being built on their respective places will be analyzed, discussed and compared with similar finds in Scandinavia, where a wide contact net had been established during this time. Different kinds of social and religious meanings and functions with the grave mounds will also be taken into consideration during the discussion and analysis. The actual findings in the graves will be not be a part of this thesis, as the aim is to focus more on the grave itself as a cultural and social symbol for the people, and the values it had, during the time period it was built.

This study tested two hypotheses related to Woodland settlement trends and ritual development in East Central Indiana through the example of Mounds State Park in Anderson, Indiana. The first hypothesis was that earthwork enclosure complexes, such as at Anderson, were utilized as central places within a defined territory for the redistribution of resources. The second hypothesis was that a link existed between increasing social stratification in a mixed foraging and horticultural economy and a shift in the function of earthwork complexes resultant from a change in subsistence. It was determined that no conclusions could be made about the validity of these hypotheses due to incomplete data. Suggestions for obtaining relevant data and a theoretical model of earthwork function based on available data are presented. / Department of Anthropology