Light on the Path: The Anthropology and History of the Southeastern Indians (review)

Charles Hudson of the University of Georgia has revolutionized our understanding of the American Indians of the Southeast. After the publication of his Southeastern Indians (1976), a groundbreaking ethnography, the eminent anthropologist transformed himself into the leading ethnohistorian of the region. Largely influenced by the Annales historians, he ambitiously delved into the study of the documents of early European explorers of the Southeast. In numerous writings that culminated in Knights of Spain, Warriors of the Sun: Hernando de Soto and the South's Ancient Chiefdoms (1999), he significantly revised the findings of John Swanton and other earlier scholars.

Thomas J. Pluckhahn, an archaeologist at the University of Oklahoma and author of Kolomoki: Settlement, Ceremony and Status in the Deep South A.D. 350–750 (2003) and Robbie Ethridge, McMullan Professor of Southern Studies and an anthropologist at the University of Mississippi who previously authored Creek Country: The Creek Indians and Their World (2003), have coedited ten essays delivered at a conference at the University of Georgia in honor of Hudson. Seven of the essays are by anthropologists, mostly archaeologists. Although there is much valuable information presented, the coeditors have not provided connecting links to the essays. The articles jump in chronology and subject matter. Introductions to each of the essays would have made for a cohesive volume.

In a fascinating analysis, "The Cussita Migration Legend," Steven Hahn, a historian at St. Olaf College and the author of The Invention of the Creek Nation, 1670–1763 (2004), explains the origins of the legend, first recorded at Savannah in 1735, that helped make the town of Coweta central in the Creek world. By positioning Coweta as the place of emergence, Chigelly, a Coweta with political ambitions, raised the town's importance in Creek history. To Hahn, in his careful study of myth-making, Coweta was not an ancient town, but may have been an upstart migrant community.

Theda Perdue, a historian at the University of North Carolina and author of Cherokee Women: Gender and Cultural Change, 1700–1835 (1998), discusses intermarriage. While the larger non-Indian world often viewed intermarriage as an impediment to the overall assimilationist goal of "civilization," individual white men frequently saw the advantages of marrying into Indian communities because Indian women had considerable power when it came to land use and assured hospitality, friendship, and better trade opportunities. The process bound these men economically, politically, and socially to these Indian communities, and, as Perdue points out, their allegiance shifted away from the Euro-American world. Although what Perdue writes is not new and conforms to other scholarly analyses focusing on French Canada, New England, and the Plains, hers is a nicely presented case study.

William Jurgelski's "New Light on the Tsali Affair" is based on the recent discovery of a document written by Nanih, Tsali's wife. Tsali is the culture hero of Cherokee resistance to the military's round up of the Indians before their forced removal west. Much of Tsali's life and actions are shrouded in mystery, which is not cleared up by the article. Jurgelewski, an anthropologist at the University of Georgia, suggests that the legend should not be dismissed so quickly by scholars.

Two essays by archaeologists deserve special praise. Steven Kowalewski's "Coalescent Societies" focuses on the combining and recombining of southeastern societies after population collapse resulting from European contact. Kowalewski, a University of Georgia anthropologist and coauthor of Ancient Oaxaca (1999), shows some of what occurred: Chiefdoms became confederacies, the nature of myths changed, and the Green Corn Ceremony arose. He makes brilliant comparisons with other regions of the Americas: the Plains, the Southwest, Amazonia. He also points out that the precontact Southwest and postcontact Southeast had similar coalescent experiences, namely in new architectural designs and innovations in material culture. In another effective essay, "Bridging Prehistory and History in the Southeast...