Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Emerald site, also known as the Emerald Acropolis, was an early Mississippian pilgrimage center key to Cahokia's development. This paper presents the hitherto unpublished results of two archaeological projects conducted at the site, one led by Howard Winters and Stuart Struever in 1961 and the other by Robert Hall in 1964. These investigations produced the most comprehensive information on Emerald's Moorehead phase (1200-1300 CE) occupation during which two of its mounds were capped, a secondary mound was constructed on the central mound, and a mound-top structure was erected on this secondary mound. Similar activities took place throughout the region …

This paper considers the importance of relationships in the constitution of personhood in the pre-Columbian American Bottom Region. Specifically, I argue that upright posts, common during the Late Woodland, Terminal Late Woodland, and Mississippian periods, were key components in a web of relationships that included plazas, mounds, structures, bodies, dimensions, and otherworldly beings, and it was the relationships between these entities that constituted personhood. Additionally, the various contexts in which these upright posts were placed through time imply that notions of personhood were constantly changing. The most radical change occurred during the Mississippian period and the sudden rise of Cahokia …