Woodland-period archaeological sites in the North Central Hills physiographic region of Mississippi appear to be highly variable in occupation size, site function, duration, and occupational intensity. To better understand the occupational history and settlement patterns of such sites, several characteristics of four Woodland-period sites located within the Tombigbee National Forest, Ackerman Unit, Mississippi, are evaluated and compared to a larger, previously investigated site, 22WI516. From the data obtained in the field and laboratory, a determination of the causes of the variability among Woodland-period sites in the study area is attempted. Physiographic constraints appear to underlie much of the variability presented by the archaeological record.

The archaeological record varies with the fluvial style and sedimentation of a river, thus controlling the location, preservation, and recognition of archaeological sites. This project identifies archaeological site patterning and preservation along a fluvial system in Iowa that has been relatively stable since the last glaciation. The Upper Des Moines River in Iowa formed approximately 12,500 yr. cal BP as an englacial channel routing glacial meltwater south along the Des Moines Lobe. During the last glacial retreat, the channel incised forming what is now called the High Terrace (TH). Early post-glacial occupations in Iowa would have had access to this the high terrace and uplands. Thus, the Paleoindian and early to middle Archaic site distributions along the Upper Des Moines River are found in upland and upper terrace locations. The intermediate terrace (TI) formed between 4000 and 1000 yr. cal BP and represents the elevation of the river flood plain during this period. Late Archaic people had access to this surface as well as the TH and uplands. By 1000 yr. cal BP, the Upper Des Moines River had eroded down to bedrock and established a floodplain at the level of the lower terrace. Subsequent erosion produced the modern channel configuration with an established series of dated terraces (High Terrace (TH), Intermediate Terrace (TI), and Low Terrace (TL)). The Woodland period peoples would have had access to the current/modern fluvial landscape. To assess site locations strategies of populations that inhabited the Upper Des Moines River valley in the Holocene, 721 archaeological sites were examined and classified using site reports and artifacts as Paleoindian, Archaic, Woodland, Historic and Unknown. The sites were then mapped and associated with geomorphic features in the valley. As expected, Paleoindian sites and Early to Middle Archaic sites were all located on the upper terrace and uplands because the intermediate and lower terraces had not yet formed. Late Archaic people had access to the floodplain that formed intermediate terrace as well as the uplands and upper terrace. Woodland period sites occurred on high (upland and TH), intermediate (TI), and low (TL and floodplain) elevation landforms along the river. The study demonstrated there was a preference for burials/ceremonial sites being placed at higher elevations (TI and higher) and habitation sites being placed at lower elevations (TL and current floodplain) near the main river channel.

The Crystal River site (8CI1) is a Woodland-period (ca 1000 B.C. to A.D. 1050) mound complex located on the Gulf of Mexico in west-central Florida. Among the features at the site are four shell and sand platform mounds, two burial mounds, and an extensive shell midden. The proximity to the Gulf and the reliance on marine and brackish resources present an apparent, yet poorly understood interaction between the people of this area and their environment. I attempt to model the relationship of the occupation of Crystal River with sea level change. The analysis of 58 soil cores from across the site provided detailed stratigraphic information and AMS radiocarbon dates needed to examine anthropogenic site formation. I then compared the rates of midden deposition and monumental architecture construction with sea level and climatic periods. This research revealed that landscape modification occurred during periods of both high and low mean sea level suggesting that human-environmental interaction at Crystal River cannot be modeled by sea level alone. Further comparison showed that mound construction increased and midden deposition decreased during the Vandal Minimum indicating a possible sociopolitical transition concurrent with changing environmental conditions.

Results from archaeological survey provide new insights into the origins of variation among the prehistoric Native American societies that occupied the Chickasawhatchee Swamp of southwestern Georgia. Through macroregional comparison, these insights are broadly applicable to the Eastern Woodlands societies that existed across the southeastern U.S. between A.D. 150 and 1600. Theoretical frameworks concerning landscape ecology, inter-regional exchange, and agency and structure provide the organizing structure for a multi-scalar view of change that contradicts earlier models.Within the Chickasawhatchee Swamp, survey, mapping, and excavation data present a complex regional settlement system. Within the swamp, a few large settlements were occupied for the long-term, in spite of the absence of monumental architecture. Smaller surrounding sites were periodically abandoned. At the swamp's edge, several subregions were organized around civic-ceremonial mound sites. At these edges, mound sites and surrounding subregions were abandoned simultaneously. Instead of being driven by changes in political complexity, residential mobility cycles were consistent through time and related to the region's heterogeneous landscape.Macroregional spatial data comparing mound locations through time support data from the Chickasawhatchee Swamp and confirm hypotheses relating mound construction and transitional landscapes. New data emphasize continuity in inter-regional exchange networks and contradict earlier views in which the emergence of hierarchical political structures were a transformational process that fundamentally altered Eastern Woodlands political economies. Temporal continuity and spatial variation are instead most evident.

This study utilizes occlusal dental microwear analysis to investigate dietary texture in a sample of Archaic period (~10,000-3,000 B.P.) and Woodland period (~3,000-950 B.P.) Native American human remains from the Carrier Mills Archaeological District (Saline County, Illinois). Molar teeth from thirty individuals were examined in a scanning electron microscope at 500x, and the number of pits and scratches were quantified. Four variables were analyzed: number of pits, number of scratches, total number of features, and the pit/scratch ratio. These four variables were used to compare differences in dietary texture between Archaic and Woodland periods, between males and females (both combined and by time period), and between those individuals who were diagnosed as having a treponemal disease and those who were not. The results indicate that there were no differences in dietary texture between the Archaic and Woodland periods. This suggests that even with the introduction of new food preparation technology (i.e. pottery) during the Woodland period, the basic texture of the food remained the same over a long period of time. In addition, no significant differences were found between diseased and non-diseased individuals at the Carrier Mills Archaeological District, suggesting that the texture of foods consumed by these two groups did not differ. Males and females, however, did show a difference in dietary texture. Females had higher values than males for all variables examined, although only number of pits and total number of features were significantly different. These results indicate that males and females had differently textured diets. I interpret this difference in the context of sex-based differences in subsistence-related activities, especially the role that females play in the acquisition and preparation of foods. When compared to previous microwear studies, these results suggest that the Carrier Mills Archaeological District differs from other Midwestern Archaic and Woodland sites due to the lack in dietary texture changes between the Archaic and Woodland periods.

Early phases of Kolomoki’s occupation have been characterized as relatively egalitarian, with little evidence for status differentiation. However, patterned variability in lithic raw material use and intensity of production in domestic areas suggests heterogeneity in the community at multiple scales. In light of Kolomoki’s emphasis on communal ceremony, internal divisions between groups of households highlight the tension between public and private expressions of status and social solidarity. New radiocarbon dates from the southern margins of the village have allowed us to assess the contemporaneity of this pattern, and by extension, the chronology of village aggregation.

Crystal River (8CI1) is a Woodland period archaeological site on the west-central Gulf Coast of Florida, famous for its diverse suite of exotic artifacts typical of the Hopewell Interaction Sphere, as well as its monumental shell mounds which surround a central plaza. Historically, these plazas are utilized as spaces for cultural expression, daily interactions between members of the community, economic exchanges, and discourse of all types. They also serve as a symbolic space, embodying social and political relations that are critical to the formation and maintenance of cultural identity. These spaces are challenging to study using conventional archaeological techniques since they were often swept clean and kept free of debris, thus discouraging the possibility of recovering artifacts of any significant size. Instead, my study utilizes integrated geoarchaeological techniques, such as microartifact analysis, soil chemical analysis, ground-penetrating radar, and magnetic survey in order to reconstruct plaza activities. The results indicate a stark difference in function between the northern and southern ends of the plaza. The South Plaza demonstrates high concentrations of elements associated with food preparation and consumption, particularly P, Sr, K, and M, high microartifact densities, and an associated strong magnetic anomaly. On the other hand, phosphate depletion is observed in the North Plaza, and it is generally barren of micro-artifacts, despite the possible presence of a few geophysical anomalies. This area appears to have been kept free of debris, save for a charcoal deposit and elevated K and Mg directly in front of Mound H, which may allude to ceremonial or other functions not associated with food.

The ceramic assemblage from previous excavations at Crystal River (8CI1), a Woodland period mound center on Florida’s west-central coast, exhibits variation in temper and surface treatments indicative of distinct pottery traditions and, perhaps, social groups. I analyzed ceramics from recent, better controlled excavations at Crystal River and the neighboring and partially contemporaneous site of Roberts Island (8CI41), using the theoretical framework of communities of practice to evaluate this claim. Analysis suggests that while some degree of diversity in paste was maintained through all four phases, there was greater homogeneity of paste, as well as more mixing of paste categories, during Phases 2 and 3. The former was an interval marked by intensive settlement at Crystal River, and the dominance of limestone tempered pottery suggests the emergence of a common, locally-based pottery making tradition. A switch to sand as a tempering agent in Phase 3 probably reflects greater dispersal of settlement, and specifically a shift to the occupation of coastal islands. Trends in surface treatments may also appear to reflect changes in settlement, although the pattern here is less straightforward owing to broader trends in ceramic decoration. The vast majority of pottery in each phase is plain, but plain pottery is particularly dominant (and the diversity of surface treatments correspondingly low) during the peak in settlement in Phase 2. As with temper, this may suggest that pottery making practices converged, as initially disparate groups lived together in closer proximity, perhaps creating a common social identity. As settlement became more dispersed in Phase 3, pottery making traditions again became more diverse. This perhaps reflects increased isolation of households, although it no doubt also stems from a regional trend toward more variety in ceramic decoration. In Phase 4, plain pottery again became dominant, a trend typical of the terminal Late Woodland. In general, the analysis suggests that temper and surface treatment track changes in settlement, and thus might be reasonably inferred to also track the extent to which potters shared pottery making practices, and perhaps social identities. Communities of practice thus provides a useful framework for understanding how social identities are expressed through technological and stylistic practices.

In southeastern North America, the Woodland period (ca. 1000 B.C. to A.D. 1050) was arguably witness to the first early village societies, and Kolomoki—located in southwestern Georgia—is among the largest villages during this interval. Though archaeologists recognize these communities as seminal developments in the course of human history, little attention has been paid to how they develop and vary internally. This thesis seeks to address these issues by focusing on the development and social construction of the early village community at Kolomoki. The results of an excavation program carried out within Kolomoki’s South Village affords a clearer picture of this understudied area, and provides supplemental collections to previous work at the site. New radiocarbon dates suggest a dynamic developmental sequence of Kolomoki’s village, starting as a relatively compact village sometime around the second century A.D., and growing to a massive scale around the seventh or eighth century A.D. Comparisons of various classes of material cultural provide evidence for contrasts between occupation along Kolomoki’s northern and southern enclosures, interpreted as differing uses of space by an internally differentiated community.

A lengthy history (1550–950 Cal BP) of ceramic manufacture took place at the Gaspereau Lake Reservoir (GLR) Site Complex in Kings County, Nova Scotia, during which potters shifted their practice from fineware, emphasizing self-expression and signalling affiliation, to “production” pottery, focusing on quick turnaround times and larger scale of production. Researchers in the Maine–Maritimes Region have repeatedly noted the change from hard-bodied, thin-walled, elaborately and carefully decorated pots during the Middle Woodland to coarser-tempered, expediently decorated pottery with many coil breaks evident during the Late Woodland. This has sometimes been interpreted as a decreasing skill level through time, but I argue that these changes instead suggest a manufacturing context in which demand for pottery increased. This created incentives for “cutting corners” and employing strategies that increased the survival rate of pots during firing. Increased production is partly evident in increasing standardization of temper minerals and clay later in time, suggesting that potters increasingly accessed a single reliable source of raw materials rather than many different sources. I further argue that manufacturing occurred at or near the End of Dyke Site. I present a method of analyzing ceramics that is designed to take full account of the unusually large and nuanced GFC assemblage. This method goes beyond chronological and typological classifications that have sometimes been employed in the Northeast: it seeks to establish a historical understanding of the assemblage through tracing learning lineages. This classification, which I have called a “tradition-based classification,” introduces knowledge transfer as the dominant mechanism behind style at the level of assemblage. The ceramics have been grouped using attribute analysis, after which inferences about the variability have been assessed, and finally, several trends—chronologically situated using AMS dates—are proposed to build a history of ceramic manufacture at Gaspereau Lake. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / Ceramics are one means of analyzing the practices of ancient cultures. Ceramics allow archaeologists to trace developments through time. This dissertation looks at how other sources of information are available to archaeologists by carefully tracing the evolution of certain characteristics through time. Some characteristics explored in this dissertation include the changing methods of manufacturing ceramics and the changing materials used by ancient potters. I conclude that ceramic production increased later in time, and that this change probably indicates a change in the larger society as pottery became increasingly in demand.