Middle Woodland Culture History in the Great Lakes Riverine Area

Abstract

There are multiple structural and stylistic differences between local Middle Woodland expressions in the Great Lakes-Riverine area. These reflect not only different cultural systems but also in some cases different levels of cultural complexity. At present these manifestations are grouped into a single Hopewellian culture on the basis of selected artifact commonalities. Variations within Great Lakes-Riverine Middle Woodland are of several kinds: (1) complexes that include diagnostic Hopewellian culture artifacts are concentrated in the major river valleys, while apparently contemporary manifestations in neighboring localities lack Hopewellian forms; (2) if we employ artifact classes other than those used as Hopewellian diagnostics, Middle Woodland regional traditions can be defined that have distributions sharply different from those of specifically Hopewellian complexes; (3) comparison of Hopewellian manifestations in Ohio, Illinois, and elsewhere indicates that these are not local expressions of a homogeneous culture but probably representatives of more than one cultural system; and (4) structural analysis of Middle Woodland mortuary and subsistence-settlement patterns in two regions, Illinois and Ohio, indicates contrasting cultural systems. It is argued that if ceramics of the Havana tradition are classified according to criteria developed in the central Illinois Valley, then potentially significant local style variations will go unrecognized. Tentative definition of four microstyle zones within the Havana tradition illustrates the utility of a system of analysis geared to recognition of small-scale style differences.

Lithic analysis and cultural inference: a Paleo-Indian case

“…Binford (1962; has argued that motivation for a multivariate approach is strong. Excellent justification for the adoption of such an approach may be found in results obtained by Struever (1965), Martin and others (1964), and by several authors in Clark and Howell (1966). All of these authors are concerned with the manipulation of artifact types already intuitively defined by others.…”

6 Political Economy and the Routinization of Religious Movements: A View from the Eastern Woodlands

“…The term Ohio Hopewell refers to the specific religious complex where most of these rites, crafts, and practices had their greatest elaboration. Hopewell‐affiliated religious complexes include the Havana mortuary tradition in Illinois (Brown 1981; Buikstra 1976; Carr 2005a; Deuel 1952; Struever 1965; Tainter 1977), the Marksville phase of the Lower Mississippi Valley (Ford and Willey 1940; Kidder 2002; Toth 1979, 1988), the Copena mortuary complex in Alabama and Georgia (Beck 1995; Knight 1990; Walthall 1973, 1979), and the Mann phase in Indiana (Adams 1949; Carr 2005a; Ruby 1993, 1997).…”

Hopewell, Middle Woodland, and the Laurel Culture: A Problem in Archeological Classification1

“…On one hand are complex, internally differentiated, probably nonegalitarian "chiefdoms" structurally like those of such historic peoples as the Natchez and Kwakiutl, and on the other, simple "bands" similar to those of the ethnographic Naskapi or Dogrib. In fact, Stuart Struever (1965) has been able to use the Service model to plausibly suggest significant and far-reaching contrasts between the social organization of Hopewell communities in Ohio and Illinois. James E. Fitting (1965) discerned divergent patterns of natural resource utilization in the Middle Woodland period in eastern Michigan and proposed three isolable traditions.…”