Eastern Peoples in Ancient America

The initial occupation of eastern North America is known to extend back to at least 22,000 years ago, as evidenced by sites such as Parsons Island in Maryland, Meadowcroft Rockshelter in Pennsylvania, and Cactus Hill in Virginia.

RELATED CIVILIZATIONS: Adena culture, Hopewell, Mississippian.

DATE: 8000 B.C.E.-700 C.E.

LOCALE: Eastern North America

Much more widespread though still ephemeral evidence of human presence occurs about 11,000-10,000 B.C.E. with the Clovis, or fluted point, horizon. The signature of humanity remains relatively light, however, until the end of the Pleistocene period, which is conventionally fixed at about 8500-8000 B.C.E.

Throughout the last six millennia of the Late Pleistocene, aboriginals in eastern North America were apparently highly mobile and targeted a wide array of now extinct as well as modern animal species while exploiting a range of plant resources. Environments were often ecologically anomalous by modern standards and have no precise analogues today.

Archaic period

By 8000 B.C.E., the Pleistocene megafauna were extinct throughout the east, and ecological conditions were similar to those of the present. In archaeological terms, the period of Paleo-Indian culture was succeeded by the Archaic, which would last in a few areas well into historical times but in most regions would grade into the Woodland period.

The Early Archaic period (c. 8000-5500 B.C.E.) is signaled by the appearance of a variety of side- and corner-notched projectile point styles that succeed the fluted and unfluted lanceolate forms of the preceding Paleo-Indian period. Ground and pecked stone implements, rare in earlier times, become common, and in the few places where preservation permits, basketry, cordage, sandals, and related plant fiber and wood-derived products are represented. The number of sites across the eastern woodlands increases markedly, presumably reflecting population increase. However, groups are still quite small in most areas and remain highly mobile as they pursue a wide range of forest products. By the end of the Early Archaic period, seasonal aggregation sites can be found in major river valleys and other favored habitats.

The Middle Archaic period (c. 5500-3050 B.C.E.) witnesses a continuation of the trends of the earlier period. Large middens composed of shell and other occupational detritus mark the locations of large seasonal aggregation sites, and many contain numerous burials suggestive of substantial population sizes. Although the inferred settlement/subsistence regimes still involve considerable mobility, occupational stability is clearly reflected in many areas where riverine, maritime, or plant resources are abundant. Important developments in the Middle Archaic period include conclusive evidence for long-distance trade and exchange as well as the first appearance of ceremonial earth-mound constructions in widely separated parts of the east. Elaborate ritual behavior is also suggested by complex funerary rites as evidenced at Windover, Florida, where Middle Archaic foragers buried more than 170 individuals, many of whom were wrapped in elaborate textiles.

The tendencies toward a more sedentary lifestyle, elaborate ceremonial architecture, intensive long-distance exchange, and higher population densities continued into the Late Archaic period (3050-1050 B.C.E.) with unprecedented site densities in virtually all habitat zones. Although scattered hunter-foragers with high mobility still existed (and would continue to exist) on the margins of the eastern woodlands, notably in Canada, the Late Archaic is typified in many areas by genuinely complex sociocultural manifestations such as Poverty Point in Louisiana and the Old Copper sites in the upper Midwest.

By the Late Archaic period, seasonal use of increased amounts of wild plants had turned into local cultivation of indigenous species such as sumpweed, sunflowers, gourds, and various chenopods such as goosefoot. Additionally, extensive exploitation of both riverine and coastal maritime resources heavily augmented the acquisition of forest products and facilitated higher population aggregates.

The Late Archaic grades almost imperceptibly into the Early Woodland period (1050-100 B.C.E.), which is marked by the widespread use of ceramics, year-round sedentism in many areas, and the appearance, in minor quantities, of nonlocal domesticates such as corn and squash. Village sites are rather small (about six to ten structures; fifty to seventy-five people), but clear evidence of nascent stratification is apparent in groups such as the Adena of the Midwest.

Middle Woodland period

During the Middle Woodland period (100 B.C.E.-1000 C.E.), many populations across eastern North America were loosely connected in a techno-economic and, possibly, religious and political exchange network known as the Hopewell Interaction Sphere, or Hopewell Culture. Named for a spectacular complex in southern Ohio, the Hopewellian efflorescence involved the incorporation into regionally distinct and essentially local cultures with a veneer of shared behaviors that includes complex burial and effigy mound construction; long-distance acquisition, use, and ritual disposal of high-status trade goods; and an almost standardized iconography.

The Hopewell phenomenon began to decline in many parts of its range by 300-400 C.E., although in restricted areas, notably the lower Mississippi Valley and parts of the southeast, it was succeeded by an even more dramatic development known as Mississippian (1000 B.C.E.-450 C.E.). This entity—actually a series of separate ethnic and linguistic units like Hopewell—represents the most complex cultural expression to appear in North America, north of central Mexico. Mississippian

Society was centered on large, town-size communities that dominated extensive territories. Organized hierarchically into stratified chiefdoms, these Mississippian centers are typified by sites such as Cahokia near St. Louis, Moundville in Alabama, and Etowah in Georgia. Though the Mississippian began to unravel well before European contact, some of its lineal descendants, such as the Natchez, remained organizationally complex well into the early historic period. Elsewhere, Eastern Woodland groups were in the process of evolving into the more or less egalitarian, maize-based societies that would soon be overwhelmed by Europeans with their introduced diseases.

Bibliography

Anderson, David G., and Kenneth E. Sassaman. The Paleoindian and Early Archaic Southeast. University of Alabama Press, 1996.

Fagan, Brian M. Ancient North America: The Archaeology of a Continent. 2d ed. Thames and Hudson, 1995.

Johnson, Carolyn Y. "Ancient Chesapeake Site Challenged Timeline of Humans in the Americas." The Washington Post, www.washingtonpost.com/science/2024/05/19/first-americans-chesapeake-parsons-island/. Accessed 3 June 2024.

Smith, Bruce D. Rivers of Change: Essays on Early Agriculture in Eastern North America. Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992.