Reconstruction of the wooden palisade bastion and curtain wall.

Wall trenches and postmolds belonging to the circular palisade bastion east of Monks Mound during 1977. ca. AD 1160

Cooking Pot braced on stumpware supports

Carved stone pipe; shaman and child?

Marginella shell beads

Shell pen from a conch

Ear spool

Ear spools

Ground stone "spud" used as an elite symbol

Alba style Projectile Point associated with Mound 72 offerings

Cahokia 3 Notched Point associated with Mound 72 offerings

Serrated Projectile Point associated with Mound 72 offerings

Cahokia 3 notched point with serrated edge associated with Mound 72 offerings

Mound 72 chunkie stones placed with elite male burial

Mound 72 disk shell beads placed with elite male burial

Woodhenge Excavation during 1977. Monks mound in the distance.

Mount 72 restored after excavation.

Sandstone tablet portraying an "Elite" wearing an ear spool and hawk/eagle wings. From east lobe of Monk Mound, ca. AD 1200. Called the Birdman Tablet .

Sandstone tablet showing a rack or tree containing two severed heads, ca. AD 1200. Called the Ramey Tablet.

Carved stone figurine of a female deity with a sacred bundle. Called the Keller Figurine. Excavated from a Stirling Phase temple area at the BBB Motor site, near Cahokia.

Birger figurine

Face of Birger figurine

Earth snake that gives gourds. Called the Birger Figurine. Excavated from a Stirling Phase temple area at the BBB Motor site, near Cahokia.

Carved pipe in form of a frog holding a rattle from which streams rain. Called the Rattler Frog Pipe; discovered in a burial mound along the bluffs near Cahokia

Extraordinarily large Ramey Incised Jar (corn kernals are modern). The exceptional size of this bowl would suggest a special offering or feasting function.

Beaker form with incised decoration associated with solar observation. Similar to the pottery beaker found in pit Feature 309 near the winter solstice sighting pole.

Cahokia was the capital city of a powerful Native American kingdom. Other archaeologists would disagree and classify the site as the seat of a powerful chiefdom or at least a chiefdom failing to become a state (as Lekson 1999:165 described Chaco in the Southwest USA). We have spent over 30 years working in both Middle Eastern and New World archaeology. Cahokia has the same grand scale and high degree of planning that can be recognized at Bronze Age cities such as Mari, Narwa, Urkish, and Ebla (all in Syria). Sacrificed retainers in rich tombs (like Mound 72) parallel the Early Bronze discoveries at Ur (in Iraq). The size and complexity of Cahokia appears inferior to MesoAmerican cities such as Teotihuacan, Tikal, Copan, and Chichen Itza. Why? Because Cahokia used timber and earth for monumental buildings instead of stone and stucco. Cahokia is remarkably larger and far more complex than the monumental sites associated with the chiefdom that governed the Hawaiian islands. Cahokia was an incipient (immature) state. This position is presented in our discussion of Cahokian religion (Fuller and Fuller 2000).

Chronology of Cahokia based upon calibrated C-14 dates (see Pauketat and Emerson 1997:Fig. 1.3)

AD 1350 to 1400 Bold Counselor Oneota Phase (Sparse reoccupation)

AD 1275 to 1350 Sand Prairie Phase (Sparsely used)

AD 1200 to 1275 Moorehead Phase (Decline)

AD 1100 to 1200 Stirling Phase (Climax of the city)

AD 1050 to 1100 Lohmann Phase (Development into a city)

AD 900 to 1050 Loyd, Merrell, Edelhardt Phases (Rapid Growth)

AD 700 to 900 Late Woodland Phases

 

Proposed Chronology for the Woodhenge (see Fowler 1996)

Woodhenge IV (associated with the sun glyph pot) = Moorehead Phase

Woodhenge III = Late Stirling Phase

Woodhenge II = Early Stirling Phase

Woodhenge 1 = Lohmann Phase

 

Proposed Chronology based upon Calibrated C-14 dates for Monks Mound (see Skele 1988)

Late Stirling and Moorehead Phases for construction of 1st Terrace

Stirling Phase for construction of 2nd Terrace

Lohmann and Stirling Phaes for construction of 3rd and 4th Terraces

 

Proposed Chronology for the Palisades (Iseminger et al. 1990: 38)

4th Palisade with small, rectangular bastions = Late Moorehead Phase

3rd Palisade with rectangular bastions =Early Moorehead Phase

2nd Palisade with large square bastions =Late Stirling Phase


1st Palisade with circular bastions = Early Stirling Phase

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Bibliography


Ahler, Steven R., (Editor)

2000 Mounds, Modoc and Mesoamerica: Papers in Honor of Melvin L. Fowler. Illinois State Museum, Springfield.

 

Fowler, Melvin L. (Editor)

1975 Perspectives in Cahokia Archaeology. Illinois Archaeological Survey Bulletin 10.

1977 Explorations into Cahokia Archaeology. Illinois Archaeological Survey Bulletin 10.

1989 The Cahokia Atlas: A Historical Atlas of Cahokia Archaeology. Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, Springfield, Illinois

1996 The Ancient Skies and Sky Watchers of Cahokia. The Wisconsin Archaeologist 77(3/4)

 

Fowler, Melvin L., Jerome Rose, Barbara Vander Leest, and Steven R. Ahler
1999 The Mound 72 Area: Dedicated and Sacred Space in Early Cahokia. Illiinois State Museum Reports of Investigations 54.

 

Fuller, Michael and Neathery Fuller

2000 New World Religions of MesoAmerica and North America. in Religion and Culture: An Anthropological Focus. Edited by Raymond Scupin. Prentice Hall. Upper Saddle River, NJ.

 

Iseminger, William R. et al.

1990 The Archaeology of the Cahokia Palisade. Illinois Historic Preservation Agency.

 

Kelly, John E

2008 Contemplating Cahokia’s Collapse. In Global Perspectives on the Collapse of Complex Systems, edited by Jim A. Railey and Richard Martin Reycraft, Anthropological Papers No. 8, Maxwell Museum of Anthropology.

 

Lekson, Stephen H.

1999 The Chaco Meridian. AltaMira Press. Walnut Creek, CA.

 

O'Brien, Patricia J.

1989 Cahokia: The Political Capital of the 'Ramey' State. North American Archaeologist 10(4)

 

Pauketat, Timothy R.

1993 Temples for Cahokia Lords: Preston Holder's 1955 - 1956 excavations of Kunnemann Mound.. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor.

1998 The Archaeology of Downtown Cahokia. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.




Pauketat, Timothy R, and Thomas E. Emerson

1997 Cahokia: Domination and Ideology in the Mississippian World. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln.

 

Skele, Mikels

1988 The Great Knob: Interpretations of Monks Mound. Studies in Illinois Archaeology 4

 

Stoltman, James E. (Editor)

1991 New Perspectives on Cahokia: Views from the Periphery. Prehistory Press, Madison.

 



Designed by Neathery and Michael Fuller, St. Louis Community College
Webpage created on Oct 10, 2002.
Updated on 19 August 2013