Ancient Objects and Sacred Realms: Interpretations of Mississippian Iconography

6. Identification of a Moth/Butterfly Supernatural in Mississippian Art

6. Identification of a Moth/Butterfly Supernatural in Mississippian Art Vernon James Knight and Judith A. Franke H ere we shall attempt an iconographic demonstration of the existence of a previously unrecognized supernatural in Mississippian art. The primary natural prototype of this supernatural is, we believe, a moth or butterfly. Further, we will build a case that this curious lepidopteran supernatural has a specifiable relationship to the much more widespread subject in these art systems known as ‘‘Birdman’’ (Strong 1989). While our point of entry into the corpus is to some degree arbitrary, we choose to begin, and end, our presentation with images from Moundville in west-central Alabama. Midway, we will range to the east and north to discuss images from the Wilbanks and Dallas phases, which skirt the margins of the southern Appalachians. Our strategy of choosing Moundville as our starting point gives us an excuse to make an initial observation that will have some bearing on our thesis later on. As follows: in Moundville art, the figure of Birdman is conspicuously absent, despite its prominence at every other major center of Mississippian figural art, including Spiro, Cahokia, Etowah, and Lake Jackson. For the moment, we must leave that observation hanging and move on to the putative insects. We begin with the imagery engraved on a paint palette of gray shale from Moundville, currently in the Peabody Museum at Harvard (Fig. 6.1). Although the artifact seems to have no name enshrined in the literature, it surely deserves one, and so we will call it the Willoughby disk in honor of the fact that the original line drawing, published by Clarence Moore (1905:134), was made by Charles C. Willoughby. Stone paint palettes are a reasonably abundant form of elite material culture at Moundville, but this is one of only a handful that carry figural art. Central to the composition is a twisting column decorated with skulls, dividing the remaining surface into two fields. On the right-hand side is some rather familiar subject matter, but the le-hand side, to which we now draw special attention, has generated very little commentary. At first glance, one identification of a moth/butterfly supernatural 137 figure 6.1. The Willoughby disk, Moundville site, AL. Drawn from a rubbing by Barbara Page (Phillips and Brown 1978:figure 208). gets the impression of an incomprehensible jumble of elements, which Phillips and Brown (1978:143) have compared to ‘‘skillful doodling.’’ But despite this impression they also assume, rightly in our opinion, ‘‘that the incomprehensible configuration on the le was just as meaningful to the artist as the rest of the design, possibly essential to an understanding of the whole.’’ Phillips and Brown call attention to this figure as an exemplar of a category of art they call phantasmagoria, a term which they apply to unique, unintelligible , surrealistic designs which nonetheless are executed with assurance. Such a category, which Phillips and Brown refer to as an ‘‘intensely personal’’ impulse of the artist, is, no doubt, appropriate to some of the more bizarre compositions on Spiro shell cups. However, in the case before us, it is our position that this ‘‘skillful doodle’’ is neither unique nor incomprehensible, and is merely a conventionalized version of a design found elsewhere in the Mississippian world. 138 ancient objects and sacred realms figure 6.2. Shell gorget from Mound C, Etowah site, GA. Before proceeding to its homologs, we need to point out that the line drawing before us is incomplete. Surface spalling of the original artifact, the limits of which show clearly in the photograph published by Moore (1905:133), has obliterated a critical portion of the lemost margin, taking with it the portion of the design next to the concentric circle and dot just below the serrated, fan-like element . Although a careful examination of the original by one of us (vjk) failed to reveal any traces of the missing part of the design, based on what is yet to come we will show in a moment what belongs there. Departing Moundville, our next exhibit is from Wilbanks phase Etowah, where we cross genres into the medium of engraved shell gorgets (Fig. 6.2). Here is one of several well-known gorgets showing a Birdman in le profile, grasping a chert sword in one hand and a complex form in the other that many have long recognized is at least...