The Mississippian culture was a Native American, a mound-building culture that thrived in what is now known as Midwestern, Eastern and Southeastern regions of the United States. The culture was practiced across various regions between approximately 800CE to 1500 CE. This way of life was dominant along the Mississippi river valley. The Mississippian period was portrayed by the height of mound building as well as mound-and-plaza architecture. This kind of architecture was multiplied throughout the Mississippi Valley, present-day Southeastern and the Midwestern of the United States (Reader’s Digest Association, 1996).
Cultural Traits
Reader’s Digest Association (1996) further states that hundreds of societies shared and participated differently in the Mississippian culture. Thus it was not a socio-political monolith ruled by rulers with total power. Furthermore, the communities were not only adapted to a variety of diverse resource base, but they also had some form of cultural uniformity around the Midwest and south areas. This was due to the long-distance trade as well as the participation in a shared religion. Penman and Gundersen (2017) further state that the Mississippian had no writing system, but they used metal which was naturally found in the area. For instance, they hammered and annealed copper to create ritual objects such as Mississippian copper plates. However, Mississippian people neither hardly smelt iron nor crafted bronze metallurgy.
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Another common cultural trait included constructing large and flat-topped mounds that were commonly found near the town plaza. The mounds were usually square, rectangle or circular. They also constructed burial buildings, residential houses or temples above the mounds. The societies further engaged in a religion that was associated with agricultural productivity. They often worshiped a fire sun divinity (Reader’s Digest Association, 1996).
The Mississippian people practiced large scale maize-based agriculture. The people embraced this type of culture since it supported a larger population and craft civilization. (Penman & Gundersen (2017) adds that beans were also cultivated and it helped to provide proteins to the people. The societies also adopted and used riverine shells as tempering agents in their shell annealed pottery. The Mississippians also had wide-spread trade networks that spread as far west as the Rockies, east to the Atlantic Ocean, south to the Gulf of Mexico, and north to the Great Lake. The societies developed institutionalized social variation and complex chiefdom. They had a centralized control of collective political and religious power that often rested in the hands of one or few members of the society. Vehik (2017) also states that the Mississippian culture is the most complex society in prehistoric North America that had a chiefdom level of society, meaning that, Chiefs ran it.
Regional Variations
The Mississippian culture was divided into four variations; Middle Mississippian, Southern Appalachian Mississippian, Caddoan Mississippian and Plaquemine Mississippian. The Middle Mississippian was used to describe the center of the Mississippian culture area. Cites in this area contain big ceremonial platform mounds, residential complexes and was very influential to neighboring societies. The sacred sites in this region include; Cahokia and Moundville which are the most complex Mississippian site. The Angel Mounds is chiefdom in southern Indiana. Kincaid Site On the hand is a major Mississippian mound center in south Illinois while the Parking Site is an expression of the late Mississippian culture (Penman & Gundersen, 2017).
Southern Appalachian Mississippian was the province that was used by W. H. Holmes to describe a southeastern regional ceramic style. It involved surface decorations that were applied with a carved wooden paddle. Southern Appalachian Mississippian areas are sites that are believed to have people who adopted Mississippian traits from their northern neighbors. Caddoan Mississippian on the other hand was an area that was primarily covered with a regional variant of the Mississippian culture and is believed to have cultural continuity (Vehik, 2017).
The Caddoans may have faced fewer threats from their neighbors since they were located at the lower level of stratification. The Caddo were divided into Kadohadacho, Hasinai, and Natchitoches, who were all connected by similar languages. Plaquemine Mississippian was an archaeological culture which was located in the lower Mississippi River Valley in western Mississippi and Eastern Louisiana. The sacred sites in this region include the Emerald Mound which is a Plaquemine period archaeological site on the Natchez Trace Parkway near Stanton. Similarly, Grand Village of the Natchez is one of the sites which were the main village of the Natchez people with three mounds that are the only ones to be maintained into historic sites.
Modern Nations Descended from the Mississippian People
The Mississippian people are virtually considered to be ancestors of the majority of the American Indian nations that presently live in this region. They include; Apalachee, the Alabama, Caddo, Chickasaw, Cherokee, Choctaw, Guale, Creek, Hitchiti, Kansa, Houma, Missouri, Natchez, Mobilian, Osage Nation, Seminole, Quapaw, Yamasee, Tunica-Biloxi, and Yuchi.
Contact with Europeans
Vehik (2017) speculates that the ancestors of the Natchez were most likely part of the dominant Quigualtam chiefdom that came across the European (De Soto) expedition in 1542-1543. The Europeans thought that they had arrived at the Asian Indies; they labeled the Native Mississippians as ‘Indians’ ((Penman & Gundersen, 2017). Scholars studied records of Hernando De Soto’s excursion to learn more about his contacts with Mississippians. They learned that he visited many villages and some encounters were violent while some were peaceful. After he left, the cultures of the Mississippian people were mostly affected indirectly by the Europeans. Since the natives were not immune to the new infectious diseases such as measles and smallpox, these epidemics thus caused much mortality that later undermined the social order of much chiefdom. Some of the native groups embraced the use of European horses and became nomads. Political constructions collapsed in many Mississippian regions, and by the time more documentary records were being written, the way of life of the Mississippian people had changed irrevocably (Penman & Gundersen, 2017).
Conclusion
The Mississippian culture is the most complex society in prehistoric Midwestern, Eastern and Southeastern regions the United States. This is because of the existence of different societies that exist in different regions but share similar cultural traits despite having different languages. At the prime of the Mississippian culture, great urban centers emerged together with unique mounds that had never been seen before. The Mississippian culture thus paved the way for an even more significant trade network that brought together connected the majority of the eastern one-half of the continent.
References
Penman, J. T., & Gundersen, J. N. (2017). Pipestone Artifacts from Upper Mississippi Valley Sites. Plains Anthropologist, 44, 167, 47-57.
Reader’s Digest Association (1996). Through Indian Eyes: The Untold Story of Native American Peoples, Reader’s Digest, Pleasantville, New York.
Vehik, S. C. (2017). Wichita Culture History. Plains Anthropologist, 37, 141, 311-332.
Wedel, W. R. (2017). Culture Sequence in the Central Great Plains. Plains Anthropologist, 17, 57, 291-354.
Weinberg, C. R. (2017). Charles W. Eagles. Civil Rights, Culture Wars: The Fight over a Mississippi Textbook. The American Historical Review, 122, 5, 1656-1657.
