Moundville, near Tuscaloosa, Alabama, is one of the largest pre-Columbian mound sites in North America. Comprising twenty-nine earthen mounds that were once platforms for chiefly residences and public buildings, Moundville was a major political and religious center for the people living in its region and for the wider Mississippian world.
A much-needed synthesis of the rapidly expanding archaeological work that has taken place in the region over the past two decades, this volume presents the results of multifaceted research and new excavations. Using models deeply rooted in local ethnohistory, it ties Moundville and its people more closely than before to the ethnography of native southerners and emphasizes the role of social memory, iconography, and ritual practices both at the mound center and in the rural hinterland, providing an up-to-date and refreshingly nuanced interpretation of Mississippian culture.
A volume in the Florida Museum of Natural History: Ripley P. Bullen Series
Contents
1. New Directions in Moundville Research I
Vincas P. Steponaitis and C. Margaret Scarry
2. Social Archaeology of Monumental Spaces at Moundville 23
Vernon James Knight Jr.
3. Long-Term Trends in the Making and Materialization of Social
Groups at Moundville 44
Gregory D. Wilson
4. Mound X and Selective Forgetting at Early Moundville 54
John H. Blitz
5. Was There a Moundville Medicine Society? 74
George E. Lankford
6. The Distribution of Hemphill-Style Artifacts at Moundville 99
Erin E. Phillips
7. Moundville Palettes- Prestige Goods or Inalienable Possessions? 121
Vincas P. Steponaitis
8. Rural Settlement in the Black Warrior Valley 134
Scott W. Hammerstedt, Mintey D. Maxham, and Jennifer L. Myer
9. Late Prehistoric Social Practice in the Rural Black Warrior River Valley 162
John F. Scarry, H. Edwin Jackson, and Mintey D. Maxham
10. Domestic and Ritual Meals in the Moundville Chiefdom 187
H. Edwin Jackson, C. Margaret Scarry, and Susan Scott
11. Crafting Moundville Palettes 234
Jera R. Davis
12. Moundville as a Ceremonial Ground 255
C. Margaret Scarry and Vincas P. Steponaitis
List of Contributors 301
Index 305
