Research in psychology has established that humans organize spatial information into “cognitive maps” oriented around visual landmarks. Much of this research focuses on individual cognitive processes such as orienteering and wayfinding. We extend this research to the level of social groups, exploring the degree to which cognitive maps are shared among near and distant neighbors and the social implications of common, overlapping, or discrete cognitive maps. We develop the concept of “sight communities” —populations which shared similar cognitive maps—and then propose methodologies to (1) identify visual anchors and quantify their visual prominence from different vantage points, and (2) detect and analyze connections among the populations which were able to see visual anchors, with a special focus on tools from social network analysis.

While there is increasing recognition among archaeologists of the extent to which non-agricultural societies have managed their terrestrial ecosystems, the traditional management of marine ecosystems has largely been ignored. In this paper, we bring together Indigenous ecological knowledge, coastal geomorphological observations, and archaeological data to document how Northwest Coast First Nations cultivated clams to maintain and increase productivity. We focus on “clam gardens,” walled intertidal terraces constructed to increase bivalve habitat and productivity. Our survey and excavations of clam gardens in four locations in British Columbia provide insights into the ecological and social context, morphology, construction, and first reported ages of these features. These data demonstrate the extent of traditional maricultural systems among coastal First Nations and, coupled with previously collected information on terrestrial management, challenge us to broaden our definition of “forager” as applied to Northwest Coast peoples. This study also highlights the value of combining diverse kinds of knowledge, including archaeological data, to understand the social and ecological contexts of traditional management systems.

Archaeological investigations at the Trempealeau and Fisher Mounds Site Complexes in western Wisconsin have provided definitive evidence of settlements and platform mounds in a portion of the Upper Mississippi Valley dating to the early Cahokian era, immediately priorto A.D. 1050 and ending before A.D. 1100. The presence ofCahokian earthen constructions, wall-trench buildings, ceramics, and imported stone tools associated with likely religious buildings and a series of possible farmsteads 900 river km north of Cahokia points to a unique intrusive occupation. We suggest that Trempealeau was a religious installation located proximate to a powerful, storied landform on the Mississippi River that afforded Cahokians access to the animate forces of that region. Probably built by and for Cahokians with minimal involvement on the part of living local people, the timing of this occupation hints at its close relationship to the founding of the American Indian city to the south.

This study integrates disparate geographical areas of the American Southeast to show how studies of Early Mississippian (A.D. 900-1250) interactions can benefit from a multiscalar approach. Rather than focus on contact and exchanges between farming communities, as is the case with most Mississippian interaction studies, we turn our attention to social relations between village-dwelling St. Johns II fisher-hunter-gatherers of northeastern Florida and more mobile Ocmulgee foragers of southern-central Georgia; non-neighboring groups situated beyond and within the southeastern edge of the Mississippian world, respectively. We draw upon neutron activation analysis data to document the presence of both imported and locally produced Ocmulgee Cordmarked wares in St. Johns II domestic and ritual contexts. Establishing social relations with Ocmulgee households or kin groups through exchange and perhaps marriage would have facilitated St. Johns II access into the Early Mississippian world and enabled them to acquire the exotic copper, stone, and other minerals found in St. Johns mortuary mounds. This study underscores the multiscalarity of past societies and the importance of situating local histories in broader geographical contexts.

This article evaluates current models of the influence of functionality and materials properties on pottery production as practiced by potters in the Middle Balsas Region of Guerrero, Mexico, during the Classic period (A.D. 300-900). The research was designed specifically to look for evidence of the influence of materials properties on pottery production in an archaeological context. Research results suggest that a specific clay deposit was selected deliberately by ancient Middle Balsas potters only when producing a subset of restricted vessels that were used for water storage. All other domestic vessels used in the Middle Balsas Region were produced from a variety of clay sources with no apparent link to vessel size, shape, or intended purpose. These production patterns endured with little appreciable change within the region for a time span of over a thousand years, from approximately 300 B.C. to A.D. 900.

This paper evaluates previous models of cave and rockshelter use in the American Midsouth from the Early to the Middle Archaic periods. Four sites are compared in order to identify variability in activities, seasonality, occupation intensity, and function. Focus is placed on using the often overlooked feature assemblages to discern these activities. Data suggest that the changing use of many caves and rockshelters is not one of longer term occupation as base camps, as has been previously argued, but rather as specialized field camps dedicated to the processing of mast resources. This shift takes place as Middle Holocene warming prompted hunter-gatherers to adopt a more logistical mobility strategy in order to take advantage of the spatio-temporal variance associated with increased mast availability. It is further argued that these sites were likely locations of women's activities and that foraging in the Midsouth involved groups of women engaged in daily tasks centered around mast, tasks that over time imbued caves and rockshelter s with symbolic meaning such that they came to function simultaneously as both processing camps and as persistent places of ritual significance in the hunter-gatherer taskscape.

Changing perspectives on concepts of personhood are explored by deconstructing mortuary customs from 10 Tucson Basin (Arizona) Hohokam archaeological sites dating from the Preclassic (A.D. 700–1150) and Classic (A.D. 1150–145011500) periods. Results indicate that certain aspects of personhood did not change across time and space at these sites. However, by analyzing changes through time in cremation rituals, it was possible to infer that some aspects of personhood did change. In the Preclassic period, after bodies were burned, the remains were distributed as inalienable possessions within social networks. This behavior suggests a relational social construction of self where burning transformed the deceased and the remains were considered part-person and part-object. Later in the Classic period, a higher frequency of cremated remains were not divided but instead transferred as a unit to secondary deposits. Perceptions of personhood during this period appear to have defined self as a complete, bounded unit, even after transformation by fire. This change possibly occurred as a result of a general decrease in remembrance networks. These changes in cremation parallel broader sociopolitical changes where increases in social differentiation and complexity are proposed for the Classic period Hohokam.

Fell's Cave lies near the Magellan Straits of South America's Southern Cone. This was the first site to provide evidence of a late Pleistocene occupation of South America, and it is the site where the Fishtail projectile point type was defined. Previous radiocarbon ages from Fell's Cave on charcoal samples from three hearths in the late Pleistocene artifact-bearing levels yielded dates ranging from ca. 11,000 to 10,100 radiocarbon years before present. New radiocarbon dates on curated charcoal samples from these same hearths yield revised ages of ca. 10,800 to 10,400 radiocarbon years before present. These new dates from Fell's Cave agree well with ages from other South American sites in the Southern Cone with Fishtail points and show that the Fishtail projectile point was made from ca. 10,850 to 10,300 radiocarbon years before present or ca. 12,800 to 12,100 calibrated years before present.

Hohokam buff ware pottery produced in Arizona has been much studied over the last few decades. However, petrographic analysis has been less frequently applied, due in part to mistaken assumptions regarding the raw materials utilized. The current study reexamined the use of petrography for locating the provenance of buff ware pottery from two sites, La Villa in the Phoenix area and Honey Bee Village in the Tucson area. The petrographic results suggest that production occurred in one primary area along the middle Gila River with minor production in a few other locations. The potters in this area supplied both the Tucson and Phoenix basins. Significantly, it was determined that, after the Early Gila Butte phase, potters switched from crushed schist to sand with natural schist. Such a phenomenon is likely related to increased demand developing from a rapidly evolving sociopolitical system and buff ware pottery becoming a socially valued commodity. This study indicates that petrographic analysis focused on relating sand to known sand composition zones, called petrofacies, can be a key tool for identifying production sources for Hohokam buff ware.

Migration is a key driver of human cultural and genetic evolution, with recent theoretical advances calling for work to accurately identify factors behind early colonization patterns. However, inferring prehistoric migration strategies is a controversial field of inquiry that largely relies on interpreting settlement chronologies and constructing plausible narratives around environmental factors. Model selection approaches, along with new statistical models that match the dynamic nature of colonization, offers a more rigorous framework to test competing theories. We demonstrate the utility of this approach by developing an Island-Level Model of Colonization adapted from epidemiology in a Bayesian model-selection framework. Using model selection techniques, we assess competing colonization theories of Near and Remote Oceania, showing that models of exploration angles and risk performed considerably better than models using inter-island distance, suggesting early seafarers were already adept at long-distance travel. These results are robust after artificially increasing the uncertainty around settlement times. We show how decades of thinking on colonization strategies can be brought together and assessed in one statistical framework, providing us with greater interpretive power to understand a fundamental feature of our past.

It has long been believed that maize (Zea mays spp. mays) was introduced in Quebec at around A.D. 1000, at the very beginning of the Late Woodland period. The identification and dating of maize phytoliths extracted from the carbonized encrustations on the interior surfaces of Native American ceramic vessels from three sites located in the St. Lawrence River valley, namely the Hector-Trudel, Station-4, and Place-Royale sites, indicate that this cultigen was rather introduced in that area during the Early Middle Woodland period, ca.400 to 200 B.C. These sites provide the northernmost and possibly the oldest evidence of maize consumption in northeastern North America. More samples of maize phytoliths from the same two sites were dated to the late Middle Woodland period, between A.D. 600 and 800, suggesting an increase in the ubiquity and importance of this new crop in the subsistence strategies. Moreover, the identification of an unknown variety of maize points toward the possibility that a new local variety of maize appeared during the process. This process might have been accompanied by a more intensive and complementary collecting of wild rice. Finally, the results support the hypothesis of an in situ origin of the St. Lawrence Iroquoians.