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8. The Development of Terminal Late Woodland Period American Bottom Settlement: The Range Site
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8 The Development of Terminal Late Woodland Period American Bottom Settlement The Range Site Most proponents of the hierarchical monistic modular polity view accept that the postulated Mississippian period dominance-based hierarchical social system of complex chiefdoms emerged rather suddenly from a system of simple chiefdoms that developed during the Terminal Late Woodland period (Pauketat 1994, 23–34). John Kelly’s (1990a, 1990b) interpretation of the Range site is an important foundation of this view. He explicitly comments that an “underlying premise of the Range site problem orientation was that a shift from a relatively egalitarian Late Woodland society to a more hierarchical Mississippian sociopolitical structure took place within the context of a number of socioeconomic transformations, including the intensification of agricultural systems and the appearance of sedentary communities that were participating in a larger scale hierarchical settlement system” (Kelly 1990a, 71; also see Kelly et al. 1984, 157). Because of the reliance of the hierarchical monistic modular polity account on the prior existence of a simple ranked social system from which the postulated paramountcy of Cahokia could emerge (Pauketat and Emerson 1997a, 20), it is critical that I give the alternative view of the Terminal Late Woodland period. This can be succinctly stated. The social system of this period can be understood as the ongoing material development of clan and cult arm’slength relations within the context and through the medium of a modifying integrated settlement articulation mode. Under the Sacred Maize model, a driving force of this developing relation would have been the escalating population growth, itself encouraged by the expansion of agriculture initiated by the midwifery ritual innovations allowing the use of maize as a subsistence crop. This trajectory would come to be characterized by ongoing elaboration of public ritual directed toward two mutually related goals—rectification and enhancement of world sanctity and renewal and, as a consequence, the enhancement of community reputation. The traditional responsibilities of the The Development of Terminal Late Woodland Period American Bottom Settlement / 17 clan, of course, would be focused on community renewal, and that of the cults, on world renewal. However, there would be close cooperation between clans and cults to enhance the collective reputation of the community, especially since, with the increasing level of sacred pollution that this population growth was perceived to generate, the peripheral-integrated settlement articulation mode might come to be seen as inadequate for the task. Instead, a new form of integrated settlement articulation mode might develop based on the clans and cults cooperating in building and sharing ritual facilities, while maintaining a formal dichotomy expressing and reconstituting their traditional arm’s-length relationship. This particular combination is most clearly manifested in the formation of the central “square” or plaza with related ritual features, partly surrounded by residential structures while being internally structured into complementary sacred spaces. These could be specialized cult spaces and structures or, alternatively , a shared central space with separate but complementary clan and cult ritual structures. Furthermore, the older peripheral-integrated modal posture would not be totally abandoned. Instead, it would be continued in a modified form so that both a central ceremonial plaza and a more distally spaced set of cult-related ritual features could be expected, with the domestic sphere of residences sandwiched in between. I term this the plaza-periphery integrated settlement articulation mode. As postulated, this plaza-periphery mode would express the cooperative interaction between the leadership of clans and cults while each grouping maintained its relative autonomy. Therefore, we would expect the formation of complex formal and spatial patterns. Clan leaders would have their larger residences since, of course, they would be expected to host ritual events presided over by the clans; cults would have their specialized structures, probably maintaining the older tradition of placing these in a position peripheral to the settlement cluster. With these possibilities in mind, I initiate this analysis with a summary description of the Range site starting with the Late Woodland Patrick phase, followed by the occupations recognized for the southern American Bottom Terminal Late Woodland period: the Dohack, Range, George Reeves, and Lindeman phases. A few words concerning dating and terminology are first required. As noted earlier, the term Terminal Late Woodland is now used by most American Bottom archaeologists to refer to what was termed the Emergent Mississippian period. This latter term was introduced by John Kelly (1982, 224), and his chronology for this period and the preceding Patrick phase of the Late Woodland period and the succeeding Lohmann/Lindhorst...