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Does North America Hold the Roots of Mesoamerican Civilization?

festival, he adds. Because Cahokia appeared

to lack vibrant trade, division of labor, and

a clear hierarchy, and because there are no

written records and few burials, many con-

sidered it an elaborate seasonal encampment

rather than a true urban area.

But more recent excavations, such as

Emersons current project in East St. Louis

and work in Cahokia by Kelly and archae-

ologist James Brown of Northwestern Uni-

versity in Evanston, Illinois, show that thearea was busy throughout the year, and that

settlements were extensive and likely per-

manent. In the July issue of the Journal of

Archaeological Sciences, Kelly, Brown, and

colleagues describe eight copper nuggets

found on one small Cahokia mound. They

conclude that Cahokians crafted copper

sheets by repeatedly heating the metal over

an open wood fire and hammering it, then

cutting it into shapes. Kelly says drinking

cups found nearby, associated with hunter

and warrior rituals, suggest this was a com-bination workshop and mens club.

The big bangThe gatherings at Cahokia began aroun

1000 C.E., when the American Bottom beg

to draw people from all over the regio

according to radiocarbon and ceramic da

ing. Pauketat and Kelly both argue th

mound alignments reinforce the idea of se

sonal ceremonies as a key part of the dra

Some mounds line up with the position

the sun at the winter solstice dawn, whi

others are oriented to its position at the equnoxes. The researchers speculate that a ra

4000B.C.E.

3000B.C.E.

2000B.C.E.

60003000 B.C.E.:

MIDDLE ARCHAIC

30001000 B.C.E.:

LATE ARCHAIC

MONROE, LOUISIANAHigh pyramids and great plazas are the hallmarksof ancient Mesoamerica, from the 3000-year-old Olmec cities along the Gulfof Mexico to the inland metropolis of Tenochtitlan encountered by the Spanishconquistadors. Yet the oldest examples that call to mind this familiar style arefound nearly 1000 kilometers to the north in the muddy bayous of Louisiana.Five millennia ago, Native Americans here began to build high mounds of earthflanked by flat plazas that resemble Mesoamericas classic architecture. A smallband of archaeologists suspect that these ancient settlements laid the founda-tion not only for the North American mound-building tradition that eventuallyculminated in the great city of Cahokia (see main text, p. 1618), but perhapsalso for Mesoamerican civilization.

The conical mounds dotting the lower Mississippi Valley were long consid-ered to be no older than 1000 years or so. But archaeologists in the 1970s and80s were puzzled by radiocarbon dates from some sites matching the Mid-dle Archaic periodwhich endedat about 3000 B.C.E.Thats nearly 2 millennia before the first cities appearedin Mexico, before the Giza pyramids, and about the sametime that the worlds first major urban centers evolvedin ancient Mesopotamia. Most researchers dismissed thedates as erroneous.

But in the 1990s, Louisiana state archaeologist JosephSaunders began a careful study of the mounds, some ofwhich still rise as high as 10 meters. On a wooded site besidea bayou west of Monroe, he examined a six-mound sitecalled Hedgepeth that includes a conical earthen structure8 meters high and some 33 meters in diameterandwas radiocarbon dated to approximately 3000 B.C.E.Another site called Frenchmans Bend, north of Mon-roe, proved to be of a similar age and boasted three lay-ers of house floors and hearths as well as a half-dozenmounds. Radiocarbon dates put Watson Brake south ofMonroe, with its vast complex of 11 mounds encircling

9 hectares, back to 3500 B.C.E. On the ridges at Watson Brake, Saundeuncovered huge amounts of fire-cracked rock used for cooking in this ppottery culture. The abundance of food was unbelievable, he says of tmassive quantities of game and fish bones left behind.

Saunderss 1997 paper (Science, 19 September, p. 1796) provided stuning evidence of a mound-building culture far earlier than previously supected. There were 2000 years of mound building in the southeastern U.Sbefore the first monumental architecture appears in Mesoamerica, says archaologist David Anderson of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Saundargues that from about 3700 B.C.E. to 2700 B.C.E., Native Americans went a building spree across the lower Mississippi Valley, leaving behind mysteriorectangular blocks of heated clay, thousands of spear points, and giant moundAt Watson Brake, Saunders thinks periodic floods may have prompted inhabants to create the mounds as platforms for living and ceremonial use. He a

others have found little sign of extensive trade and sugest that the mounds were not part of a closely connectculture, but rather a feature that each group may haused and interpreted differently.

In the decade and a half since that key paper, a dozother Middle Archaic mounds have been identified. B

Saunders and other archaeologists say that more excavtion and precise redating are critical.

Instead, however, the state of Louisiana is focusiits limited resources on winning World Heritage statfor Poverty Point, the premier settlement during the seond great burst of mound building, which began abo1600 B.C.E. and lasted for nearly 600 years. Located a bayou east of Monroe, the site includes a giant mousecond only to that at Cahokia in size. Shaped like a flyibirdan image repeated in the region for 3 millenniathe structure rises 22 meters high, is 200 meters lonand contains the equivalent of 27 million baskets

Solo seeker.With little support, JosephSaunders has pioneered work on MiddleArchaic mounds.

23 DECEMBER 2011 VOL 334 SCIENCE www.sciencemag.org620

35002500 B.C.E.Watson Brake/Frenchmans Bend/

Hedgepeth Mounds

About 1400 B.C.E.

Poverty Points Birdman Mound buWatson Brake

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1200 C.E. East St. Louis burns;

palisade at Cahokia

1300 C.E. Cahokia falls

1492 C.E. Europeaarrive in NorthAmerica

1100 C.E. Monks Mound built

of surprising astronomical events, such as

Halleys Comet of 989 C.E. followed by the

supernova of 1006 C.E., may have sparked a

religious and political movement in a culture

that kept close watch on the sky.

Seeking clues to that spark, University

of Michigan, Ann Arbor, anthropologist

Casey Barrier is excavating an 8.2-square-

hectare cornfield close to the Mississippi

River 64 kilometers south of Cahokia. Radio-

carbon and ceramic dating put the complexbetween 1000 and 1050 C.E., after which it

was completely abandoned. The short time

span provides a rare window into the moment

Mississippian culture began to organize in a

more complex way. So far, Barriers as-yet-

unpublished work shows that rather than

construct a traditional village of simple rectan-

gular huts, the 100 to 200 inhabitants created

a massive plaza and three mounds on virgin

land. They also built 40 or so houses, some

with courtyards. But they abandoned them all

within a generation or twopossibly, he says,to join the growing crowds at Cahokia.

Back at Monks Mound, scientists a

reconsidering their old assumption that t

massive project, which required movin

6 million baskets of dirt (assuming 1 cub

foot of earth per basket), took generations

complete. After 2007 excavations, Timot

Schilling, now an archaeologist at the Univ

sity of Indiana, Bloomington, found little ev

dence of erosion or organic matter collecti

at the mound, as would be expected in lon

term construction. Based on radiocarbon daing, he concludes that the mound took few

500 C.E.1000 C.E.:

LATE WOODLAND

1000B.C.E.

1C.E.

1000C.E.

10001500 C.E.:

MISSISSIPPIAN CULTURE

1 C.E.500 C.E.:

MIDDLE WOODLAND

earth. The mound is at the apex of a remark-able C-shaped complex spanning three hectaresand including six half-rings and a host of smallerconical and flat-topped earthworks (see image,p. 1620). Most radiocarbon dates put construc-tion between 1400 and 1200 B.C.E.

Unlike the Middle Archaic sites, which showlittle sign of long-distance trade, Poverty Pointwas practically a trade fair. Along with more than8000 spear points, archaeologists have foundred jasper, quartz, and copper from as far as the Great Lakes, chert from nearSt. Louis, plus more than 130 clay figurines and innumerable bone awls likelyused to puncture animal hides. Poverty Point is vacuuming in materials inquantities that continue to stagger me, says archaeologist Tristram R. Kidderof Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. He has worked at the site sincethe 1990s and in 2009 published a report summarizing recent field seasons.What was exported from Poverty Point is a mystery, however. Only a few stonebeads that may have been manufactured there have been found in elsewhere.Baskets, salt, and other possible exports may have left no trace.

As at Cahokia, Kidder and Timothy Schilling of the University of Indiana,

Bloomington, discovered that the Bird Mound may have been built quickly,perhaps in less than a year. The 2009 report on the mound notes that sedimenton the bottom was squeezed up into upper layers, and there are no microscopicsigns of worm burrows or raindrops, which would have left traces if the moundhad been built in stages. The Bird Mound complex is not matched at other sitesfrom the era; Mesoamerica at that period lacked monumental structures alto-gether. Its unique, says Kidder, noting that the mound predates Olmec pyra-mids and plazas by a couple of centuries.

Did the Middle Archaic mounds and Poverty Point influence the rise ofMesoamerican civilization? The question tantalizes archaeologists. The propor-tions used at the Louisiana sites closely match those found in Mesoamerica,notes John Clark, a Mesoamerican specialist at Brigham Young University in

Provo, Utah. By examining the alignmentsArchaic mounds, retired civil engineer RobPatten argued at a recent conference archaeo-astronomy that the numbers assoated with the sites are mirrored in later Mesamerican calendars as well as in the design

structures. The origin of the Mesoamerican system should be searched for ivast area between the Mississippi River Basin and Mesoamerica, he says. Claagrees: We need to look to Louisiana as a source.

Mesoamericans may have used the plaza-and-pyramid innovation to hecreate a more complex social organization and to jump-start urban life. Butthe Mississippi River valley, this didnt happen. The second period of moubuilding came to a halt by 1000 B.C.E., when Kidder says abrupt changeseconomy and society took place across eastern North America. Recent gearchaeological research in northeast Louisiana suggests large-scale flooand river instability, along with cooler temperatures. Flooding may have re

dered sites like Poverty Point uninhabitable. Coring in the Gulf of Mexico hlately confirmed that large floods, some episodes extending over decaddumped enormous quantities of sediment into the gulf for half a millenniuKidder adds.

For several hundred years, there were no mounds built. Finally in the eacenturies C.E., the third and final period of mound building began, this timcentered in the Ohio River valley and culminating in Cahokia.

Explaining the construction gaps is a daunting challenge. But archaeogists say the older mounds could provide a key to understanding New Wordevelopmentif a new generation of researchers focuses on these largobscure sites. Its very exciting, Anderson says. This is changing our whopicture of the region across a vast time span. ACR

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RTESYSMITHSONIANNATIONALMUSEUM

OFNATURALHISTORY;PETEBOSTROM/LITHICCASTIN

GLAB.C

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Land of plenty.Poverty Point residents valuexotic materials, like the imported stone these figurines.

www.sciencemag.org SCIENCE VOL 334 23 DECEMBER 2011

600600 B.C.E.Poverty Point

200 B.C.E. 400 C.E.Hopewell culture in Ohio

10001200 C.E.Cahokia

rise

1000 B.C.E.1 C.E.:

EARLY WOODLAND

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