Signs of Power: The Rise of Cultural Complexity in the Southeast

9 Are We Fixing to Make the Same Mistake Again?

The identi¤cation of mounds dating to ca. 5000–6000 b.p. has required archaeologists to rethink the process of social evolution. The existence of Archaic mounds provides us with one of those rare research opportunities of a win-win situation. Archaic period mounds are signi¤cant if they were constructed by societies with social inequality, and they are equally signi¤cant if they were constructed by egalitarian cultures. On the one hand, we extend traditional models (social inequality) back almost two thousand years earlier than previously thought; on the other hand, we break the traditional bond between monumental architecture and social inequality, an element often considered necessary for the construction of public architecture. In many respects, the choice we must entertain is an excellent example of Kuhn’s proposed growth of knowledge in a normal science (Kuhn 1962). Standard interpretations or theories (paradigms) accommodate new data that do not¤t the established explanation (anomalies). Initially the anomalies are treated as unique, exceptions to the rule, or as outliers to the norm. As anomalies accumulate , adjustments to the established explanation are made, until the anomalous data reach critical mass, forcing researchers to offer alternative explanations that embrace the old as well as the new observations (Lakatos 1970). In our particular case, traditional models of social evolution have proposed a number of preconditions or co-occurrences that are associated with societies that construct monumental architecture.1 Initially, various material and social traits included agriculture, pottery, sedentism, trade, and social inequality (Ford and Willey 1941; Fried 1967; Johnson and Earle 1987; Service 1975; Willey and Phillips 1958:146). With the excavations and dating of Jaketown (Ford et al. 1955; Phillips et al. 1951) and Poverty Point (Ford 1954, 1955a, 1955b; Ford and Webb 1956), the precondition/co-occurrence of pottery was abandoned . Although there was no evidence for plant domestication at Poverty Point, 9 Are We Fixing to Make the Same Mistake Again? Joe Saunders it was viewed as a necessity for sustaining a large population at the site (Willey and Phillips 1958:156). Gradually, however, agriculture was excluded as a prerequisite from the general model (Johnson and Earle 1987; Price and Brown 1985) and for Poverty Point in particular (Gibson 1973; Webb 1982; Williams and Brain 1983), with perhaps the assumed co-occurrence of plant domestication , mound construction, and social inequality being laid to rest with evidence that domesticated plants were at best supplementary foods for later ceramic cultures (Bender 1985a; Kidder and Fritz 1993). Evidence for sedentism at Poverty Point also was challenged (Jackson 1991; Williams and Brain 1983), leaving trade (Gibson 1994c; Lehmann 1991; Smith 1991) as the sole independent variable suggesting an association between monumental architecture and social inequality. Consequently, Poverty Point was considered to be an aberration (Smith 1986). Although the site’s existence refuted many of the preconceived notions about social evolution, because it was an outlier, it did not disprove the general model. Besides that, there was trade. The identi¤cation of multiple Archaic mound sites in the Southeast (Connaway et al. 1977; Gagliano 1967; Manuel 1983; Neuman 1985; Russo 1996a; Russo et al. 1991; Russo and Fogleman 1994; Saunders and Allen 1994; Saunders et al. 1997; Saunders et al. 2000; Saunders et al. 2001) has eliminated the anomalous status of Poverty Point.2 Many sites with monumental architecture date to ca. 5000 years b.p., approximately 1,500 years before Poverty Point. Site testing indicates that the subsistence base was nonagricultural, and, in fact, most of the sites were only occupied seasonally. Furthermore, at least for the Archaic sites in Louisiana, trade was negligible. Therefore, trade too was not a necessary trait, or substitute precondition, for the emergence of social inequality and monumental architecture. These data show that mound sites were constructed without pottery, plant domestication, sedentism, or trade. The only precondition left is social inequality—and among the original traits, the remaining evidence for unequal status among these early mound builders is the mounds themselves, which is circular reasoning. Social inequality is necessary for mound construction because such undertakings require planning, construction, and provisioning , which in turn require leadership. Therefore where you have mounds, you have social inequality. Essentially, we are left with a choice: either social disparity was necessary for mound construction, or it was not. Unfortunately, too often the choice is determined more by one’s theoretical preference than by the evidence for the presence or absence of social inequality in the archaeological record. The purpose of this chapter is to...