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Ihave always found Historic period descriptions of aboriginal habitation structures in the southern Appalachian region confusing. The buildings often sound so bizarre and different from one another that I am tempted to question the observational abilities of European eyewitnesses. Houses are variously described as resembling caves, open pavilions, or European style dwellings; as being circular, octagonal , or rectangular in shape; as having subterranean ®oors, one or two stories, log or wattle-and-daub wall construction, and gabled or conical roofs covered with cane mats, bark, shingles, or earth—the latter bearing intentionally sewn vegetation . The available descriptions are not, however, totally lacking in agreement. A few common characteristics can be found, including: the distinction between summer and winter houses; the rectangular shape of summer houses; and the replacement through time of single-set post construction by horizontal log construction. Despite the degree of uniformity in historical descriptions, it is dif¤cult to know whether the architectural variability recorded there re®ects change over time, differences between regions and ethnic groups, variability within single communities that are undergoing rapid acculturation, or simply observer error. Archaeological investigations by Baden (1983), Faulkner (1978), Russ (Russ and Chapman 1984), and Schroedl (1986a, 1989), in T ennessee, and Cottier (Waselkov et al. 1990), C. T. Sheldon (1997), and Waselkov (1985) in Alabama have begun to unravel this confusion for the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Cherokee and Upper Creek. In this paper, I would like to build on their work by looking at the late prehistoric and protohistoric antecedents of the historic period structures and by expanding the geographical area of investigation to include Georgia and the Carolinas as well as eastern Alabama and T ennessee. 6 / “As caves below the ground” Making Sense of Aboriginal House Form in the Protohistoric and Historic Southeast David J. Hally Late Prehistoric and Protohistoric Domestic Architecture The domestic architecture I am most familiar with is that of the early to midsixteenth century Lamar occupation of northwestern Georgia. The most easily recognizable structure type at sites where I have worked—Potts Tract (9mu103), Little Egypt (9mu102), King (9®5), and Leake (9br2)—was typically erected in a shallow basin about 70 cm deep, had a ®oor plan that was square with rounded corners, and averaged about 8 m across (Figure 6.1). Exterior walls were constructed of individually set posts. These were covered on their exterior by bundles of cane or possibly split cane mats. Earth from the basin was piled against this surface, probably to a height of 1 m. Roofs were pyramidal in form and rested on exterior wall plates and beams supported by four centrally located posts. The roof had a smoke hole at its apex and was plastered with several inches of clay on its underside, from the smoke hole outward to the four support posts. Roofs were probably covered with sheets of bark or with thatch. The outer ®oor space was divided by partition walls into a number of alcoves that probably contained raised benches made of wood and cane. There was a hearth in the center of the ®oor, and human interments were placed in the outer ®oor space. Given their substantial construction and depressed ®oors, it is highly probable that these structures were occupied primarily during the winter months. There is also a tendency for structures—or, more correctly speaking, structure locations—to be utilized for fairly long periods of time—perhaps up to 20 or 30 years. This is indicated by the habit of rebuilding structures to be rebuilt one or more times and by the number of burials interred in some structures. Structure 23 at King, for example , was rebuilt three times and contained 13 burials. It is almost certainly this type of structure that is referred to in accounts from the de Soto, Luna, and Pardo expeditions dating between 1540 and 1566. Here we found a difference in the houses of the Indians; we found them as caves below the ground. (Beidma in Clayton et al. 1993:228) The winter houses are all covered with earth and they sow whatever they like over them. (Fray Domingo de la Anunciacion in Priestley 1928:239) [T]he Indians took shelter in the huts that they had inside of it [the palisade wall], which were under the ground, from which they came out to skirmish with the Spanish. (Martinez in C. Hudson 1990:320) Biedma and Martinez are clearly referring to semi-subterranean buildings of the type described above. Biedma’s reference to...

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