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Floodplain Agriculture in the Driftless Area: A Reply to Overstreet

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

James P. Gallagher
Affiliation:
Mississippi Valley Archaeology Center at The University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, 1725 State Street, La Crosse, Wisconsin 54601
Robert F. Boszhardt
Affiliation:
Mississippi Valley Archaeology Center at The University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, 1725 State Street, La Crosse, Wisconsin 54601
Robert F. Sasso
Affiliation:
Mississippi Valley Archaeology Center at The University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, 1725 State Street, La Crosse, Wisconsin 54601
Katherine Stevenson
Affiliation:
Mississippi Valley Archaeology Center at The University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, 1725 State Street, La Crosse, Wisconsin 54601

Abstract

Comments offered by Overstreet are based on a misunderstanding of the physiographic setting of the Sand Lake site and selective reading of the data. The Sand Lake ridged fields are situated in a floodplain in the Driftless Area of southwestern Wisconsin, a setting very different from that of upland ridged fields in glaciated eastern Wisconsin. Overstreet attempts to refute interpretations that we have already revised significantly. Current interpretations of the floodplain ridges suggest that, although surface drainage of the fields was probably not their primary function, periodic internal drainage of the soil would have been important.

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Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1987

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References

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