Aerial photographs made with hand-held cameras and taken from small aircraft revealed soil discolorations on two sites in Illinois. The light and dark parallel lines were interpreted as evidence of prehistoric agricultural fields. Evidence of houses in the center of these fields was also noted. Ground reconnaissance, controlled surface collecting, and cross-trenching tended to confirm this interpretation. These data were compared with archaeological evidence from Macon Plateau in Georgia and historic records for the Great Lakes region. It is proposed that Mississippian agriculture was based upon a field system and a technique of ridge-furrow cultivation that made it possible to utilize low-lying river bottom land.

Archaeological sites to which the rather indefinite term Archaic has been applied have been known from various areas throughout the eastern United States for a good number of years. At the outset, these sites were defined as Archaic primarily by their lack of evidence for agricultural practices and pottery, although more positive traits were also used in such definitions. The term Archaic has now come to be used in two major ways: as a time period in a local sequence, and as a cultural stage in general preceding the development of agriculture and settled communities.

This Study deals primarily with the pottery from a series of 8 Middle Woodland village sites in the central Illinois River valley (Mason, Tazewell, Fulton, Peoria, and Marshall counties in Illinois, see Fig. 62). Comment regarding 3 other sites is also included. All of these sites but one are either directly associated with Hopewellian burial mounds or have Hopewellian pottery and other artifacts scattered throughout the debris. There are numerous other sites known with material similar to these sites, but they are not included here due to the small number of sherds in each of these sites (for example, F°77, Fv88, and others reported on by Cole and Deuel in 1937).

The purpose of this particular study is twofold. First of all an attempt is being made in this report to present indications of changes through time and style preferences in a rather well-known culture. It is hoped that these indications will help us to understand the temporal position of the different sites and to build up a body of information that will allow better understanding of the various cultural forms, in this particular case, pottery.

Fluted points, like many other artifacts, seem to be more common than previously thought. Once attention is called to a given item representative specimens are 'found in existing collections only waiting to be recognized. Smail (1951) has presented a discussion of many points of this type from the St. Louis area in Illinois.

Recently several interesting specimens have been brought to the Illinois State Museum and are here illustrated, due to their unusual combination of attributes and location. The first of these (Fig. 57) was found in Fulton County in 1924 by the late Frank Aidrich of Bloomington, Illinois. It is lanceolate in shape, WA inches long, 114 inches wide about % of the length from the base, and lenticular in cross section. Its very delicate chipping produced parallel long flake scars running from each edge to the center. The base is ground on each side and across the bottom.