Rethinking the Ramey State: Was Cahokia the Center of a Theater State? Author(S): Julie Zimmermann Holt Source: American Antiquity, Vol

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Rethinking the Ramey State: Was Cahokia the Center of a Theater State? Author(s): Julie Zimmermann Holt Source: American Antiquity, Vol. 74, No. 2 (Apr., 2009), pp. 231-254 Published by: Society for American Archaeology Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20622425 . Accessed: 25/06/2013 17:14

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This content downloaded from 146.163.163.212 on Tue, 25 Jun 2013 17:14:28 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions RETHINKING THE RAMEY STATE: WAS CAHOKIA THE CENTER OF A THEATER STATE?

Julie Zimmermann Holt

Archaeologists often portray Cahokia as the center of a chiefdom. A minority view is that Cahokia was the center of a state. These competing views are considered here, and an alternative model is presented, that Cahokia might be considered the center of a theater state. This model agrees with other models that Cahokia was an economic and political center, but also emphasizes Cahokia's role as a center of ritual. In the theater state model, thepower of a state lies more in its ceremonies than in its armies. People came to Cahokia, helping to build it and feed it,not because theywere coerced but because they wanted to be part of the drama. This view of Cahokia is not presented in order to replace all other models but, rather, to stimulate archaeologists to rethink what Cahokia might have been like. Geertz 's theater state model suggests an alterna tive, non-Western view of the state thatmight be useful in reconsidering other archaeological complex societies as well.

Frecuentemente los arque?logos pintan Cahokia como sifuera un centro de grandes caciques. Una pequena minoridad dice que era el pueblo central y el asiento del estado. Se consideran ambos puntos de vista, y tambien se presenta otro modelo, donde se consideraria Cahokia como el centro de un estado teatro. Este modelo como los otros modelos describen Cahokia como un centro econ?mico y politico, pero de m?s importancia, Cahokia era un centro ritual. En el modelo teatro estado, el poder del estado se concentra m?s en las ceremonias que en los ejercitos. Vino la gente a Cahokia ayundando a construirla y alimentarla, no porque vinieron a fuerza sino porque querian serparte del drama. No se presenta estd interpretaci?n de Cahokia para reemplazar todos los otros modelos, sino para estimular la interpretaci?n arqueol?gica de lo que podria haber sido Cahokia. El modelo teatro-estado de Geertz sugiere una vision alternativa y no occidental del estado, una vision que podria ser ?til al reevaluar otras complejas sociedades arqueol?gicas tambien.

|hecontemporary significance ofCahokia is Fortier 2007). The Mississippi River separatedEast international in scale: UNESCO has St. Louis and Cahokia from theMississippian .A. deemed Cahokia a World Heritage Site mound center at St. Louis, which had approxi because of its "outstanding universal value." The mately 25 mounds, but perhaps thatsite too should site is the largestarchaeological sitenorth of Mex be considered part of the same cultural phenome ico by any measure used. Such measures might non (cf. Pauketat 2004). Unfortunately, all the include the area of the site, the number of people mounds in St. Louis and East St. Louis have been who lived at the site, thenumber of earthenmounds destroyed, at least above ground (see Fortier 2007; built at the site, or the size of Monks Mound, Kelly 1994; Pauketat 2005), and we will never fully Cahokia's largestmound, which stands at over 30 understand the relationship between these sites. m talland covers approximately 17 acres at itsbase More fortunately, the state of Illinois owns the (Dalan et al. 2003; Fowler 1997). Ifwe consider "downtown" portion of Cahokia and has an active thedifficulty in drawing a clear boundary between program to purchase more land in itsvicinity. The Cahokia, which had as many as 120mounds, and InterpretiveCenter at Cahokia Mounds State His the neighboring East St. Louis site, which had toric Site receives over 300,000 visitors per year, approximately 50 mounds, we begin to realize the includingvisitors from78 foreigncountries in 1996 enormity of this archaeological phenomenon (see (Dalan et al. 2003:12). This attention clearly Kelly 1994:Figure 1;Milner 1998:Figure 1.1; demonstrates the international significance of the Pauketat 1994:Figure 1.1, 2004:Figure 4.2; cf. site in thepresent.

Julie Zimmermann Holt Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, Department of Anthropology, Edwardsville, IL 62026-1451 ([email protected])

American Antiquity 74(2), 2009, pp. 231-254 Copyright ?2009 by the Society forAmerican Archaeology

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The prehistoric significance of Cahokia is less tion of Ramey potterymarks the spatial extent of clear.While many models of Cahokia have con Cahokia's power and influence. sidered the site tobe the center of a chiefdom (e.g., Gibbon (1974) proposes thatthe Red Wing area Milner 1990, 1998; Pauketat 1991, 1994), a few ofMinnesota became incorporated on some level archaeologists have suggested thatCahokia was into theRamey State, which he suggests was a instead the capital of the "Ramey State" (e.g.,Gib "theocratic state" borrowing a model proposed by bon 1974; O'Brien 1989, 1991). At a recent con Wheatley (1970, 1971). Within such a state, reli ference onMississippian polities, common themes gious institutionsdominate economic institutions; of discussion were power and ritual, which often cities are ceremonial, administrative, and political seemed to be presented as opposing theoretical centers "diffusing traditional culture" (Gibbon positions (see Butler andWelch 2006). Itwas also 1974:132, citing Redfield and Singer 1954). Gib observed at this conference thatCahokia was the bon briefly examines thedevelopment of Cahokia "900 pound gorilla" of theMississippian world. as a center and the spread of influence from Most Mississippian societies,which were laterand Cahokia into the Upper Midwest. Comparing significantlysmaller thanCahokia in scale, are con Cahokia toTeotihuac?n, Gibbon hypothesizes that sidered chiefdoms. Is itreasonable to thinkthat the the theocratic statecentered atCahokia was extrac 900 lb gorilla was somethingmore than the sim tive and used magico-religious controls within its pler, smaller societies thatfollowed it? widespread exchange network.The distant reaches An alternativemodel is offered here, Geertz's of that exchange network, such as theRed Wing (1980) model of a "theatre state."Geertz's analy area, "were inhabited by a predominantly hinter sis of thenineteenth-century Balinese state suggests land population, although Cahokians may have that "power" and "ritual" are not in opposition; been instrumentalin theiradministration" (Gibbon indeed, thepower of a statecan lie in itsceremonies 1974:136). Gibbon suggests that disruption at more so than its armies. The source of Cahokia's Cahokia, increasing power within distant centers, power was in itsrituals, and thatpower surely tran and climatic change led to the collapse of the scended thepower of any laterMississippian chief Ramey State. dom or othernative society northof Mexico. Given In her analysis of Cahokia's influence,O'Brien the scale and nature of Cahokia's power, Cahokia (1989) has a verydifferent view of theRamey State. might best be seen as a theater state. She finds four common themes inhow a "state" is defined: 1. a of the threatof theuse Previous Views of Cahokia monopoly of legiti mate force Many researchershave stressed thecomplexity and 2. the presence of political-economic classes far-reaching influence of Cahokia (e.g., Dalan et 3. thepresence of a hierarchical bureaucracy al. 2003; Emerson 2002; Fowler 1974; Hall 1991; 4. thepresence of hierarchical decision-making Pauketat 2007), but few have gone so far as to sug (with 3 settlement levels or more being crucial) gest that itwas the capital of a state (Gibbon 1974; [1989:278]. Kehoe 1998; O'Brien 1989; Sears 1968). The label O'Brien (1989) finds evidence of all four themes "Ramey State" was apparently coined by Conrad in the archaeological record of Cahokia and its and Harn (1972) to refer to the area theybelieved "hinterland." She considers "massive human sac was controlled by Cahokia. Ramey Incised pottery rifice" at Cahokia as evidence of the threatof the is the ceremonial ware at Cahokia and is found in use of force. In particular, some 250 people, mostly various amounts throughoutthe American Bottom, young women, were sacrificed and interred in the broad floodplain surroundingCahokia, and in Cahokia's Mound 72. Labor specialization (a pot the uplands adjacent to theAmerican Bottom. ter's hamlet, shell bead manufacture, etc.), lower Ramey Incised designs are also found at scattered and middle-class neighborhoods atCahokia, and a sites in theMississippi and adjacent river valleys rural supporting population are evidence that as farnorth asWisconsin andMinnesota and as far political-economic classes existed. Evidence of south as southern Illinois and southern Indiana. hierarchical bureaucracy is found in elite burials, The label "Ramey State" implies that the distribu monumental construction and public structures,the

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skills necessary to plan the layout of Cahokia, and [O'Brien [1972], 1989,1991]. Cahokia ispor "systematic" garbage collection at Cahokia. As trayedas a great and powerful place, thepre O'Brien states, "Where there are plans, there are mier site in a society thatwas organized and planners, and planners are generally bureaucrats" operated in fundamentallydifferent ways than (1989:283). Finally, O'Brien argues that there are itsMississippian counterparts elsewhere. It five levels in theMississippian settlement system was poised on thebrink of becoming a state if in theAmerican Bottom, which constitutes evi ithad not already arrived there [1998:10; cf. dence of hierarchical decision making. Muller 1997]. In subsequent work, O'Brien (1991) examines Milner (1998) credits (or blames) work by Fowler the economic base of the "Ramey State," looking (e.g., 1974) on Cahokia's internal structureand on at Cahokia's subsistence base and labor force, its its settlement system for inspiring thesemodels, tradingnetwork, and evidence of tribute.Here she and he (1990) argues that the settlement system of argues thata rural supportingpopulation supplied theAmerican Bottom is not as hierarchical as Cahokia with food, and again she argues for evi Fowler suggests. Whereas Fowler (cf. O'Brien dence of craft specialization. Exotic materials such 1989) argues thatvarying numbers of mounds at as shark's teeth,copper, andmarine shellwere com Mississippian sites indicate hierarchy, Milner monly traded to Cahokia, as well as "mundane (1990) argues that thenumber ofmounds at a site manufacturingmaterials" such asMill Creek chert indicates site longevity, competition, and history. (which was used tomanufacture Mississippian Milner (1998) argues that there are threeprimary hoes) and salt. Bastions identified excava during with Cahokia a state or tion at Cahokia's Tract 15B were for secure stor problems labeling emerg ing state.First, finds atCahokia are essentially sim age of tradegoods, according toO'Brien. Finally, ilar to finds at otherMississippian chiefdoms, O'Brien defines tribute as payments made by a except that the amount of earthmoved in building subordinate group to a dominant group, politically themounds atCahokia was thanelsewhere. and she believes that there is evidence of tribute greater Second, fewerpeople lived atCahokia than is com made to Cahokia from places quite distant. She monly estimated (Milner estimates thatthere were argues thatMississippian "frontier towns,"which only a few thousand inhabitants;more common are typically fortified and strategically located estimates are 10,000 or 20,000 inhabitants); there along traderoutes, functioned toprotect goods dur fore, extensive taxes, trade, and tributewere not ing transportation.Examples would includeAzta necessary to support them.Finally, while there is lan, which is found on the Crawfish River in evidence of extensive earthmovement, craftwork, Wisconsin, so placed toprotect the tradeof copper trade,and elites at Cahokia, thisdoes not indicate and other northernproducts (fish, furs, and lum thatCahokia was "politically centralized, eco ber); and Dickson Mounds, which is found at the nomically specialized, or aggressively expansion confluence of the Spoon and Illinois rivers, possi istic" (Milner 1998:13). bly placed to protect the trade of animal products Milner concedes that the "achievements" of (especially meat and bison hides). These and other Cahokia were "impressive," but he believes that Mississippian frontiertowns typicallyhave a tem they are essentially similar to those of other ple mound; they are seen as colonies of Cahokia large/strongchiefdoms elsewhere. He prefers to because "there is no evidence of a localMississip label Cahokia a "complex chiefdom" (1998:3), and pian evolution" (O'Brien 1991:160). a primarygoal of his book, appropriately titledThe Such models of the "Ramey State," in particu Cahokia Chiefdom, is to argue this point.Milner larO'Brien's, are dismissed byMilner as "mighty thatCahokia, like othermounded Cahokia" scenarios: (1990) suggests Mississippian sites, controlled the territoryonly Conventional wisdom about the society cen within its immediate vicinity and that its popula teredon Cahokia is a pastiche of solid research tionwas largely self-sufficient. findings,field impressions,and outrightcon These competing models are given historical jecture.This curiously undifferentiatedmix is context by Pauketat (2002). He defines four "gen trottedout inarguments for a societyat thehigh erations" of Cahokia archaeology. In thefirst gen end of theorganizational complexity spectrum eration, archaeologists like Griffin (e.g., 1952)

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focused on chronology and culture history. In the eliteswere themovers and shakersbehind thiscoa second-generation synthesis,archaeologists includ lescence, althoughmore recentlyhe has noted that ing Fowler, Gibbon, and O'Brien looked at the "Mississippian farmershad agency," too (2003:56). organization and influence of Cahokia with the A new view of Cahokia is presented by Byers general view thatCahokia was internallycomplex. (2006), who would seem to take the "downsized" In the third-generationsynthesis, cultural resource view to a new extreme. Byers sees no centralized management provided a new wealth of compara hierarchy leading Cahokia, not even thatof a chief tive data on other sites in theAmerican Bottom. dom much less thatof a state; instead,he envisions Based on this new view from the "periphery," a "heterarchy" at Cahokia. Instead of "chiefs and archaeologists such as Milner began to question chiefdoms" Byers sees "clans and cults organized earlier claims of Cahokia's complexity and influ into complex settlement arrangements based on ence. The fourth-generation synthesis has come mutual alliances and enmities and having social about since 1990 due to investigations at Cahokia structuresbased on mutual autonomy of responsi itself,including both new excavations and reanaly ble parties who interact through collective con sis of previously excavated materials. Pauketat sensus rather than zero-sum dominance" points out that these new investigationshave made (2006:xiii). Byers likens Cahokia to a shopping itpossible tocompare developments atCahokia and mall, where clans and cults came to conduct their other sites in theAmerican Bottom for the first rituals with the same autonomy thatshopping mall time. "Theoretically speaking," Pauketat writes, merchants and shoppers have today. "the fourth-generationview is a return to a histor Pauketat (2004) would agree with Byers that ical perspective, but one thatnow highlightshuman there is evidence of heterarchy at Cahokia, but he agency and the two-way 'negotiations' of culture" argues thathierarchy and hegemony existed there (2002:150). And so, thependulum swings. alongside heterarchy. Indeed, Pauketat and Emer Pauketat (2002) includes his own work in both son (1999) argue that community was used at the third-generationand the fourth-generationsyn Cahokia tomask hegemony. In contrast to Byers theses. In his earlier work (e.g., 1991) he charac (2006), however, most contemporary archaeolo terizesCahokia as a chiefdom or "prestate" society. gists writing about Cahokia operate under the In a more recent publication, Pauketat refers to assumption that itwas the center of a chiefdom Cahokia as a "city" thatwas involved in "state (e.g., Beck 2006; Dalan et al. 2003; Emerson making," but he suggests that itwas not "a state in 1997a;Finney 2000; Kelly 2001;Mehrer 1995; the typical sense of thatword" (2004:168). Most Milner 1998; Pauketat 1994; Schroeder 2004; Tru recently,Pauketat has declared the chiefdom an bitt 2000). Of these, probably none is as vocifer "archaeological delusion" and suggests thatboth ous as Milner in explicitly arguing against the "chiefdom" and "state" are evolutionary types that notion of a "Ramey State." should be discarded?although he refersto Cahokia Mississippian leadership and polities were the as "statelike" and seems to prefer the term civi topic of the 2003 Visiting Scholar Conference at lization (2007:159,17). Regardless of thenomen Southern Illinois University, Carbondale (see But clature used, Pauketat's view of Cahokia is ler andWelch 2006). Here, too, theunderlying and "consistentwith Fowler's view of Cahokia's inter unquestioned assumption seemed tobe thatall Mis nal complexity and thereforecontrary to the 'down sissippian societies were chiefdoms, even though sized' views ofMilner (1998) andMuller (1997)" itwas acknowledged thatCahokia operated on an (2002:152). He argues thatCahokia became "the entirelydifferent scale thanall otherMississippian preeminent cultural center" ina "Big Bang" around polities (Welch and Butler 2006; cf. Cobb 2003). cal A.D. 1050?"Cahokia coalesced in shortorder As Dalan et al. write, "Cahokia was not just a large around a political leader, a religiousmovement, or Mississippian site; itwas both structurallyand orga a kin-coalition that rapidly centralized the social nizationally differentfrom other Mississippian cen relations and political economy of theAmerican ters" (2003:197). Similarly, Pauketat and Emerson Bottom" (2002:152). Agency is the theoretical state thatCahokia was a "political, economic, and undercurrent throughout thiswork. In Pauketat's social behemoth" (1997:269). Yet they, likemost earlier work (e.g., 1994), a handful of motivated other third-and fourth-generationCahokia archae

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as ologists, referto Cahokia a chiefdom, albeit the erence, "countryside," "region," "village," even or "granddaddy of Mississippian chiefdoms" "place," and sometimes "dependency" (1999:303). "governed area." In its broadest sense desa is Another themeat the2003Visiting Scholar Con theword for theworld ... of the rural settle ference (Butler and Welch 2006) was debate ment, of thepeasant, the tenant,the political between archaeologists who used words likepower subject, the "people." Between these two poles, and domination and archaeologists who used words negara and desa, each defined in contrast to like ritual and myth.Examples of the former in the the other, the classical polity developed and, Butler andWelch volume might include Beck's within the general contextof... cosmology, (2006) analysis of "persuasive politics and domi took its distinctive,not to say peculiar, form nation" atCahokia andMoundville; theycertainly [1980:4]. would include previous works by Emerson and It is easy to see the fundamental contrast between Pauketat (e.g., Emerson 1997a; Emerson and "capital" and "countryside" described byGeertz in Pauketat 2002; Pauketat and Emerson 1997,1999). Cahokia and its "hinterland." Cahokia, East St. An explicit example of the latteris Brown's (2006) Louis, and St. Louis togetherstretched out more or analysis of Mound 72 as the enactment of an less continuously from one side of theMississippi episode from theRed Horn myth (Radin 1948; also to the other, a stringof perhaps some 200 mounds see Brown 2003); other examples would certainly all together.Of the three sites, Cahokia is often include pioneering works by Hall (1991, 1996, seen by archaeologists as the paramount center, 1997, and also recent book etc.) Byers's (2006). even though itmight be somewhat arbitrary to Two very differentworldviews seemed to be determine where one site ends and the next reflected in thisdebate. As one casual observer at begins?except forwhere theMississippi River theVisiting Scholar Conference noted, the con divides them (see Kelly 1994:Figure 1;Milner trastingviews seemed to tellmore about thearchae 1998:Figure 1.1; Pauketat 1994:Figure 1.1). ologists than thearchaeological record. In any case, Together we might say they formed a single cen we know as anthropologists that it is impossible to ter (cf. Fortier 2007; Fowler 1997; Hall 2006), or separate these aspects of culture; as Bailey notes, what Pauketat (1994, 2004) calls a "central "Traditional Osage social, political, and religious political-administrative complex" (also see Emer institutionswere so highly integratedthat they con son 2002), even if theirconjoining is to some extent stituteda single unified system" (1995:29). It seems the result of several centuries of prehistoric subur we need tobe reminded thatpolitics, religion, and ban sprawl. other cultural subsystems are integrated, perhaps Smaller mounded sites in theAmerican Bot most obviously in "traditional" cultures.Power and tom, and laterMississippian centers of the South ritualwere certainly inseparable in the theaterstate. east for thatmatter, might have had more in common with nonmounded villages and farmsteads The Theater State than theyhad with Cahokia. Surely, Cahokia was perceived as "town" in contrast to the "country Negara, Geertz explains in his book of the same side,"whether one thinks 16,000 people (Pauketat name, was theclassical stateof precolonial Indone 2003; Pauketat and 1997) or a "few" sia,what Geertz calls a "theatre state": Lopinot only thousand people lived at Cahokia (Milner 1998). Negara... originallymeaning "town," is used Cahokia was also surelyperceived as the "capital" in Indonesian to more or languages mean, less in contrast to the "rural settlement" or "governed simultaneouslyand interchangeably,"palace," area"?given thatthe population ofCahokia's hin "capital," "state," "realm," and again "town." terland surelyhelped build itand probably helped It in itsbroadest is, sense, theword for (clas feed it (e.g., Dalan 1997; Kelly 1997; Lopinot for sical) civilization, theworld of the tradi 1997). Cahokia would have been the "capital" of tional city,the high culture thatcity supported, "civilization" and "high culture" in the area,where and the system of superordinate political people came to participate in ceremonies, rituals, authoritycentered there. Its opposite is desa and feasts (e.g., Kelly 2001; Pauketat 2002). ... with a meaning, similar flexibilityof ref Cahokia was as surely the center of "political

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authority"as outlying settlementswere home to the The power of the Indonesian theater statewas "people" (e.g., Emerson 1997a, 1997b; Pauketat not about how much land was controlled; itwas 2003). about the loyalty, support, and deference of the It seems therecan be only one possible sticking state's supporters.Geertz writes, "Political power point in this initialcomparison between negara and inhered less inproperty than inpeople; was a mat Cahokia?was Cahokia also a "state"? Geertz terof theaccumulation of prestige, not of territory" writes that therewere hundreds ifnot thousands of (1980:24). These people were needed "for staterit negaras in Indonesia over time, as "kingdoms of ual and, what was really the same thing,for war various dimensions and durability rose, intrigued, fare" (Geertz 1980:24). Likewise, most fought, and fell in a steady, broadening stream" archaeologists do not believe thatCahokia directly (1980:4). States coalesced and collapsed, "an controlled a huge territory,but the prestige of expanding cloud of localized, fragile, loosely inter Cahokia is surely indicated by thepresence of arti related pettyprincipalities" (Geertz 1980:4). Here, factsmade at Cahokia or in theCahokia style at then, is a difference between Cahokia and the sites hundreds ofmiles away fromCahokia (e.g., negaras of Indonesia: therewas only one Cahokia. see Hall 1991; Kelly 1991). Although thepalisade The "negara" at Cahokia lasted a few centuries. at Cahokia might suggest warfare (Trubitt2003), Nothing like it in scale or complexity followed else there is little if any evidence of actual warfare at where in theMississippian world. Does itsunique Cahokia. Fertilityrather than war symbolism seems ness make the developments at Cahokia less to dominate Cahokian ideology (e.g., Emerson significant?To the contrary, the fact that it stands 1989, 1997c; Emerson et al. 2000; Johannessen out in such contrast to the historically observed 1993; Pauketat and Emerson 1997). However, war Mississippian chiefdoms of theSoutheast suggests symbolism becomes more prominent afterA.D. thatCahokia was more thana chiefdorn?although 1200 (see Brown and Kelly 2000), around the time perhaps just as localized and fragile as any Indone that thepalisade was built (Trubitt2003). The pal sian negara. isade and war symbolismmight suggest, therefore, Geertz suggests thatthe theater stateof Indone thatwarfare became important afterA.D. 1200. sia was not so much about government as itwas Trubitt (2003) suggests thatwarfare at Cahokia about spectacle and ceremony: "Court ceremoni was about the accumulation of social prestige, as alism was the driving force of court politics; and itwas inBali. Iwould suggest furtherthat warfare mass ritual was not a device to shore up the state, at Cahokia may have been ritualized; similarly, but rather the state, even in its final gasp, was a Brown and Dye argue that "trophymotifs served device for the enactment of mass ritual. Power not only as a symbol of success at war but as a served pomp, not pomp power" (1980:13). We can metaphor for specific mythic narratives" again see parallels with Cahokia. Archaeologists (2007:274; also see Brown 2007). Given the link may debate how much power Cahokia had, but no between warfare and mourning among "all Indian one debates thatpowerful ceremonies took place societies in themidcontinental United States" (Hall at Cahokia. Dramatic examples would include 1998:57), itwould be surprising if ritualwarfare mass human sacrifice atMound 72?quite a spec were not part of mourning rituals at Cahokia. In tacle even though the sacrifices took place on sev any case, there is no evidence at Cahokia of war eral occasions, as Milner (1998) points out (cf. fare over territory (cf. Trubitt 2003), although Pauketat 2004). Rituals like this signal the great Pauketat (2007) suggests thatCahokia could have "power a few highly ranked individuals held over had a standing army. the lives of some people," as Milner (1998:136) The ruling class of the Indonesian theater state acknowledges. Geertz's model of the theater state was a hereditary elite, but not all elites were eligi suggests that rituals like this were what gave ble to be rulers. The caste system described by Cahokia power. Rituals thatincluded mound build Geertz forBali was complex: ing and human sacrifice drew people toCahokia; InWeberian terms,Sudras could achieve the they did not need to be coerced (cf. Byers 2006; power necessary forthe establishment of effec Hall 2006; Pauketat 1998a). They wanted tobe part tive authority,but inevitably lacked the trap of the spectacle. pings of moral qualification which are also

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an necessary for such establishment; whereas State?Geertz writes thatthere were twobasic oblig Brahmanas had the qualifications in full ations: degree, were in fact the purest embodiments And those two were but analogues, cultural of cultural excellence, but could not achieve equivalents: ritual service and military service. the requisite power. Only the Satrias and Beyond these obligations, which could of Wesias were possessed of one and could course onerous be enough, the kawula was not acquire theother so as toattain genuine author bound. He was not a tenant, a serf, a servant, ity, substantial legitimacy, and become the or a was even ... a slave. He not subject. He pivot upon which the entire system?priests, was stagehand, spear carrier,and claqueur in commoners, and less successful gentry? an endless political opera [1980:65]. turned [1980:27]. Peasants inBali were sometimes tenants,but to a These various elites had differenthereditary claims differentlord; peasants also paid taxes,but the taxes to power, but Geertz argues that theyhad to com theypaid (husked rice at harvest time, for exam petewith one another?through rituals?to achieve ple) might go toyet another lord.Geertz concludes, the fullpotential of theirpower. Was the class sys "There was no unitary government,weak or pow tem at Cahokia as complicated as the Indonesian erful,over thewhole realm at all. There was merely system described by Geertz? The Natchez, a his a knottedweb of specific claims usually acknowl toricMississippian group of theSoutheast, has been edged" (1980:68). used as amodel forclass structureat Cahokia (e.g., There is no way to know with certainty if the see theCahokia Mounds InterpretiveCenter). The web of claims ingreater Cahokia was quite so knot Natchez social hierarchywas multitiered and com ted,but otherwise, it is again easy to see parallels. plex, with the "Great Sun" at its apex (Swanton The commoners, themajority of thepopulation in 1911). To extend our ethnographic comparison to theAmerican Bottom, surely gave ritual service, thewest, Hall (2006) suggests thatsouthern Siouan forexample, by providing labor in theconstruction ranking,both within and between clans, was also ofmounds and plazas atCahokia (see Dalan 1997; multitiered and complex.1 Clearly therewas a social Dalan et al. 2003). Given the likelihood that the hierarchy atCahokia (e.g., Emerson 1997a; Emer same workers also built themounds and plazas of son,Hargrave, and Hedman 2003; Goldstein 2000; East St. Louis (Forcier 2007) and otherAmerican Hall 2006; Pauketat 1994;Wilson et al. 2006), and Bottom centers, then the claims on their service most archaeologists would agree thatCahokia was may indeed have been quite knotted. Ifritual war ruled by a hereditaryelite (e.g., Fowler et al. 1999). fare was practiced in some form at Cahokia as That elites used rituals to compete forpower could might be indicated by war imagery found there be indicated by the numbers or varying size of (Emerson 1982,1989), it is reasonable to imagine mounds found in theAmerican Bottom (e.g., Beck that commoners provided this service also. It is 2006; Milner 1990). Dalan et al. document that also that the commoners of the mounds closest toMonks Mound were "on the plausible farming American Bottom gave a portion of theirmaize har small side, taking no risk at competing with the vest toCahokia (Pauketat 1991, 1994, 2004). largestmonument at the site" (2003:92). Other Hall states that for theOmaha pro mounds at Cahokia, East St. Louis, St. Louis, and "religion vided a fabric of and that othermound centers in theAmerican Bottom were privileges obligations bound society together and countered tendencies large byMississippian standards but only a frac toward segmentation" (2006:194). We can hypoth tionof the size ofMonks Mound (cf.Milner 2003). esize that similar threads tiedCahokians together Knight argues thatMississippian platformmounds and return were that in for their services, commoners "objects of sacred display" (1986:678). If received both tangible and intangiblebenefits. Mil Cahokian mounds were sacred icons (Knight 1986) ner (2003) notes that commoners had access to and Cahokian elites competed through rituals, many of the same types of artifacts thatelites had, mound building would have been a likely form of but of lesser quantity and Pauke elite competition. quality. Similarly, tat (2004) finds thatfarmers in theupland villages Within the caste system,what were the obliga east of theAmerican Bottom had access to "elite" tions of peasants to elites in the Indonesian theater

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were goods, but in smaller amounts thanfloodplain farm The state ceremonials of classical Bali ers,who in turnhad less access to valuables than metaphysical theatre: theatre designed to a residents ofCahokia. Giving commoners access to express view of the ultimate nature of real items such as marine shell beads may have been ityand, at the same time, to shape theexisting to consonant with that yet anotherway of binding society togetheror of conditions of life be to an attracting people to the theater at Cahokia. Tru reality; that is, theatre present ontology bitt's (2000) observation of increasing elite control and, by presentingit, to make ithappen?make over shell artifactproduction through timemight itactual [1980:104]. suggest that "door prizes" were less necessary to In Bali, state leaders as actors in this theater leapt attract later in Cahokia's or participants history, alive into flames to demonstrate their social rank what Beck (2006) interprets as a shift from a and spiritual power. The rituals that took place at "group-building" to a "group-distancing" strategy. Cahokia's Mound 72 were surely as powerful and Alternatively, if the benefits to commoners did dramatic (e.g., Goldstein 2000; Pauketat 2004; include intangibles, then perhaps through time Porubcan 2000). Fowler, who excavatedMound 72, "door prizes" became less importantthan benefits makes an analogy toNatchez mortuary practices, (such as blessings or anointing), which do not so suggesting that themortuary features inMound 72 readily leave an archaeological signature. are those of a powerful leader of Cahokia who was Beyond providing services and taxes, villagers buriedwith multiple retainers,with additionalmass seem tohave been autonomous in theIndone fairly sacrificesmade at various times thereafter(Fowler sian theaterstate, and it seems reasonable to assume et al. 1999). In contrast,Brown (2003) suggests that thatMississippian villagers were too. In Bali, how theprimary burial inMound 72 took place in a rit ever, therewas also a "rice-field cult," a coordina ual reenactment of the Red Horn myth (Radin tion of labor that "enabled theBalinese irrigation 1948). system towork and which gave it form and order" Hall's (1997) description of a historic Skiri No "intensive of (Geertz 1980:77-78). applications Pawnee version of theMesoamerican arrow sacri coercive from a centralized state"were nec power fice indicates that itwas also dramatic, since itusu essary (Geertz 1980:82) because labor was orga ally entailed shooting a "young maiden" through nized through a ceremonial system of ritual theheart with an arrow.Hall (personal communi In theAmerican Bottom, therewas no obligations. cation 2007) suggests that the Skiri acquired this need for irrigation,but ithas been hypothesized that ritual fromCahokia, although its ultimate origins fieldswere constructed ridged (Fowler 1969,1992). areMesoamerican. The occasions ofmass human I have suggested elsewhere thatmaize was grown sacrifice (or "scheduled death," to use Hall's ter in communal fields using communal labor in the minology) atCahokia's Mound 72 would have been American Bottom (Holt 1996; cf. Lopinot 1997). even more dramatic, given that these involved the Maize was grown in townfields by historic south sacrifice of asmany as 53 individuals at once. Like eastern Indians, with both men and women con wise, theburial of fourheadless, handless men also tributinglabor (Swanton 1946). The presence of suggests dramatic ritual sacrifice. Fowler et al. maize in "communal" features on American Bot (1999) suggest that the four sacrificedmen repre tom sites Hall 1996) and shiftsin faunal exploita (cf. sented the four cardinal directions. Hall (2000, tionmight suggest that thiswas thepractice in the 2006) concurs, interpretingthese four (and a sim late American Bottom also (Holt 1996). prehistoric ilar burial at Dickson Mounds) as evidence of the Coordination of such labor is likely,and whether or Green Corn ceremony,which was practiced by his not this laborwas organized throughritual obliga toric southeastern groups as both a fertility(first tions, there is no evidence that itwas coerced. fruits) and world-renewal ritual. To reiterate, though, the real power of the Rituals that took place at Cahokia's wood Indonesian theaterstate was in itsrituals. "The cer henges were probably also dramatic events. emonial lifeof the classical negara," Geertz writes, Although these circles of posts are interpretedas "was as much a form of rhetoricas itwas of devo astronomical and calendrical devices, these and tion,a florid,boasting assertion of spiritualpower" single posts found atCahokia may have also served Geertz continues: (1980:102). as markers or other functions (Fowler 1996; Hall

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2004; Smith 1992;Wittry 1996; Young and Fowler direct thepowers of nature into theheart of thecom 2000). Hall (1996) notes that Sun Dance lodges, munity" (Hall 1996:125). Indeed, such circlesmay likeCahokia's wood henges, are circularwith a cen have symbolized nothing less than thecosmos (e.g., tral pole (cf. Kehoe 2002). Caddoan speakers of Fowler 1996; Hall 1996). East Texas built circles of poles forritual purposes, Rituals are also indicated by Mississippian including fallharvest festivals. Sacred poles among Long-Nosed God masks and Cahokian figurines of historically known groups such as theOmaha were redMissouri flintclay. Hall (1991,1997,2006) sug multipurpose; for example, they symbolized the gests that theLong-Nosed God masks symbolize authorityof chiefs and were probably used in ear theRed Horn myth (Radin 1948): Red Horn is also lier times inmourning rituals (Hall 1997). An known as He-who-wears-human-heads-as Omaha myth states that the tree cut for the Sacred earrings, and the tinyMississippian "masks" that Pole was attacked like an enemy; thepole was later look like faces were actually worn as earrings or referredto as a human being, and a scalp was hung pendants. Hall believes that these "masks" were fromits top togive ithair (Hall 1997). Hudson notes used in adoption rituals that functioned to create thatCreek "slave posts" were also "decorated with fictional kinship tiesbetween groups, similar to the the scalps of slain enemies, and prisoners of war historic calumet ceremony. Although Hall (see were sometimes tied to them.The skulls of slain 1991:Figure 1.7) notes that no Long-Nosed God enemies were sometimes placed on top of these masks have been found atCahokia itself,they have posts" (1976:221). Similarly, an image from Le been found nearby, and theirdistribution more or Moyne's visit toFlorida in 1564 shows "Indians" less coincides with the distributionof Ramey pot seated in a semicircle facing a semicircle of posts tery.Hall suggests themasks were distributedfrom (Lorant 1946:67). In thecenter of thecircle formed Cahokia, noting that hundreds of peace medals by posts and people, a man dances, accompanied were distributed fromWashington, D.C., yet none by threemen playing drum and rattles; from each has been found in excavations there.Similarly, fig post hangs a scalp, a leg, or an arm. Le Moyne urines carved of redMissouri flintclay are believed describes the scene as a ceremony to celebrate a tohave been made atCahokia and distributed from victory over enemies. there (Emerson 1997a; Emerson andHughes 2000; Historic evidence such as the Sun Dance ritual, Emerson, Hughes, et al. 2003), although none has theOmaha myth, and Le Moyne's illustrationsug been found at Cahokia itself; these toomay have gest thatrituals undertaken at Cahokia's wood symbolized scenes from theRed Horn (Morning henges and other sacred poles in thepast were not Star)myth (Reilly 2004). However, whereas Long necessarily as peaceful or passive as those under Nosed masks have a distributiongenerally northof takenby New Agers who gather on solsticemorn Cahokia, the flintclay figurines tend tohave amore ings atCahokia today.Evidence ofritual atCahokia southerlydistribution. Most flintclay figurineshave like thatdepicted by Le Moyne comes from a pit been found in thegreater American Bottom around excavated inCahokia's Tract 15A, located on the Cahokia, while a number have been found at Spiro, edge ofWoodhenges III andV (Circles 2 and 3; cf. and single specimens have been found at other sites Wittry 1996). That pit contained human arm and in theSoutheast (Emerson andHughes 2000; Emer legbones, probably articulatedwhen deposited and son, Hughes, et al. 2003). If Long-Nosed God all from different individuals (Pauketat 1998b; masks were used in adoption rituals, perhaps Young and Fowler 2000).2 If scalps decorated the Cahokian flintclay figurineswere too, since there posts, of course theywould not be preserved in the is convincing evidence that both represent the archaeological record.Thus, it is likely thatsolstice Morning Starmyth. In supportof thisnotion, Reilly rituals took place at Cahokia's wood henges, but (2004) points out thatmany figurineswere recon these and other posts at Cahokia might have also figured as pipes (cf. the calumet pipe) and were served functions inmourning, warfare, and other found far from Cahokia. Like the calumet cere rituals (cf. Hall 1997, 1998). Hall suggests that mony, adoption ritualswould have been important Cahokia's wood henges served not only as passive in integratingthe widespread peoples of theRamey astronomical observatories; they also served as State (cf.Pauketat 2004). symbolic world centers and "active instrumentsto Another ritual that took place in the plazas of

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Cahokia is represented by chunkey stones,which surely as meaningful in surely as many ways (e.g., are occasional finds at sites in theAmerican Bot Brown and Kelly 2000; Emerson 1989, 1997c; tom (Koldehoff andKassly-Kane 1995). An unusu Emerson et al. 2000). The foregoing discussion of ally large cache of 15 chunkey stones along with rituals atCahokia illustrates thatwe can attempt to remains of possible chunkey equipmentwere found get at some of thesemeanings throughcomparison inCahokia's Mound 72 (Brown 2003; Fowler et with ethnohistoricNative American mythology, as al. 1999). In addition,Wittry (1996) suggests that Hall (e.g., 1997) and Brown (e.g., 2007), forexam some of theposts excavated inCahokia's Tract 15A ple, have done quite convincingly.Nevertheless, we were chunkey yardmarkers. Chunkey was a game will never understand all of themeanings Cahokian played by southeastern Indians, but it is safe to say rituals and religious symbols held?and we would that itwas more thanjust a game. Hudson suggests not know even ifwe did. thatchunkey was "probably bound up with tradi Geertz writes that the Balinese palace was a tional Southeastern beliefs and social alignments" temple: "The seat of the king was the axis of the (1976:425). Mississippian gorgets engraved with world" (1980:109). Similarly, the large structure pictures of chunkey players suggest the ritual that stood at the top ofMonks Mound was proba importance of thegame (e.g., see Brown 2007); the bly both a palace and a temple, and this summit chunkey game was also featured inmyths, includ was probably theaxis ofCahokia and theCahokian ing theRed Horn myth (Brown 2007; Radin 1948). world (cf. Fowler et al. 1999; Kelly 1996; Roling Hudson mentions thatCreek chunkey yards were son 1996). Geertz also discusses the "sacred located in theirceremonial centers and were pub mountain motif in Indie mythology (1980:114); lic places "for games, dances, ritual, and public indeed, mountains are sacred inmany mytholo spectacle" (1976:221). Among southeastern Indi gies. It is easy to imagine thatCahokians built ans, Hudson states that the stones were "owned" Monks Mound to be their sacred mountain where by towns or clans within towns; Bartram (1988 otherwise none existed in the relative flatness of [1791]) notes that for this reason chunkey stones theAmerican Bottom. SurelyMonks Mound with were not buried with an individualwhen he died. the palace-temple at its top was the axis of the Given this observation, the burial of 15 chun Cahokian world; moreover, climbing this sacred key stones inMound 72 suggests thatbeliefs sur mountain would have taken participants to the rounding chunkey changed through time.DeBoer Upper World or at least closer to it.Hall (2006) (1993) has identifiedadditional evidence of change relates a Cheyenne myth in which a boy travels in the archaeological record of theAmerican Bot many miles to a mountain where men of many tom.DeBoer argues thatchunkey became popular nations were gathered.Was thatmythical moun in theLate Woodland period, during which time tainMonks Mound? chunkey stones are found invaried contexts, includ Finally, we might see another parallel in the ingmiddens and burials of children. Change is model of a Mississippian center that Cahokia apparent in theMississippian period; chunkey became. Geertz writes that the lords of Indonesian stones were of a more standardized size and tend theater states strove constantly to conform to their to be found in elite contexts, suggesting thatMis vision of a more perfect past: sissippian elites appropriated the game (cf.Kold From themost pettyto themost high theywere ehoff and Kassly-Kane 1995). Historically, continually striving to establish, each at his were events; chunkey games high-stakes gambling own a an level, more truly exemplary center, DeBoer argues thatCahokia elites regulated the authenticnegara, which, if itcould notmatch "game" so that they could control gambling, or even approachGelgel inbrilliance... could this typeof exchange. Viewing therebycontrolling at least seek to imitate it and so re-create, to chunkey as a ritual, thisalso suggests thatCahokia some degree, the radiant image of civilization elites took control over Kold popular symbols (see that the classic state had embodied and the ehoff and Kassly-Kane 1995; cf. Beck 2006). postclassic degeneration had obscured The religious symbols of Bali are "richly poly [1980:18]. semic" according toGeertz (1980:105), as are reli was a to gious symbols anywhere. Those at Cahokia were Gelgel legendary court, perhaps similar

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Camelot in its historical-mythical importance. In ideological debate, is to allow most ofwhat is the same sense Cahokia can be seen as the"authen most interestingabout it to escape our view tic negara" of theMississippian world. Long after [Geertz 1980:123]. Cahokia's demise and hundreds of miles away, InGeertz's view, ritual in the theaterstate is power; otherMississippian societies modeled themselves ceremony is the state. afterCahokia Anderson 1997; 1997; (cf. Knight I contend thatGeertz's model of the theaterstate Pauketat 2004, 2007). They built mounds as a fitsvery well with what we know ofCahokia. Dalan means of unifyingpeople and building community, et al. (2003) would seem to thinkso too.While they and their leaders lived in house-temples atop flat do not discuss the theater statemodel itself, they toppedmounds, as theyhad at Cahokia centuries point out thatelements of the four "tired" views of earlier.3Similarly, Brown andKelly (2000) suggest the state summarized by Geertz also fitCahokia, thatthe Southeastern Ceremonial Complex had its just as Geertz admits that theyfit Bali. Dalan et al. origins at Cahokia (cf. Emerson, Hughes, et al. conclude, "We believe thatCahokia surpassed other 2003). Brown (2004) argues thatboth the artistic mound centersbecause thepopulace wanted topar styles and the canon of icons associated with this ticipate in such a great undertaking" (2003:174). "cult" are firstvisible at Cahokia. He that suggests That is the essence of the theater state. influence fromand emulation of Cahokia aremost Thus, Dalan et al. (2003) see these four differ evident at Spiro, Oklahoma, but they are also dis ent types of states expressed in themonumental cernible at Etowah, Georgia, and Moundville, constructions Cahokia, and they believe that Alabama. Cahokia "surpassed othermound centers." How In his conclusion, Geertz (1980:122) sketches ever, theydo not discuss thepossibility thatCahokia fourWestern views of the state. First, there is the was the center of a state; instead, they refer to beast" view of the state, inwhich the state "great Geertz's models of the state as models of uses ... "power "parade and ceremony to strike terror"; relationships" (2003:173) when theyapply them to that is, the of the state lies in its "threat to power Cahokia. These models of the statefit Cahokia? harm." Then there is the "great fraud" view of the the logical conclusion seems tobe thatCahokia was state, in which elites demand surplus from a state. I agree with Dalan et al. (2003) and Byers nonelites, using state ceremony tomystify the (2006) thatpeople wanted toparticipate?because extraction of that surplus. Then there are populist theywanted to be part of the spectacle and the views of the state,which see the state as a formof drama ofCahokia. That iswhat a theaterstate is all rituals thereforecelebrate community cooperation; about: its rulers rule not somuch with armies but thenation's will. Finally, thereare pluralistic views by drawing thecrowd willingly into the theater.The of the state,which seem tobe about rules and polit theater statemodel is similar to themodel of the ical competition of various interestgroups; in this theocratic state suggested by Gibbon (1974). Per view, ritualswould seem to give moral legitimacy haps the primary difference is thatritual would to the state's rules. Geertz writes, "In all these seem tobe more importantthan religion in the the views, the semiotic aspects of the state ... remain ater state; control and coercion would seem to be so much con mummery. They exaggerate might, less than an theatrical ceal inflate ormoralize important engaging perfor exploitation, authority, pro mance. cedure. The one thing they do not do is actuate Geertz's interpretationof nineteenth-century anything" (1980:123). Geertz admits that itwould Bali has been criticized. This is hardly surprising, be very easy to fitBali into any one or all of these given thatthere are many ways to read thepast, just models at once. After all, as there aremany ways to read thepresent. How no one remains dominant politically forvery ever,while critics ofGeertz's model might debate long who cannot in some way promise vio how much power kings inBali had, theyagree with lence to recalcitrants,pry support frompro Geertz thatpolitics and religion were inseparable ducers, portray his actions as collective in precolonial Bali. For example, while Hauser sentiment,or justifyhis decisions as ratified Sch?ublin critiques the theater statemodel, she practice.Yet to reduce thenegara to such tired emphasizes repeatedly that separation of politics worn commonplaces, the coin of European and religion is a "European idea" (e.g., 2003:158).

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She furthersuggests that the notion of the state as ern notion of the state,what Geertz refers to as "the a bureaucratic institutionwith "uniformregulations worn coin of European ideological debate" or government," "a monopoly of power," and (1980:123). clearly defined boundaries is also aWestern idea I am suggesting here thatCahokia was a differ (2003:155, 157). Thus, while shemay debate the ent kind of a state, a theater state,which built its specifics of the role of Balinese kings in control power and attracted its supportersnot throughwar ling irrigation systems, shewould concur that the fare, coercion, or even "persuasive politics" (Beck received notion of the state isEurocentric.4 2006) but by drawing them in to take part in the Thus, I suggest thatGeertz's model of the the drama of itsceremonies. Other archaeologists have ater statehas heuristic value in inspiringarchaeol emphasized the power of elites at Cahokia (e.g., ogists to thinkabout the state differentlythan we Emerson 1997a; Pauketat 1994), or they have usually do. The model has been applied outside Bah emphasized ritualas somethingdistinct from power by historians (e.g., Brown 1999), but it seems to (e.g., Brown 2006; Byers 2006). Power and ritual have been mostly overlooked by archaeologists: to are inseparable in the theater statemodel; indeed, my knowledge this is the first time it has been politics and religion are cultural subsystems that applied to the archaeological record. I think are inseparable in probably all cultures. Geertz's theater statemodel might provide a fruit There are specific features of theBalinese state fulway to rethinknot just Cahokia but also many thatobviously are not found atCahokia. For exam other archaeological cases that are often uncom ple, irrigationwas important inBali, and Bali was fortably referred to as "petty" states, "primitive" a literate society.However, irrigationand writing states, "archaic" states, and the like.5That is, per are by no means central toGeertz's (1980) thesis, haps some societies thatdo not fitcomfortably with unlike other theoriesof cities and states (e.g.,Childe either chiefdommodels or traditional statemodels 1950;Wittfogel 1957). At any rate, I certainly do might find a betterfit with the theater statemodel. notmean to suggest thatCahokia was just likeBali but, rather,that the theater statemodel provides a usefulway to rethinkCahokia. Geertz's point is that The Ramey State as Theater State there ismore to politics than power. He suggests Sometimes implicitly and sometimes explicitly, that equating politics with power is a Eurocentric chiefdom models have dominated discussions of notion, and I would agree. Cahokia for the last several decades. Such models Discussions of power, domination, and hege may ormay not be adequate to capture the diver mony have dominated interpretationsof Cahokia sityof most southeasternMississippian societies. for the past decade or longer (cf. Brown 2006; However, chiefdom models are not adequate to Byers 2006). In his earlierworks, Pauketat hypoth capture the scale or complexity of Cahokia, espe esizes how Cahokian chiefs achieved a "hegemonic cially when we recognize itas a single entitywith transformation,"taking control ofCahokia and ulti sites atEast St. Louis and possibly St. Louis. Lately, mately building a "Cahokian Leviathan" thatpolit Pauketat (2004, 2007) has reached the same con ically dominated "greater Cahokia" (e.g., clusion. He suggests that greater Cahokia repre 1994:168, 1998a:50). Similarly, Emerson (e.g., sents 1997a) hypothesizes how the chiefs of Cahokia gained power and built hegemony. Both Pauketat a singular episode of pre-Columbian state (1994) and Emerson (1997a) build careful argu making. This is not to say thatCahokia was a ments relying on diverse data sets. Both conclude state in the typical sense of thatword (e.g., that ideology was a primary means of how the Feinman and Marcus 1998). Perhaps chiefs at Cahokia were able tomake their"ascent" Cahokians would have built a territorialstate and achieve domination over theirrural hinterland if theyhad inventedwriting or extended their (e.g., Pauketat and Emerson 1997); Pauketat (1994) territorythrough conquest warfare [2004:168; even refers to a "divine chiefship." emphasis in original]. The emphasis on ritual atCahokia as something more The problem thatPauketat is strugglingwith here distinct from hierarchical power has been is that the "typical sense of thatword" is aWest recent in thearchaeological literature(e.g., see But

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ler andWelch 2006). Brown (2003, 2006) argues cion, but again other interpretationsare possible. convincingly thatrituals at Cahokia do not neces Emerson and Pauketat conclude, "Mound 72 is not sarily indicate hierarchy or domination (cf.Byers thereflection of elite power asmuch as itis thecoor 2006; Goldstein 2000; Milner 2003). Brown has dination of power and the concomitant construc also described Cahokia as a "cosmic theater" tion of Cahokia" (2002:118). Clearly, therewas (2006:208), describing the rituals that took place power inCahokian rituals: theywere the founda atMound 72 as "a public ceremony for a collec tion of Cahokia. tive, community-wide purpose" (2003:97). Simi In short, the archaeological record of Cahokia larly,Pauketat writes that some of the rituals that indicates something more than a chiefdom (cf. took place atMound 72 were "probably public Pauketat 2007) andmore thana ceremonial center. spectacles" with a "possible theatrical aspect" Itwas clearly a "theater of power" (Kehoe 2002), (2004:90). More forcefully,Emerson and Pauke but what sort of theaterwas it?8Geertz's theater tatcharacterize Mound 72 as "a palimpsest of the statemodel offers an alternative view of the state atrical performances" and "Cahokian theaterat its and in this an alternativeway of interpretingthe best" (2002:115, 117). More broadly, Pauketat archaeological record of Cahokia. The power and writes: "Cahokia, as a Mississippian mecca asso ritual thatexisted atCahokia were on a scale unlike ciated with powerful, supernatural qualities in the thatfound in any otherMississippian society, sup eyes of people outside theAmerican Bottom, could porting the argument that theRamey State was a have attracteddistant visitors, dignitaries, and pil theater state.The name "Ramey State" is appro grims actively seeking to obtain or emulate what priate here, suggesting thatLate Woodland and Cahokia had tooffer" (1998a:49). Clearly, Cahokia Mississippian peoples living as far north asWis was a ceremonial center, or what Kehoe (2002) consin andMinnesota were within Cahokia's "hin termsa "theater of power"; I cannot imagine that terland" (e.g., see Stoltman 2000). This is not to any archaeologist would dispute that. suggest that these groups were directly controlled Obviously, there is power inritual. I agree with by Cahokians but, rather, that they too were sub Pauketat and Emerson (e.g., 1997,1999) that ide jects of the theaterat Cahokia in the sense thatthey ology was used at Cahokia tomanipulate people, saw Cahokia as a center. but I do not assume as they seem to thatdomina Cahokia would be considered a state by mea tion is theprimary reason for theelaboration of rit sures used elsewhere (see O'Brien 1989). Do we ual at Cahokia or thatcoercion was necessary (cf. question the power of Cahokia because its elites Saitta 1999).61 agree with Brown (e.g., 2003,2006) lived in structuresmade of thatch?Would we ques thatCahokia was a theaterand thatwe can inter tionwhether Cahokia was the capital of a state if pret burials inMound 72 as evidence of a cosmic Monks Mound had been built of stone rather than performance. Unlike Brown, however, I see hier dirt?Would we deny that the leaders of Cahokia archical power in theceremonies that tookplace at were kings if theyhad leftmonuments declaring Cahokia,7 and I would point out (as others have) themselvesking asMayan elites did? Kehoe (1998) that the scale of human sacrifice at Cahokia goes points out thatEuropean chroniclers referred to beyond anything observed among other Native laterMississippian leaders of theSoutheast as kings Americans north ofMexico. Brown does not dis and royalty. If the leaders of thosemuch smaller cuss the litterburials thatFowler et al. (1999) inter and simpler polities were seen as kings by con pret as high-statusburials or, evenmore noteworthy, temporaryEuropean observers, who were the sub the 157 people (mostly groups of young women) jects of kings themselves, surely the leaders of sacrificed and buried inmass graves inMound 72. Cahokia would have been considered kings. Sim While I can imagine ways to fit these burials into ilarly,Hall observes, Brown's interpretationof themain burial, at the The Indian nations amongwhom de Soto trav same time itcannot be that some of the disproved eled were themost advanced inNorth Amer Mound 72 burials represent sacrificed retainers ica from the standpoint of political (Fowler et al. 1999). The evidence of violence in organization and much else. They could be one of themass graves could indicate thatrituals compared to city-states governed by all at Cahokia may have occasionally included coer powerful hereditary rulerswho would have

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been known as princes had the seats of their tution real unless people perceive it as real (see authoritybeen located inFrance or Italy dur Pauketat 2007). ing the same century [1997:145-146]. In the case of Cahokia, there surely was a O'Brien would where The leaders of Cahokia would have been more bureaucracy?as (1989) say, thereare plans, thereare planners.More important powerful than the leaders encountered by de Soto in a theater state,however, is the enduring institu and his colleagues. Examples of the latter include tionof ceremony.These ceremonies and rituals are the "Lady of Cofitachequi," who was carried on a transformed into something larger than an indi littercovered with a delicate white cloth, and the vidual, however charismatic, and larger than a kin "Great Sun" of theNatchez, who was accompanied group.10At Cahokia, mound building, feasts, chun at his death by wives, relatives, attendants, and key, and elaborate rituals like those enacted at many otherswho voluntarilyoffered themselves for Mound 72 were perhaps at firsta means to an end? sacrifice (Hudson 1976). Given the loyalty com a means to gain control by one or a few individu manded by such leaders,Hudson also suggests that als or perhaps more benignly to integrate "at the time of de Soto, some of the Southeastern people?but in the end theybecame the institution Indians may have had what were either very pow itself.Perhaps the theater state crystallized some erful chiefdoms or perhaps very small primitive time aroundA.D. 1050, when the "Big Bang" ush states" (1976:203). These hierarchies began to col ered in theMississippian period (Pauketat 1994). as diseases spread, and their col lapse European A transitionof some sort occurred within the was made when surely lapse complete Europeans theater state aroundA.D. 1200 at the "Moorehead themselves invaded the land. Moment" (Brown 2001), a time that is character The band-tribe-chiefdom-state typology obvi ized by significant changes including the con ously masks significant variation (e.g., see Fein structionof thepalisade and theelite appropriation man and Neitzel 1984). As Kehoe points out, its of exoticmaterials and symbolic items (Beck 2006; "fourfold categorization obfuscates issues of Trubitt 2000, 2003). Given significantdepopula power" (2002:263). Pauketat (2007) and other tion in the greaterAmerican Bottom along with "a criticsmight likeus todiscard the typology (which significantlydiminished and reorganized regional he dismisses as neoevolutionary) altogether.How political economy" during this time (Pauketat ever, these types thatwe have created us mod give Cahokia's as a theater els to test and a with which to 2004:150), perhaps heyday vocabulary was over. state already communicate our about the past.What thoughts Cahokia survived the deaths of at least several is the difference between a very chief powerful leaders. I would that these leaders and a or Can we see the difference suggest might king queen? be seen as heads of a theater state ratherthan chiefs in the archaeological record (cf.Patterson 2003)? because rituals at Cahokia were more important Both chiefs and heads of state use religion as a than any individual or descent group. Surely there tool tomanipulate and control people. Both chiefs were multiple competing descent groups atCahokia and (usually) heads of state are supported by a and in the surrounding region. Any one of them powerful and influential family.What, then, is the could have taken power from another group at difference?A decidedly Western notion might be Cahokia, and the institution?that is, theceremony that thedifference is a or the bureaucracy, perhaps and the rituals?would have endured and did difference is the presence of a army. I standing endure. The faces and families at the ofMonks believe that thisnotion of the state is unnecessar top Mound may have changed through time, but still ily constraining,with the result thatboth third-and people came to Cahokia to build more mounds, fourth-generationCahokian archaeologists hesi have more feasts, and mourn (or celebrate) the tate touse it in reference toCahokia.91 would sug death of theirmost recent king or queen. gest that themost critical difference between chiefdom and state is thatpower in the chiefdom relies on the chief, whereas power in the state Just Another Label? goes beyond the individual to the institutionof the In summer 1991,1 was thewoods state?but that institution is not a hiking through necessarily with Rob Beck somewhere on theEast Coast?I bureaucracy in theWestern sense. Nor is the insti

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think itwas South Carolina. Itwas hot and humid, 1998), no southeasternMississippian site had a and we were burdened with shovels, screens, and population close toCahokia's. field kits as we traversed the hills digging shovel And that is just Cahokia. What was the rela tests thatyielded littlebeyond poison ivy.Despite tionship likebetween Cahokia and the sites at East these conditions, Rob was talking about Missis St. Louis and St. Louis, which were also as large sippian chiefdoms with great enthusiasm. I won as or larger thanMoundville? Were their inhabi dered tomyself how we could know that these tantsalso considered Cahokians? Pauketat's (e.g., archaeological cultureswere chiefdoms. Finally, I 2003,2004) work suggests thateven inhabitantsat muttered, perhaps irritablyas I slapped amosquito, rural farmingvillages in thegreater American Bot that I hated theword chiefdom.Rob's enthusiasm tommight have been considered Cahokians. There was unabated as he responded, "We have to call was a significantpopulation increase not only at them something." Cahokia but also in the greaterAmerican Bottom After a decade of teaching, I have come to at the timeof Cahokia's "Big Bang." Ceramic evi believe thatmy colleague was right. Labels are dence indicates that people who emigrated to useful because they conjure up a whole body of Cahokia and its rural villages came from distant ideas with a single word or phrase. As a teacher, places including southeastMissouri and northeast I find it useful to discuss labels like "band," Arkansas (e.g., Pauketat 2003). Their presence "tribe," "chiefdom," and "state" because they suc made Cahokia amultiethnic society, a characteris cinctly refer to idealized models. Of course the ticwe do not usually associate with chiefdoms. models are idealized?no actual case in the real Surely, something different was happening at world will perfectly fit the type. The type is a Cahokia. To repeat: "Cahokia was not just a large hypothesis we can testwith real data, and we can Mississippian site; itwas both structurallyand orga keep theparts thatfit and reject or correct theparts nizationally differentfrom other Mississippian cen thatdo not fit. ters" (Dalan etal. 2003:197). I do not want to debate whether the southeast Because they are embedded in the notion that ern cultures of which my colleague spoke were Cahokia was a chiefdom, I do not findmodels by truly chiefdoms. Whether or not theywere, the Trubitt (2000) and Beck (2006) entirely convinc label is entirely inappropriate to capture themag ing as written.However, they are valuable in that nitude of events that created and occurred at theyencourage us to thinkabout how interactions Cahokia. It is commonly recognized among archae may have occurred atCahokia and about how these ologists thatCahokia operated at a differentscale systemsmay have evolved over time.Either model thanMississippian societies of theSoutheast. Dalan could, in fact,be accommodated within the theater et al. (2003) point out thatall ofMoundville, often statemodel. As I have suggested above, "corporate" touted as the second-largestMississippian center, and "network" strategies (Trubitt 2000) can be would fitwithin theGrand Plaza of Cahokia. All employed by leaders of states as well as chiefdoms themounds atMoundville combined contain a frac (cf. Blanton et al. 1996). Likewise, "group tion of the dirt thatwent intoMonks Mound (see building" and "group-distancing" strategies could Dalan et al. 2003:Figure 18). Dalan et al. (2003) be used by elites in either a chiefdom or a state furthersuggest that a similar level of effortwent (Beck 2006). We can easily incorporateTrubitt's into leveling theGrand Plaza?and letus not for and Beck's models within the theater statemodel get the effortof building 119 more mounds, pal by looking for shifts in the strategies used by the isades, wood henges, and so on. Another measure leaders of theCahokia theater state. of comparison between Cahokia andMississippian Pauketat (2007) has also grown frustratedwith "chiefdoms" of the Southeast would surely be thechiefdom concept and has recently come to the human sacrifice. I am just guessing here, but all the conclusion that it is an archaeological "delusion." sacrifices found on all theMississippian sites in the Pauketat's preferredparadigm, agency theory,gives Southeast would probably number less than those us a way to step outside the band-tribe-chiefdom found inMound 72.We might also compare pop state typology entirely.Nevertheless, agency the ulation levels at these sites: even using conserva ory and neoevolutionarymodels are not necessarily tivepopulation estimates forCahokia (e.g.,Milner mutually exclusive, as previous work by Pauketat

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(e.g., 1994) has shown: one can thinkof agents as The Balinese considered theirleaders kings. Euro chiefs. However, in trying to shake free of one pean accounts of southeastern cultures upon con archaeological delusion, Pauketat (2007) has tact also suggest that they thoughtof their leaders instead fallen back upon another label, "civiliza as kings and queens, since theirEuropean observers tion,"which inmy mind still carries the baggage certainly did. I would suspect that similar notions of nineteenth-centuryunilineal evolution. I agree of leadership were present at Cahokia. with Pauketat thatCahokia was not a chiefdom. Finally,my point here is not simply to reject old However, to rename it a "civilization" is inmy labels by sticking on a new one. My point is to cri mind not a good solution to the problem. tique existingmodels and suggest an alternative that O'Brien (1989, 1991) offered us a solution to I thinkbetter describes Cahokia and its relation the problem nearly 20 years ago. She correctly shipswith other sites.Archaeologists who work in points out thatCahokia would be considered a state other parts of theworld might also find ituseful in according to criteriaused inother parts of theworld. reexamining their data. Thus, I offer the theater Why not here?Again the implication is thatarchae statemodel as a hypothesis for furthertesting. My ologists studyingCahokia have been prejudiced by goal is not to claim that I have climbed Monks aWestern bias against architecture of earth, logs, Mound and found the truthbut, rather, to encour and thatch.However, I think that in her critique age archaeologists and anyone else who is inter O'Brien runs into the same problem thatPauketat ested to rethinkCahokia. The chiefdom model is has encountered in his critique: both O'Brien and tired at best?at least in reference to Cahokia. I Pauketat rely on aWestern notion of the state,with think that the theater statemodel is a good fitwith its implication of armies and growth by military the archaeological record as I understand it,and I conquest. Surely, Cahokia had warriors, but there thinkthat it sheds new lighton how Cahokia might is little evidence of Cahokian armies marching have worked. The more I have read about Cahokia across the land (although perhaps there is some; see in writing this article, themore evidence I have Pauketat 2007). found to support the theater statemodel. Other I believe thatO'Brien put us on theright track, archaeologists will surely see existing evidence dif and I do not thinkthat her ideas have received ade ferentlyand will disagree. Future evidence might quate attention.However, Iwould suggest the the support themodel, or itmight not. That is theway ater state as an alternativemodel of the state and hypothesis testingworks. Either way, rethinking one that is a better fitfor Cahokia. It steps outside will have occurred. thebox created byWestern scholars: Geertz explic their"tired" notions of the state. the itlyrejects Yes, Conclusion leaders of a theater statemanipulate, threaten,and con theirconstituents as any leaders do. However, The Rajah of theneighboring State died on the theway theydo it is not theway Western scholars 20th ofDecember 1847; his body was burned typically expect in a state.Ritual was the theater with great pomp, threeof his concubines sac state; the statewas a theater?and both elites and rificing themselves in theflames. Itwas a great nonelites played roles in the theaterthat were mean day for theBalinese. Itwas some years since ingful to them. Both were willing participants in theyhad had the chance of witnessing one of the drama. these awful spectacles, a spectacle thatmeant Why call Cahokia?or Bali, for thatmatter?a for them a holiday with an odour of sanctity theater state rather than a theater chiefdom? The about it; and all the reigningRajahs of Bali latter termmight fitmore comfortably with our made a point of being present, eitherperson preconceived notions about people who live in ally or by proxy,and brought largefollowings. thatchhouses and would certainly inspire less crit Itwas a lovely day, and along the softand icism than this article will. However, Geertz cre slippery paths by the embankments which ated themodel, and I am his term.Moreover, using divide the lawn-like terracesof an endless suc I think this term is absolutely appropriate from an cession of paddy-fields,groups of Balinese in emic point of view in the case of Bali or from an festiveattire, could be seenwending theirway empathetic point of view in the case of Cahokia. to theplace of burning.Their gay dresses stood

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out inbright relief against the tendergreen of movement?both before and arguably even after the ground over which they passed. They his death. However, I think that themovement looked littleenough like savages, but rather would have happened without him?it would have like a kindly festive crowd bent upon some been different,but itwould have happened. Iwould pleasant excursion. The whole surrounding make two points. First, social conditions in the bore an impress of plenty,peace, and happi United States were ready forKing; he would have ness, and, in a measure, of civilisation. It was been less successful in another era. Second, the hard tobelieve thatwithin a fewmiles of such civil rightsmovement did not end with his death; a scene, threewomen, guiltless of any crime, themovement was larger thanKing, and the ball were, fortheir affection's sake, and in thename thathe helped set inmotion continued rollingwith of religion, to suffer themost horrible of out him. deaths, while thousands of theircountrymen Likewise, we might argue that one or more looked on [Helms 1882, quoted inGeertz charismatic leaders atCahokia took charge around 1980:98]. the time of the so-called Big Bang of A.D. 1050 (Pauketat 1991,1994). However, the social condi Add 50 women and replace the paddy fields with tions of theAmerican Bottom were ready for maize fields, and we may begin to have an idea of them?the events of theEmergent Mississippian theceremonies thattook place atCahokia's Mound period prepared the scene; those individuals could 72 some 900 years ago. Whether those young not have taken control 300 years earlier.The ritu women buried inMound 72 went voluntarily to als were already there in one formor another; they theirdeaths for the sake of "affection" or theywere simply had to be put to new purpose. Moreover, wealth" (Porubcan 2000; cf. simply "surplus Cahokia did not die with the death of these indi Pauketat 2004) we cannot know, butwe can be sure viduals. The rituals theyused tomobilize andmoti that theywere actors in a cosmic theater (Brown vate people were institutionalized in the 2003) and that and ritualwere ideology primary and thereforeoutlived them? motivators. The individual or individuals who led Mississippian period for a fewmore generations, at least. The rituals the people of Cahokia were surely "agents" of became the essence of theRamey State. The sup change,most likely supportedby an elite kin group porters of this state did so not because theywere (cf. Trocolli 2002), and surely they used religion coerced but because theywanted to takepart in the and ritual as a tool (cf.Pauketat 1994), as did most drama, a grand cultural experimentunlike anything ifnot all leaders of states. In fact, the same early seen before or after in theirworld. could be said of our own political leaders today. The Ramey State collapsed byA.D. 1350 ifnot However, Geertz's model suggests thatthe insti sooner.There is convincing evidence thatenviron tutionof the state ismore importantthan any indi mental problems, some anthropogenic in origin vidual leader. Charismatic leaders are surely and others not, were a factor in the demise of necessary to form a state,but they are less neces Cahokia (e.g.,Dalan et al. 2003; but seeHall 2006). sary as the statebecomes an institution(again, look This highlights theultimate flaw in using religion toour own political leaders). Our usual notionmay tomotivate people: leaders who are supposed to be that it is a bureaucracy of pencil pushers or an have divine contacts lose supportwhen thingsgo army thatforms thebasis of the institution,but that wrong.11 Despite the collapse of Cahokia, how is a contemporaryWestern notion. In a theaterstate, ever, the theater lived on.We can see that in the rituals and ceremonies are the institutionand keep templemounds of later southeastern Indians, in the the organization going beyond the death of any Sun Dance of laterPlains and in individual leader. Indians, adoption and other rituals practiced from the Southeast to We might draw a parallel with a contemporary the Plains. The rituals were undoubtedly trans socialmovement, such as thecivil rightsmovement formedwith time and space, but theydid not end in the United States. Historians might argue with Cahokia. If later groups like the Natchez whether or not the civil rightsmovement would indeed formed primitive states, as Hudson (1976) have taken place without Martin Luther King Jr. suggests, thenwe might go so far as to say that the Clearly King was an important agent of change state did not really die, either. In any case, and highly influential in leading the civil rights

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Cahokia?like Gelgel and Camelot?lived on. Representation. Wisconsin Archeologist 84(1-2):83-99. 2004 The Cahokian Expression: Creating Court and Cult. Indeed, Cahokia lives on still, more atten attracting In Hero, Hawk, and Open Hand, edited by Robert F. more ever tion and visitors today than before. Townsend, pp. 105-123. Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago. 2006 Where's the Power inMound Building? An Eastern Acknowledgments. I want to acknowledge the generations of Woodlands Perspective. In Leadership and Polity inMis edited Brian M. Butler and Paul D. archaeologists who have worked at Cahokia and in the sissippian Society, by Welch, 197-213. Occasional No. 33. Center for greater American Bottom, whose dedication and hard work pp. Paper Archaeological Investigations, Southern Illinois Univer have made possible everything we know (or thinkwe know) sity,Carbondale. about Cahokia. Thanks go to four anonymous reviewers, 2007 On the Identity of theBirdman Within Mississippian Henry Holt, Miranda Yancey, Mark Esarey, and above all Period Art and Iconography. InAncient Objects and Sacred Robert Hall for comments on this article. providing Realms: Interpretations ofMississippian Iconography, their comments the content of Although greatly improved edited by F. Kent Reilly III and James F. Garber, pp. this article, they are of course not to be blamed for any short 56-106. University of Texas Press, Austin. comings herein. Thanks go to Jim Brown and Gayle Fritz for Brown, James, and David Dye 2007 Severed Heads and Sacred sending me copies of their unpublished papers. Thanks go to Scalplocks: Mississippian In The and of Liz Fonseca for translating the abstract into Spanish. Finally, Iconographic Trophies. Taking Displaying Human Body Parts as Trophies byAmerindians, edited by thanks go toKaren Blu for introducing me to negara back in Richard J. Chacon and David H. Dye, pp. 274-294. 1992.1 hope I have done Geertz's work justice, but Dr. Blu Springer-Verlag, New York. is not to blame if I have not! Brown, James, and John E. Kelly 2000 Cahokia and the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex. InMounds, Modoc, and Mesoamerica: Papers inHonor References Cited ofMelvin L. Fowler, edited by Steven R. Ahler, pp. 469-510. Scientific Papers Vol. 28. Illinois StateMuseum, Anderson, David G. Springfield. 1997 The Role of Cahokia in theEvolution of Southeast Butler, Brian M., and Paul D. Welch (editors) ern In Cahokia: Domination and Mississippian Society. 2006 Leadership and Polity inMississippian Society. Occa Ideology in theMississippian World, edited by Timothy R. sional Paper No. 33. Center forArchaeological Investiga Pauketat and Thomas E. Emerson, pp. 248-268. Univer tions, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale. of Nebraska Press, Lincoln. sity Byers, A. Martin Appadurai, Arjun 2006 Cahokia: A World Renewal Cult Heterarchy. 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Research Program, University of Illinois, Urbana. Sears, William 2002 A Fourth-Generation Synthesis of Cahokia andMis 1968 The State and Settlement Patterns in theNew World. sissippianization. Midcontinental Journal ofArchaeology In Settlement Archaeology, edited by K. C. Chang, pp. 27:149-170. 134-153. National Press Books, Palo Alto. 2003 Resettled Farmers and theMaking of aMississippian Smith, Bruce D. Polity. American Antiquity 63:39-66. 1992 Mississippian Elites and Solar Alignments: A Reflec 2004 Ancient Cahokia and theMississippians. Cambridge tion ofManagerial Necessity, or Levers of Social Inequal University Press, Cambridge. ity? In Lords of the Southeast: Social Inequality and the 2007 Chiefdoms and Other Archaeological Delusions. Native Elites of Southeastern North America, edited by AltaMira Press, Lanham, Maryland. Alex W. Barker and Timothy R. Pauketat, pp. 11-30. Pauketat, Timothy R. 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ship and Polity inMississippian Society, edited by Brian Lohmann phase refuse washed into Stirling phase pits. In M. Butler and Paul D. 43-72. Occasional Welch, pp. Paper sum, it is possible that pit Bui was contemporary with one or No. 33. Center for South Archaeological Investigations, more wood henges. ern Illinois University, Carbondale. 3. This is not to suggest that the earliest mound and plaza Wittfogel, Karl constructions are found at Cahokia (e.g., see Kidder 1998; 1957 Oriental Despotism. Yale University Press, New or that other mound cen Haven. Rolingson 2002) any Mississippian ter to Cahokia's Wittry,Warren L. attempted duplicate exactly unique configu ration of four a central mound Dalan 1996 Discovering and Interpreting the Cahokia Wood plazas surrounding (e.g., et al. henges. Wisconsin Archeologist 77(3^4):26-35. 2003; Kelly 1996; Pauketat 2004). Nevertheless, Wolf, Eric Robert Cahokia was among the earliest and was clearly the most 1990 Lecture: Power?Old Distinguished Facing Insights, powerful of the Mississippian centers. Likewise, Camelot New American 92:586-596. Questions. Anthropologist may not have invented the round table, but Camelot's round 1999 Power: Dominance and Envisioning Ideologies of table is the one we remember. Crisis. University of California Press, Berkeley. 4. Hauser-Sch?ublin's (2003) interpretation of the Woods, William Balinese state differs from Geertz's more in degree than in 2001 Mounds Mound: A View from the Top. Paper pre kind, I think. She writes, sented at the66th Annual Meeting of the Society forAmer ican Archaeology, New Orleans. This was a state in which the king, in cooperation Young, Biloine Whiting, and Melvin L. Fowler with the priests, organized mass mobilizations by 2000 Cahokia: The Great Native American Metropolis. means of rituals and brought people?as pilgrims?to University of Illinois Press, Urbana. the "center," the state temples. There localities emerged inwhich people experienced a sense of com Notes munity and of belonging to a principality by partici pating in the same rituals. There they were able to 1. Comparison with contact-period groups of the witness not only the basis of the king's divine power Southeast like the Natchez is appropriate because, like but also how themany different and competing seg Cahokians, they too are considered Mississippian (Hudson ments of the state?the contest state?were, tem 1976). In this sense, we might think of those later southeast porarily, integrated into a single overarching ern groups as cultural descendants or at least relatives of hierarchy. This experience was certainly one of the Cahokians. However, researchers such as Hall (e.g., 1991, most important constituents of the communication 2006) and Brown (2007) argue that Cahokians were Siouan and the relationship between the ruler and his people; speakers, which suggests that their cultural and perhaps through their?invited?participation it became com genetic descendants would be found to the west, not the prehensible to themwhy they had to contribute to this southeast. Thus many scholars today (e.g., Brown 2006; Hall overarching community (uniting humans and gods as 2006;Kelly 2006;Welch 2006) believe thatit is appropriate well) taxes and corvee labor for a sovereign and his to use the ethnographic record of Siouan groups such as the priestly counterparts whom they otherwise rarely saw Osage, Omaha, and Ponca to interpret the archaeological [2003:170; emphasis added]. record of Cahokia. Although Hauser-Sch?ublin emphasizes the "construc 2. Excavation of Tract 15A and the adjacent Dunham tion of 'localities'" (2003:154; sensu Appadurai 1996), we Tract revealed a palimpsest of some 800 Emergent can see fundamental similarities between her interpretation and features. Pauketat (1998b) Mississippian Mississippian and Geertz's theater statemodel: rituals are critical sources of assigned the pit containing human remains (Bui) to the power in both views, and in both views participation in ritu Lohmann phase, apparently based on its artifact contents (it als was clearly voluntary and not coerced. was not radiocarbon dated), whereas Woodhenges III and V 5. Some will probably argue that the theater state model (Circles 2 and 3) were assigned to the Stirling phase based on does not explain anything. Pauketat writes, "The 'rituality' radiocarbon dates. This would that Bui suggest pit predates . . . explanation suffers from theoretical underdevelopment. Woodhenges III and V. However, samples from just eight of Calling Cahokia a 'ritual center that served to pull people into the post pits in Tract 15A were radiocarbon dated (Pauketat its orbit' is non-explanatory (cf. Kelly 2002:145)" 1998b:Table 5.1), and although Pauketat identifies all of them (2004:182). I assume that when he refers to "explanation" as Stirling phase, in fact they range between A.D. 890 and here, Pauketat is looking for origins. Geertz (1980) does not 1420 when calibrated. Pauketat suggests that 151 post pits not seem to be concerned with explaining how negara originated; assigned to a specific phase probably formed additional wood instead, he offers his interpretation of how the theater state henges thatwere undefined by excavators. Pauketat suggests functioned in Bali. That is not to suggest that he makes any that these undefined wood henges also date to the Stirling effort to show that the functioning of the theater state was based on radiocarbon the post phase dating, although pits somehow "rational." contained Emergent Mississippian and Lohmann phase arti 6. For example, while acknowledging thatmembers of a facts, not Stirling phase artifacts. Thus, based on the radio community might provide labor or surplus freely because carbon and artifactual evidence, the possibility of one or more they are members of that community, Pauketat and Emerson wood henges dating to the Lohmann phase cannot be ruled write that "it is inappropriate to ignore hegemonic processes out. Alternatively, it is possible that pit Bui dates to the as if theywere nullified by communal principles. The process Stirling phase, if we accept Pauketat's argument that

This content downloaded from 146.163.163.212 on Tue, 25 Jun 2013 17:14:28 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Holt] RETHINKINGTHE RAMEYSTATE 253 may appear intentionless, lacking exploiters or exploited, but that ethnographers could "purchase" rituals demonstrates that it does not lack power resident in representation of commu such knowledge was not always restricted to particular kin nity" (1999:305; emphasis in original). Their view here groups; however, Bailey notes that "Osage priests would not, seems essentially similar towhat Geertz critically refers to as under normal conditions, have allowed an uninitiated outsider ... the "great fraud" view of the state (1980:122), which would to record themost sacred and secret religious knowledge" seem to suggest that Pauketat and Emerson believe that the (1995:18). Someone who had the right to teach such rituals people of theAmerican Bottom who provided labor and sur might "adopt" an initiate thathe deemed worthy, although his plus were dupes rather than agents. However, elsewhere actions were open to retribution from those who might dis Emerson and Pauketat suggest that elites are not alone in hav agree (e.g., see Hall 1997). Hall's discussion of adoption cer ing power; they find evidence that upland farmers "resisted" emonies suggests that kin groups themselves were fluid Cahokia by building theirhomes and organizing their villages entities.We might conclude thatmotivated individuals might in pre-Mississippian styles. Here, Emerson and Pauketat find themeans to acquire sacred knowledge if they did not argue that power "was enacted and embodied by all people" inherit the right to it. Kelly (2006) points out that ritual (2002:119). In both views, there is an emphasis on power, knowledge among theOsage was shared; for example, differ which apparently is hegemonic in the hands of elites and ent clans would contribute different parts of a single ritual resistant in the hands of nonelites. Both views suggest under item. Kelly demonstrates that production of ritual items at lying themes of conflict and coercion. Cahokia was probably similar; for example, marine shell 7. Brown states that there were people at Cahokia "who beads appear to have been manufactured in stages at multiple set and controlled the agenda" but that "their authority locations, with different groups presumably undertaking the derived from structural power, not from domination" different stages. Welch also writes of the Osage, "Because (2006:210). Structural power is defined (afterWolf 1990, most of the priesthoods were restricted to specific clans or 1999) as the power to "set the agenda." This distinction subclans and many of the ceremonies required participation between structural power and hierarchical power is not clear of all the priesthoods, the religious life of the community to me, since in my view hierarchy does not necessarily could not be dominated by any single lineage or clan" involve domination. Brown cites Goldstein: "That the people (2006:221). Thus, it seems reasonable to suggest that cere or group represented inMound 72 have status in the commu monies and rituals at Cahokia were not restricted to a partic nity is not under question?they would not have access to ular kin group (cf. Kelly [1994], who posits the "retirement" these rituals and to this place otherwise" (2003:88, citing of lineages). The fact thatmany rituals were shared by differ Goldstein 2000:203). Thus Brown like Goldstein does not ent groups of Native Americans, albeit in varying forms, is deny the existence of status and authority at Cahokia. His further evidence that ritual knowledge was not necessarily point is that the remains in Mound 72 are not mortuary restricted to particular kin groups. remains reflecting the status in life or "power" of the individ 11. Geertz (1980) does not seem to be any more interested uals buried there; instead, the remains are evidence of ritual in the collapse of the theater state than he is interested in its that is essentially nonmortuary. Elsewhere Brown refers to origins. However, he writes that the king ensured the pros "chiefly power" at Cahokia (Brown and Kelly 2000:484), perity of his realm: "the productiveness of its land; the fertil which would imply that therewere chiefs at Cahokia. This is ity of its women; the health of its inhabitants; its freedom in contrast with Byers (2006), who apparently sees no hierar from droughts, earthquakes, floods, weevils, or volcanic chy and no chiefs at Cahokia. eruption" (1980:129). Surely a king who was unable tomain 8. Kehoe (1998) suggests thatCahokia was the capital of tain prosperity would potentially face an early curtain call. a state, and she includes it along with Tiwanaku, Teotihuac?n, There can be little doubt thatCahokia faced environmen Tikal, Rome, Versailles, Beijing, Constantinople, and tal problems. For example, Ollendorf (1993) provides evi Chichen Itz? as examples of "awesomely grand central dence of drought in theAmerican Bottom around A.D. 1200. places, in-your-face centralized authority" (2002:266). Lopinot and Woods (1993) provide evidence that the flood 9. We might also see in this hesitancy a degree of ethno plain around Cahokia was ultimately deforested; this would centrism, the lingering traces of nineteenth-century have resulted in erosion, as well as made obtaining wood for Moundbuilder Myths that held thatNative Americans were construction and fuel difficult. Dalan et al. (2003) suggest not capable of building mounds, much less states of any kind that alterations of the regional hydrology (through deforesta (Pauketat 2004, 2007). tion, erosion, etc.) led to crop failures. Growing maize (which 10. Knight suggests thatMississippian "esoteric knowl is nitrogen depleting) without beans (which are nitrogen fix edge and ritual manipulation" were passed down within clan ing) would have also resulted in declining yields; further based or lineage-based cults (1986:680); similarly, Trocolli more, a diet dominated by maize without beans is deficient in (2002) suggests thatMississippian leadership positions were protein. The deer herd probably also declined due to the num restricted to particular lineages. Among Siouan groups, ritual ber of hunters living in the American Bottom during the was knowledge purchased and sold (e.g., see Hall 1997). This Mississippian period (e.g., see Holt 1996; Kelly 1997). transference ordinarily occurred within kin groups; for exam Although Pauketat argues that environmental problems ple, Bailey (1995) notes that therewere tribal priesthoods and alone would have been insufficient to cause the collapse of clan priesthoods among theOsage. Clan priesthoods initiated Cahokia, he does suggest that "a great earthquake centered in new priests from within the clan, whereas "any man, regard New Madrid, Missouri, of the sort that rocked the mid less of clan or moiety affiliation," could be invited for initia continent in 1811-12" would have been an event "sufficient a . . . tion into tribal priesthood (Bailey 1995:53). The very fact to throw the legitimating ideology of the ruling elite into

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doubt" (2004:152). Pauketat cites Woods (2001), who Thus, Cahokia may have ended as well as started with a believes that evidence of slumping inMonks Mound indi Big Bang. Beyond Cahokia, I would point out that the area cates that a significant earthquake hit Cahokia in the late thir affected by the 1811-1812 earthquakes is also consistent with teenth century. At sites farther south, geologists and the Vacant Quarter (e.g., compare Cobb and Butler archaeologists have compiled overwhelming evidence that an 2002:Figure 1 with the map in Kerr 1981). Anyone who earthquake or series of earthquakes comparable to those of denies that environmental change can stimulate cultural 1811-1812 occurred in theNew Madrid zone at A.D. 1450 ? change might note that some governments are taking action 150 (e.g., Tuttle et al. 2002). The earthquakes of 1811-1812 now to mitigate possible impacts of global warming in the were powerful enough to reverse the course of theMississippi future. Those who remain skeptical about the impact of the River, sink some areas of land while raising others, and flat environment on culture might wait and see what changes take ten forests (Penick 1981). Between flooding and earth move place in the future in those societies currently ignoring evi ment, such violent events probably would have devastated dence of global warming. Mississippian agricultural systems and especially following a period of other environmental problems, would have been Received November 1, 2006; Revised December 21, 2007, dramatic enough to shake anyone's faith. April 14, 2008; Accepted August 25, 2008.

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