The Creation of Inequality: How Our Prehistoric Ancestors Set the Stage for Monarchy, Slavery, and Empire (49 page)

FIGURE 46.
   Many Native American societies of the U.S. Southeast had two major divisions, in which the hereditary rank of clans or subclans reflected their genealogical distance from the chiefly line. Sometimes the rank order could be detected in the layout of a settlement.

On the left we see the layout of a “council square” occupied by the Chickasaw a century ago. A north-south line separated the two major divisions, called Intuckwalipa and Imosaktca. Six subclans on the west and seven on the east were ranked in descending order, from north to south.

On the right we see the layout of Moundville, a prehistoric chiefly center, as it probably looked 750 years ago. A north-south line, passing through the earthen mounds that supported the chief’s residence (B) and the central temple (A), creates two major divisions of residential and mortuary mounds. Mounds R, P, N, and L (on the west) and E, G, and I (on the east) decrease in cubic volume of earth from north to south, perhaps reflecting the relative rank of the families whose houses they supported. The mounds shown in black are believed to have supported mortuary temples. (Moundville’s plaza measures 1,600 feet from north to south.)

On the right, in
Figure 46
, we see Moundville as it would have looked between 750 and 700 years ago. Looking at the arrangement of its earthen mounds, Knight saw some interesting similarities with the layout of the Chickasaw council camp.

On the northern edge of Moundville’s plaza lies Mound B, which probably supported a paramount chief’s residence. Mound A, which supported Moundville’s main temple, occupies a central position similar to that of the Chickasaw council fire. A north-south line through Mounds A and B divides the plaza in half.

Running down both sides of the plaza are residential mounds that decrease in cubic volume of earth as one moves from north to south. Mounds R, P, N, and L line the west side of the plaza; Mounds E, G, and I line the east side. These mounds may have supported the houses of families whose rank decreased from north to south. Alternating with these houses were mounds containing high-status burials, decapitated skeletons, skulls, and infant burials. These mounds may have belonged to mortuary temples associated in some way with the residences.

While Knight is cautious in his interpretation, Moundville’s layout does resemble that of the Chickasaw council camp. To be sure, the Chickasaw camp had no major temple and no chiefly residence equivalent to Mound B, which stands 56 feet high and required three million cubic feet of earthen fill. That difference, however, may reflect the much higher population and centuries-long occupation at Moundville. Knight’s use of Ca’bi’tci’s diagram is an example of the way social anthropology can be used to reconstruct the living society that created an archaeological site.

Social inequality at Moundville was also reflected in burial ritual. Mounds C and D (to the north of the plaza) contained numerous burials of highly ranked people. Mounds M1 (to the south) and U (to the north) contained dense concentrations of commoner burials.

The most impressive sumptuary goods occurred with people buried between 700 and 550 years ago. One adult male in Mound C wore bracelets and anklets of copper-covered beads, three gorgets of sheet copper, a pearl necklace, an amethyst pendant, a copper ornament fixed to his hair with a pin made of bison horn, and a copper-bladed axe, which seems to have been a favored possession of elite men. Other highly ranked people were buried with copper ear ornaments, stone cosmetic palettes, lead ore crystals, and seashell beads. Such prestige goods make it clear that, in Colin Renfrew’s terms, Moundville was an individualizing rank society.

CHIEFLY CYCLING IN NORTHERN GEORGIA

The ancient chiefly societies of northern Georgia underwent cycles like those of the Kachin and Konyak Naga. According to archaeologist David Hally, few north Georgia rank societies remained at peak strength for more than a century or two. Among the reasons for their periodic collapse were factional disputes, military defeats, revolts against overly demanding chiefs, and episodes of weak leadership. Such problems may occasionally have been worsened by drought.

Chiefly centers tended to endure longer than their satellite communities, but even they went through periods of decline and reorganization. A frequent strategy for retaining power was to form confederacies with neighboring rank societies through chiefly intermarriage or military alliance.

The greater a north Georgia society was, the larger the sparsely occupied buffer zone left around it. At the slightest sign of weakness or decline in a preexisting rank society, ambitious rivals tried to establish themselves in one of these buffer zones. Such a pattern was not unique to Georgia. In studying analogous African societies, anthropologist Igor Kopytoff found that ambitious leaders often attempted to establish new territories in the unoccupied frontiers between preexisting societies.

Hally describes most chiefly territories as only 10 to 12 miles wide. Exceptional chiefly centers like Etowah (described later) might have had territories 18 to 20 miles in extent. The sparsely occupied zones between rival societies could be five to 20 miles wide. In addition to serving as military buffers, these zones were often filled with the second-growth forest preferred as a habitat by white-tailed deer.

Three of the best-known rank societies in north Georgia were the one centered at ancient Etowah (which peaked between 750 and 675 years ago) and the historic Coosa and Ocute (which were visited by European explorers between
A.D.
1500 and 1580). In this chapter we look at Etowah and the Coosa.

The Growth of Etowah

The remains of the prehistoric chiefly center of Etowah lie on the river of the same name near Cartersville, Georgia. The site’s semicircular defensive ditch (both ends of which once reached the Etowah River) enclosed more than 50 acres (
Figure 47, top
). In its heyday Etowah was the paramount center for a chiefly territory 20 to 30 miles across, separated from its rivals by buffer zones. There were at least three smaller villages across the river from Etowah, three more upstream, and three more downstream. Its hinterland also included shifting farmsteads.

FIGURE 47.
   The archaeological site of Etowah was the chiefly center for an important prehistoric rank society of northern Georgia. Above we see the overall layout of Etowah, with its defensive ditch and Mounds A-F; the area enclosed by the ditch was 50 acres.

Below we see a pair of marble statues, found hidden in a log tomb at the base of Mound C. These statues are believed to represent the mythological couple who founded Etowah’s chiefly lineage.

Archaeologists have studied Etowah for more than 100 years. Work began with Cyrus Thomas in the 1890s and Warren G. Moorehead in the 1920s, continued with Lewis Larson in the 1960s, and then the torch was passed to Adam King in the early twenty-first century. We do not know the name of the ethnic group that founded Etowah, but it lay in Coosa territory at the time Spanish explorers arrived.

The largest earthen construction at Etowah was Mound A, which once stood 66 feet high and contained an estimated four million cubic feet of fill. An earthen ramp led from the summit of Mound A to a ceremonial plaza. To the south of Mound A were Mounds B and C, both large. On the opposite side of the plaza were smaller mounds, called D, E, and F. Early excavators concluded that Mounds B, D, and E had supported residences. Mound C attracted the most attention because it had once supported a temple; in the mound below the temple there were many burials with fabulous sumptuary goods.

Etowah was founded some 1,000 years ago, and, according to King, its beginnings were modest. None of the large mounds had yet been built at that time. The original occupants were just beginning to enjoy the benefits of Eastern Flint corn, which they combined with the hunting of deer and the taking of turtles, catfish, drum, and gar from the river.

In levels that antedated the building of Mound C, Larson uncovered half a dozen houses and a series of ritual buildings, built one atop another. One of the ritual buildings was more than 100 feet long and may have been a charnel house. Another building was 40 feet long, and its floor had been coated with red ocher pigment. Mounds A and B were built between 900 and 800 years ago, after which Etowah went into decline.

New leaders appear to have rejuvenated Etowah between 750 and 675 years ago, and the site entered an impressive phase of public building. Mounds A and B were enlarged, and Mound C was raised in multiple stages to an estimated height of 18 feet. At this time the defensive ditch was dug, and just inside this newly created perimeter the occupants erected a wooden palisade with bastions.

Mound C was filled with burials of the hereditary elite. Larson believed that he could detect both “major nobles” (buried in log tombs) and “minor nobles” (buried in simpler graves). Many Etowah burials were accompanied by standardized elements of costume and paraphernalia that probably reflected their rank.

Let us look now at a few notable burials from Mound C. Burial 57 was a robust adult male, placed in a log tomb with a pole roof and a floor of walnut planks. He wore copper-covered wooden spools in his earlobes, multiple shell necklaces, a shell gorget, a headdress with copper ornaments, traces of a disintegrated feather robe, and masses of pearls that had once been attached to a garment. He had been buried with eight conch shell cups, five or six embossed copper plates, and two copper axes.

Burials 25 and 64 provided evidence for inherited rank. Burial 25, an adult, had its head covered with a copper sheet. Burial 64, a five-year-old child, had its head covered with a similar, but miniature, copper sheet. Since Burial 64 had surely not lived long enough to achieve renown, he or she must have been entitled by noble birth to be buried with a copper sheet.

Larson reveals that offerings of engraved shell, symbolic “swords” chipped from Tennessee flint, stone cosmetic palettes, lead ore, shark teeth, beaded arm and leg bands, stone and copper axes, cutouts of mica and sea-turtle shell, and embossed copper plates were standard burial goods for the Etowah elite.

Finally we come to Burial 15, a log tomb at the base of the ramp leading to the summit of Mound C. Inside were the dismembered skeletons of four individuals, accompanied by copper-covered earlobe spools, copper hair ornaments, antler points for weapons, shell beads, and tobacco pipes. Added to this tomb was the remarkable pair of statues shown at the
bottom of Figure 47
. One of these marble statues represents a man seated cross-legged; the other is a kneeling woman.

King’s interpretation of these marble statues takes us back to the Natchez, whose creation myth held that the first Suns were a man and woman who came to earth from the Upper World. When his work on earth was done, the primordial man turned himself into stone.

King suggests that the marble statues in Burial 15 depict an analogous “founder couple” and may originally have been kept in a mortuary temple. The disarticulated occupants of the log tomb seem to have been hurriedly buried, at roughly the time that Etowah’s palisade was burned; they might therefore represent the elite victims of a raid. Under such circumstances, their tomb may have been seen as a convenient place to hide the sacred statues.

Following the burning of its palisade and the hiding of its founder couple’s effigies, Etowah was abandoned for most of a century. Although it eventually rose again from the ashes, its moment of greatness was over.

The Coosa Confederacy

Some rank societies of northern Georgia lasted long enough to be seen and described by sixteenth-century Spanish explorers. Such was the case with the Coosa, who were visited by de Soto in 1540 and Juan Pardo between 1566 and 1568. Coosa history has been the subject of collaborative research by Charles Hudson, David Hally, and their colleagues.

The Coosa, like several other rank societies in the Southeast, had made themselves stronger through confederacy. To do this they used military alliances and noble intermarriage. The resulting confederacy was able to demand tribute from a much larger area. Leaders sent each other gifts, smoked tobacco together, and exchanged wives. Unfortunately, since they included multiple factions with conflicting agendas, most southeastern confederacies were doomed to collapse.

According to Hudson the territory of the sixteenth-century Coosa extended from the village of Chiaha (near Knoxville, Tennessee) to the village of Talisi (near Birmingham, Alabama). This is a distance of roughly 250 miles, too large by far to represent the territory controlled by a single chief. The Coosa had surely formed a confederacy of some kind, and Hally has identified approximately 11 clusters of Coosa sites that may have been participants.

The main town of the Coosa lay near Carters, Georgia, at the confluence of the Coosawattee River and Talking Rock Creek. Known today as the Little Egypt site, this community covered ten acres at its peak. The Spaniards described the paramount chief of the Coosa confederacy as traveling in a litter, accompanied by hundreds of warriors. He is said to have owned three houses atop pyramidal mounds, but only two mounds survive at Little Egypt today. Archaeologists believe that these mounds occupied the north and east sides of a plaza measuring almost 350 by 200 feet.