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Modeling Prehistoric Health in the Middle Cumberland Region of Tennessee: Mississippian Populations on the Threshold of Collapse

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University of Tennessee, Knoxville TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School 8-2016 Modeling Prehistoric Health in the Middle Cumberland Region of Tennessee: Mississippian Populations on the Threshold of Collapse Christina Laiz Fojas University of Tennessee, Knoxville, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss Part of the Biological and Physical Anthropology Commons Recommended Citation Fojas, Christina Laiz, "Modeling Prehistoric Health in the Middle Cumberland Region of Tennessee: Mississippian Populations on the Threshold of Collapse. " PhD diss., University of Tennessee, 2016. https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss/3859 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a dissertation written by Christina Laiz Fojas entitled "Modeling Prehistoric Health in the Middle Cumberland Region of Tennessee: Mississippian Populations on the Threshold of Collapse." I have examined the final electronic copy of this dissertation for form and content and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, with a major in Anthropology. Dawnie W. Steadman, Major Professor We have read this dissertation and recommend its acceptance: David G. Anderson, Benjamin M. Auerbach, James A. Fordyce Accepted for the Council: Carolyn R. Hodges Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (Original signatures are on file with official studentecor r ds.) Modeling Prehistoric Health in the Middle Cumberland Region of Tennessee: Mississippian Populations on the Threshold of Collapse A Dissertation Presented for the Doctor of Philosophy Degree The University of Tennessee, Knoxville Christina Laiz Fojas August 2016 Acknowledgements This work would have been a truly insurmountable undertaking if not for the encouragement of numerous people along the way. Gratitude is extended to my doctoral committee who helped shape this research: Dawnie Steadman, Benjamin Auerbach, David Anderson, and James Fordyce. Since starting my doctoral studies, Dawnie has been a continual source of direction and patience. Her dedicated mentorship was paramount in grounding a solid anthropological framework in my work. Ben offered much fodder with regard to methodological approaches, and an open office door for equal parts musing and rambling. Dave’s enthusiasm and encyclopedic knowledge of Southeastern prehistory enhanced my understanding of the context centering my research. Thanks to Jim for his statistical wizardry and help with coding. A Dissertation Fieldwork Grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation provided financial support for this research. Thank you to those who allowed me to access the Middle Cumberland Region skeletal collections under their care: Kandi Hollenbach, Ben Auerbach, and Tim Baumann (University of Tennessee), Tiffiny Tung (Vanderbilt University), Mike Moore (Tennessee Division of Archaeology), and Michele Morgan, Jane Rousseau, and Olivia Herschensohn (Peabody Museum, Harvard University). I’m indebted to my undergraduate and Masters mentors for their early tutelage. When I was an undergraduate at New York University, I took Susan Antón’s forensic anthropology and human osteology classes. Susan’s passion for teaching was inspiring, and I am grateful for her continued guidance. During my time at Mercyhurst University, Dennis Dirkmaat, Luis Cabo, Steve Symes, and Steve Ousley challenged my ii understanding of skeletal biology principles and offered unparalleled opportunities with forensic casework. Special thanks to Charlie Cobb for discussions about the Middle Cumberland Region and his comments on grant proposals. Lyle Konigsberg has been always been gracious with his open source R code, and I could not have carried out my analyses without his assistance. Likewise, Bridget Algee-Hewitt and Jeremy Wilson have selflessly shared their quantitative knowledge and time. I am grateful for the camaraderie of those in Knoxville who made this process infinitely easier. I value the friendship of Michael Kenyhercz, Katie Kulhavy, Jieun Kim, Kyle McCormick, Sean Tallman, Janna Andronowski, Giovanna Vidoli, Alana Brooks, Alex Craib, and many others. I’ll miss our dinners, happy hours, and outings that kept an otherwise delirious dissertator sane. Thank you to my family for their love and encouragement as I pursued a rather unconventional career path working with the dead. Lastly, thank you to Adam Burnett for his unyielding support, optimism, and ability to put things in perspective. I am lucky to have you all in my life. iii Abstract This research explores differences in mortality and survivorship resulting from factors associated with the abandonment of the Middle Cumberland Region (MCR) of Tennessee during the Mississippian period (ca. 1000-1500 AD). My dissertation investigates whether individuals from the Late Mississippian period had a greater risk of death than individuals from the Early Mississippian period. Adult age-at-death estimates (n=545) were calculated using Transition Analysis, a Bayesian maximum likelihood method. Gompertz and Gompertz-Makeham hazard models were utilized to reconstruct the mortality profile of the MCR as they model human adult mortality and generate robust parametric mortality profiles. Rather than recount the prevalence of disease conditions, this project uses MCR skeletal data to understand the biological, social, and ecological processes that positioned some individuals in the community with a greater risk of death than others. To this end, biological markers of childhood physiological stress and poor dental health, skeletal evidence of warfare-related trauma, and paleoclimate data were analyzed as health co-variates in a series of Kaplan-Meier survival analyses and log-rank tests. The paleodemographic results suggest that survivorship did not simply decrease with age. Marked differences between the sexes indicate that females had increased mortality compared to males. Survivorship of males decreased sharply from the Early Mississippian to Late Mississippian period, possibly due to elevated rates of conflict. On the whole, mortality was elevated in the Late Mississippian period compared to the Early Mississippian period. Paleoepidemiological results demonstrate that risk of death was not uniform across the MCR during the Mississippian period. While some findings support iv traditional interpretations that the presence of certain conditions (porotic hyperostosis, carious lesions, skeletal trauma) had a negative impact on survivorship, results for linear enamel hypoplasias, dental abscesses, and antemortem tooth loss offer support for the osteological paradox. v Table of Contents CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION .................................................................................... 1 RESEARCH HYPOTHESES ......................................................................................... 3 DISSERTATION ORGANIZATION ............................................................................ 4 CHAPTER 2: THE MISSISSIPPIAN CULTURAL TRADITION IN THE SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES ........................................................................... 7 AGRICULTURAL INTENSIFICATION ...................................................................... 8 RANKED SOCIOPOLITICAL ORGANIZATION ..................................................... 11 WARFARE ................................................................................................................... 18 MIDDLE CUMBERLAND REGION: GEOGRAPHY AND ENVIRONMENT ....... 24 MIDDLE CUMBERLAND REGION: SETTLEMENT CHRONOLOGY ................. 26 MIDDLE CUMBERLAND REGION: CULTURE HISTORY ................................... 29 MIDDLE CUMBERLAND REGION: WARFARE .................................................... 35 POPULATION DECLINE OF PREHISTORIC POPULATIONS .............................. 36 The Vacant Quarter .................................................................................................. 39 Explaining Regional Depopulation........................................................................... 41 CHAPTER SUMMARY ............................................................................................... 44 CHAPTER 3: MIDDLE CUMBERLAND REGION SITES...................................... 46 EARLY MISSISSIPPIAN MCR SITES ....................................................................... 49 Bowling Farm (40Dv426; Bosley Farm) .................................................................. 49 Moss-Wright (40Su20) .............................................................................................. 50 Mound Bottom (40Ch8) ............................................................................................ 51 Noel Cemetery (40Dv3; Cain’s Chapel; Kain’s Chapel) ......................................... 53 Sellars (40Wi1; Lindsley Estate, Greenwood Earthworks, Greenwood Seminary) . 54 MIDDLE MISSISSIPPIAN MCR SITES .................................................................... 56 Arnold (40Wm5; Emily Hayes Farm) ....................................................................... 56 Ganier (40Dv15) ......................................................................................................
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