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The Residues of Feasting and Public Ritual at Early Cahokia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Timothy R. Pauketat ,
Lucretia S. Kelly ,
Gayle J. Fritz ,
Neal H. Lopinot ,
Scott Elias  and
Eve Hargrave
Timothy R. Pauketat
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, 109 Davenport Hall, 607 S. Mathews Avenue, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801
Lucretia S. Kelly
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, One Brookings Drive, Campus Box 1114, Washington University, St. Louis, MO 63130
Gayle J. Fritz
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, One Brookings Drive, Campus Box 1114, Washington University, St. Louis, MO 63130
Neal H. Lopinot
Affiliation:
Center for Archaeological Research, 901 South National, Southwest Missouri State University, Springfield, MO 65804
Scott Elias
Affiliation:
Geography Department, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, Surrey, TW20 OEX, United Kingdom
Eve Hargrave
Affiliation:
Illinois Transportation Archaeological Research Program, 209 Nuclear Physics Lab, 23 East Stadium Drive,University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61820
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Abstract

Archaeological remains excavated from the stratified layers of a pre-Columbian borrow pit in the middle of the Cahokia site inform our understanding of how ritual events were related to the social and political foundations of that enormous center. Ordinary and extraordinary refuse, ranging from foods and cooking pots to craft-production debris and sumptuary goods, are associated with a series of large-scale, single-event dumping episodes related to activities that occurred in the principal plaza. Taken as a set, the layers of ceramic, lithic, zooarchaeological, archaeobotanical, osteological, paleoentomological, and sedimentological materials reveal that the construction of Cahokia's Mississippian order was an active, participatory process.

Résumé

Résumé

Restos arqueológicos recuperados de la excavación de las capas estratigráficas de un "pozo de préstamo de tierra " precolombino en la parte central del sitio de Cahokia amplían nuestro entendimiento de como los sucesos rituales se relacionaban con la base social y político del enorme centro. La basura cotidiana y extraordinaria comprende desde comida y ollas de cocina hasta los desechos de la producción artesanal y bienes suntuarios y se asocian a una serie de episodios singulares de gran escala, llevados a cabo en la plaza principal, en los cuales se depositaba la basura. Tomadas como un conjunto, las capas de materiales cerámicos, líticos, zooarqueológicos, arqueobotánicos, osteológicos, paleoentomológicos y sedimentológicos revelan los mecanismos mediante los cuales la comunidad y la entidad política fueron fusionadas para crear el orden Mississippian de Cahokia.

Type
Articles
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 67 , Issue 2 , April 2002 , pp. 257 - 279
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 2002

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