Chapter 6 LATE PREHISTORIC STAGE (A.D. 150-1540)
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Chapter 6 LATE PREHISTORIC STAGE (A.D. 150-1540) Kevin P. Gilmore CULTURAL BACKGROUND For the following discussion of the post-Archaic cultures in the Platte River Basin, the Ceramic stage of Eighmy (1984) has been replaced with the Late Prehistoric stage, patterned after the Late Prehistoric period defined by Mulloy (1958) and Frison (1978; 1991 a). Others have rightfully pointed out that it is the uncritical use of taxa from various taxonomies that has given the prehistoric taxonomy currently in use in eastern Colorado a somewhat frankensteinian quality, most obviously that of the post-Archaic period (see Butler 1988). However, logic dictates that it makes more sense to acknowledge the greater importance of a continued reliance on an economic base of hunting and gathering than to characterize a cultural evolutionary stage on the introduction of a single technological innovation such as ceramics that while important, does not have a profound impact in the overall subsistence system. The term "Late Prehistoric" for describing post-Archaic stage people has also found greater use in the mountain subarea of the Platte River Basin, where the use of terms such as "Ceramic" and "Formative" have been thought to be inappropriate in the discussion of the continuation of what are in essence Archaic settlement and subsistence patterns. Even with the apparent addition of limited horticulture on the Colorado Piedmont, the settlement and subsistence systems in use in these areas were little changed from the previous Archaic stage. Use of the term "Late Prehistoric" also does not elevate in importance the introduction of ceramics over that of the introduction ofthe bow and arrow into the area, the bow being a technological innovation that eventually became widespread in its distribution, unlike ceramic technology. Small corner- and side- notched points have been used as index fossils in both the mountains and plains to define the Late Prehistoric stage, and are much more common in artifact assemblages than ceramics throughout the Platte River Basin. Figure 6-1 contains illustrations of projectile points representative of the Late Prehistoric stage. Elevating the term Late Prehistoric from a period name to the level of an evolutionary Stage designator in a hierarchical taxonomic system allows for the continued use of Early Ceramic period and Middle Ceramic period within this stage. These periods are useful taxa, in that they acknowledge the demonstrated cultural relationship between people of the Western Plains and the ceramic cultures of the Central Plains, where the Early and Middle Ceramic periods are also recognized cultural taxa defined by similar cultural and temporal criteria. The Early Ceramic period is defined primarily by the Woodland culture and Woodland variants throughout the Midwest and into the Great Plains, and the Middle Ceramic period is defined by the development of the Central Plains tradition. The use of the Late Prehistoric stage is also consistent with the taxonomy proposed by Zier and Kalasz (1999) for the Arkansas River Basin, although periods within this stage in the Arkansas River Basin differ from those used in the Platte River Basin, based on the obvious cultural differences between the two areas. 175 ,- . " " ;~'- ... : . ~. " Magic Mountain Comer Nolched Magic Mountain Corner Notched " , .... , " Bayou Gulch Comer Notched Bayou Gu'lch Corner Nolched Avonlea Prairie Side Notched Plains Side Notched Upper Republican/Plains Village Unnotched Desert Side Notched Figure 6·1. Late Prehistoric projectile points. 176 In other areas ofN011h America, the appearance of ceramics in the archaeological record heralds the arrival of the Formative stage, and with it an entire suite of new, interdependent adaptations, such as an increased reliance on domesticated plants and food production. This reliance encourages and usually accompanies a gradual movement away from living in small, highly mobile nomadic groups to a more sedentary life, eventually leading to clustered populations living most of the year in villages of more permanent structures. Village life raises the profile of these groups within the archaeological record, with pithouse depressions, extensive middens and storage features, and a general increase in the amount and variety within the al1ifact assemblage. In the Platte River Basin, the changes are much more subtle, which is in keeping with the dryer and therefore marginal (as far as reliable horticulture is concerned) climate that is encountered as one moves west and gains elevation from the more moist and horticulturally favorable Central Plains to the High Plains, eventually moving into the rain shadow of the Rocky Mountains. Occurrence of ceramics in artifact assemblages is the characteristic that distinguishes components of the Early Ceramic period from otherwise similar if not identical assemblages dating to the Late Archaic period. The present assumption is that the introduction of the bow and arrow to eastern Colorado is evidenced in archaeological contexts by the presence of smaller, lighter, corner-notched projectile points with relatively narrow neck widths. Because the timing of this technological innovation seems to coincide closely with the introduction of ceramics, the presence of these small points in an assemblage is also used to distinguish Archaic from Late Prehistoric components. However, the seeming coincidence of larger dart points and smaller arrow points in components dating to the initial few centuries of the Early Ceramic period suggests that these different technologies may have been used side by side for a certain period of time before the bow and arrow superseded the atlatl and dart. Therefore, corner notched dart points are not exclusively assignable to the Late Archaic period, although no demonstrably single component sites contain ceramics and dart points exclusive of arrow points. The term "Plains Woodland" has for some time been the center of a certain amount of controversy as it is used in Colorado. Some critics of the .term like to point out that the term itself is an oxymoron, that there are no woodlands on the plains. This fact is not in dispute, but it should be noted that the term does not refer to a vegetation community or a geographic region, but to a cultural tradition with marked similarities to cultural manifestations of the Middle Woodland (500 B.C.-A.D. 500) and Late Woodland (A.D. 500-1000) periods in the east and Midwest (O'Brian 1994). The similarity between the Woodland cultures and the Plains Woodland has been recognized in the Great Plains since the 1930s (Wedel 1986:81). Direct connection with the Hopewell of the eastern woodlands is represented by a Middle Woodland complex centered in the Kansas City area. Exotic materials from Kansas City Hopewell sites sllch as copper (Lake Superior) and obsidian (Yellowstone National Park) indicate that the people living at these sites participated in the greater Hopewellian interaction sphere, centered in Illinois and Ohio. Also associated with the Kansas City Hopewell are stone-vaulted burial mounds in which cremated remains were interred (O'Brian 1994:202-203). Two undated burials excavated at a site in Red Willow County in southwestern Nebraska contained artifacts of sheet mica (often associated with Hopewell burials, sometimes carved into elaborate geometric or representative patterns), native copper, shell beads, red ocher, chipped stone (including a Hopewell-like projectile point), and a marine shell gorget simi lar to those associated with midwestern Archaic horizons. It is unknown if these burials are Archaic or Hopewell in affiliation (Wedel 1986:91). These burials are located approximately 130-160 km (80 to 100 mi) downstream from the Colorado state line. 177 Burial mounds in the lower valley ofthe Republican River in Kansas, south of the Nebraska state line, that contain primary flexed and extended burials, secondary bundle burials, scattered secondary disarticulated remains, or fragmentary cremated remains are designated the Schultz focus or phase; they are thought to be related to the Kansas City Hopewell complex (Wedel 1986). Burial accompaniments were included haphazardly within mound fill and included disk beads manufactured from freshwater mussel shell, tubular bone beads, some with incised annular or spiral patterns, beads made from marine shells such as conch and Olivella shell, pendants manufactured from freshwater shell, ullmodified shell, and corner-notched and stemmed types of arrow and dart points. In addition to the above materials, the James Younkin mound on the Republican River also contained 15 cone-shaped bone beads manufactured from deer toe bones, similar to artifacts found at the Hazeltine Heights and Lena Gulch burials (see below). Some of these mounds contain slab walls somewhat reminiscent of more the more complex dry laid, masonry-chambered vaults in Kansas City Hopewell burial mounds (Wedel 1986:82-83). The question remains open of whether the Schultz phase and the Kansas City Hopewell are contemporaneous Middle Woodland manifestations or if the Schultz phase is a Late or Plains Woodland phenomenon (O'Brian 1994:207). Upstream on the Republican River in Nebraska, the camp and burial sites without mounds and with a "somewhat more limited material culture inventory" (Wedel 1986:81) are assigned to what is variously called the Keith focus, phase, or variant. The Keith focus was defined by Kivett (1949, 1953) during his work in the Republican River valley of south-central Nebraska.