5 - Agricultural chiefdoms of the Eastern Woodlands

Summary

The long and complex history of the eastern United States prior to European contact has often been viewed as being largely peripheral to, and derivative from, cultural developments in Mesoamerica. This tendency to look south of the border has been particularly pronounced in attempts to account for the agricultural chiefdoms that emerged around A.D. 1000, and flourished across much of the eastern United States right up to the arrival of Europeans. These were the largest and most hierarchical indigenous societies to develop north of Mexico. At first glance, a proposed derivation of the principal features of these agricultural chiefdoms from Mesoamerica does not seem unreasonable. There are obvious, if only general, parallels in public architecture, iconography, socio-political organization, and economy.

The Mississippian chiefdoms of the East constructed flat-topped, rectangular mounds, sometimes of considerable size, arranged around open plazas. Such mound-plaza areas were the central focus of fortified civic-ceremonial centers that often had a sizable resident population. In addition, Mississippian societies were markedly hierarchical. Their constituent kin units or clans were ranked, with political and religious power and authority maintained, through inheritance, in the highest ranking clans. Elaborate iconographic systems developed in Mississippian chiefdoms, reflecting and supporting both their hierarchical structure and their larger worldview. Some of the elements of these iconographic systems (e.g., snakes, raptorial birds, costumed dancers, trophy heads) have vaguely Mesoamerican parallels encouraging a search for connections south of the border. The important role of two Mesoamerican crop plants – maize (Zea mays) and beans (Phaseolus vulgaris) – in the agricultural economy of Mississippian societies also suggests Mesoamerican connections, with the shift to maize-centered agriculture in eastern North America between A.D. 800 and 1000 corresponding to the initial emergence of Mississippian chiefdoms.