Sedentism and Hunter-Gatherer Adaptations in the Lower Mississippi Valley: Subsistence Strategies During the Poverty Point Period. (Volumes I and II).

Abstract

The Poverty Point Culture existed in the Lower Mississippi Valley from about 2000 B.C. until 500 B.C. The largest site of this culture, Poverty Point, is the earliest large-scale earthwork in North America. Evidence for a far-reaching exchange network includes lithic materials and minerals from sources throughout the Southeast and Midwest. The Cultural developments during the period are significant because they appear to have been supported primarily by a hunting-gathering economy. This study examines the subsistence economy that supported populations living in the Lower Mississippi Valley during the Poverty Point Period. Of particular interest are the effects of residential sedentism on procurement patterns and social interactions. Biological and environmental data are used to critically evaluate the Lower Mississippi Valley resource base. Archaeological materials from a single Poverty Point Site, J. W. Copes, are used to reconstruct local economic patterns and to evaluate the social relations involved in maintaining a sedentary hunter-gatherer community. Archaeological remains, and faunal seasonal indicators point to a community used during all seasons of the year. The occupants depended on exchange relations for utilitarian commodities as well as ritual or ceremonial goods. Variation in plant resource yields suggests that periodic shortages of high quality calories, particularly fats and carbohydrates from nuts, may have been a problem facing prehistoric hunter-gatherers of the region. It is unlikely that the subsistence base was adequate to support large permanent populations. Even small populations such as that living at the Copes Site may have been periodically affected by local shortages. Analysis of faunal remains from the Copes Site suggests that a procurement strategy concentrating on high fat-yielding animal species, in particular deer and catfish, was pursued as one means of ameliorating these periodic shortfalls. Based on evidence for the exchange of animal products, including meat, it is argued that exchange relations are an integral aspect of sedentary hunter-gatherer adaptations. It is proposed that cultural developments during the Poverty Point Period can be explained largely as a consequence of the extension of social networks related to increased hunter-gatherer residential permanence, rather than necessarily resulting from the evolution of a complex society as previously suggested by others.