Shell beads from Mississippian sites in the northern Yazoo Basin, Mississippi

Connaway, John M.

doi:10.1080/0734578x.2018.1440464

Cited by 5 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…Traps were common in reaches above the fall line due to the availability of boulders which were stacked in shallow bedrock shoals (Hubbert & Wright, 1987). However, they were also built in coastal plain reaches of the Mobile Basin, including the Tombigbee River, and were supposed to have been designed to capture eels, shad, and sturgeon (Connaway, 1982; Mistovich, 1981).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pre‐impoundment fish migrations in the Mobile Basin, Alabama

Hershey,

Wright,

Williams

et al. 2024

Ecology of Freshwater Fish

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Assessing the status of several migratory fishes in the Mobile River Basin, Alabama, has been complicated due to a general lack of historical data on their life history, habitat requirements, and distributions. Whether distributions were restricted by natural or man‐made barriers to migration is difficult to answer because few scientific collections were made before dams were built, and the earliest dams were built at the largest biogeographic barrier in the basin: the geological fall line. Therefore, we used what information was available, including anecdotal information, primarily records from archived newspapers and government reports, to describe the ranges of six migratory species prior to the construction of dams in the Mobile Basin. We describe the complicated history of Alabama Shad Alosa alabamae and show that range declines may have been masked by the stocking of American Shad Alosa sapidissima in the late 19th century. We show that Gulf Sturgeon Acipenser oxyrinchus desotoi probably migrated well above the fall line in the Coosa River, and may have been sympatric with Lake Sturgeon Acipenser fulvescens. We found no records of Alabama Sturgeon Scaphirhynchus suttkusi above the fall line. American Eel Anguilla rostrata migrated above the fall line in every Mobile Basin river before dams were built. Finally, Paddlefish Polyodon spathula may have once occurred above the fall line in at least two rivers, but they persist today in impounded reaches in the coastal plain, unlike some other species. We hope that future work will continue to consider archival sources of information to re‐trace the histories of imperilled species.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pre‐impoundment fish migrations in the Mobile Basin, Alabama

Hershey,

Wright,

Williams

et al. 2024

Ecology of Freshwater Fish

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“…Similar amounts of fish could have been extracted in ancestral Maya ecological aquaculture. Comparative research in the Americas has also demonstrated that many types of fish remains, in addition to wooden posts and stones for fish weirs, materials for smoking fish, cooking areas, stone cutting tools for processing fish, net fragments and weights, projectile points, and hooks can be archaeologically recovered (Connaway 1982; Lyons 2015; McKillop and Aoyama 2018; Rice et al 2017; Rodríguez Galicia 2017; Yu 2015). Therefore, people living in sites on floodplains or near wetland fields, reservoirs, and canals in various parts of Mesoamerica may also have intensified aquatic resource production (Ebel 2019; Guzmán and Polaco 2002; Morehart 2016; Sluyter 1994; Stoner et al 2021; VanDerwarker 2006; Weigand 1993) giving ecological aquaculture and integrated subsistence significant research potential.…”

Section: Background: Maya Wetland Agriculture and Water Managementmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The canals contain various linear stone features (Dunning et al 2022:27; Fedick 2003), including dams, sluices, and weirs seen in the Maya area (Figure 13). One excavation inside the main canal at Los Olores uncovered a series of small post holes with woven cane and packed clay that could have been a wooden fish weir or trap (Connaway 1982; Kestle 2013; Ringer 2008). An excavation of the canal near a platform recovered artifact deposits (Figure 14) with Late Postclassic pottery fragments, trash, and dark brown ceramic figurines in the upper layers.…”

Section: Canals Reservoirs and Fishing In The Western Maya Lowlandsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ancestral Maya domesticated waterscapes, ecological aquaculture, and integrated subsistence

Palka

2023

Ancient Mesoam

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Ancestral Maya engineered wetland fields and canals in floodplains for plant cultivation and water management. Canals and reservoirs, however, also provide aquatic resources to supplement agriculture. Maya created multi-trophic ecological aquaculture by modifying the waterscape to increase the amounts of foods and useful materials, such as fish, turtles, waterfowl, and reeds. While archaeological and ethnographic investigations across the Maya area explore aquatic constructions, technology, and foodstuffs, they have not focused on aquaculture. In the western Maya lowlands, including the site of Mensabak, Chiapas, Mexico, ancestral Maya modified floodplains around lakes and rivers for farming fish and aquatic resources near their settlements and fields. These extensive modifications for ecological aquaculture enhanced the productivity and resiliency of natural ecosystems. The domesticated waterscapes near the ritually important Mirador Mountain at Mensabak also followed pan-Mesoamerican beliefs in origin mountains that generated water, plants, and fish for humans. Importantly, Maya integrated subsistence is illuminated by research on domesticated landscapes and ecological aquaculture that examines a range of resources rather than just plants. Certainly across Mesoamerica, ecological aquaculture allowed people to intensify production of “farms” of aquatic species, particularly fish.

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“…The Yazoo Basin (Figure 3) is an ovoid floodplain in northwestern Mississippi that is dense with archaeological sites bearing monumental architecture (Brain, 1989; McNutt, 1996; Phillips, 1970; Phillips et al., 1951; Williams and Brain, 1983). While the majority of earthen mounds were constructed during the Mississippi period (A.D. 1200–1540), mound building in the region extends as far back as the Archaic period (5000 BC–3000 BC), as discovered at the Denton site (Connaway, 1977). Poverty Point culture (A.D. 1700–700 BC) and earthworks are found at the Jaketown site (Ford et al, 1955), Teoc Creek (Connaway et al., 1977), and at Slate (Lauro and Lehman, 1982).…”

Section: Regional Culture Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

Mound building and summit architecture at the Carson site, a Mississippian mound center in the southeastern United States

Mehta

2019

North American Archaeologist

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Significant scholarly attention has been paid to monument construction, craft production, and leadership strategies in the Mississippian world (A.D. 1000 to A.D. 1540) of the Southeastern and Midcontinental United States. As new sites are discovered and new data brought into consideration, greater consideration can be made linking the building of large earthen mounds to social and political relationships. This article presents an archaeological and ethnohistoric consideration of mound building and mound summit use at Mound D at the Carson site, located in northwest Mississippi. Data from earthen mound excavation, mound summit architecture, material culture, and optically stimulated luminescence and radiocarbon (accelerator mass spectrometry) dating are used to discuss the formation of the monumental landscape beginning in the early 13th century. Several postulates are offered for the interpretation of mound construction and mound summit use.

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Shell beads from Mississippian sites in the northern Yazoo Basin, Mississippi

Cited by 5 publications

References 2 publications

Pre‐impoundment fish migrations in the Mobile Basin, Alabama

Pre‐impoundment fish migrations in the Mobile Basin, Alabama

Ancestral Maya domesticated waterscapes, ecological aquaculture, and integrated subsistence

Mound building and summit architecture at the Carson site, a Mississippian mound center in the southeastern United States

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