Review by Choice Review
In eastern North America, the Mississippian complex emerges after 800 CE with the development of complex sociopolitical organization, dependence on agriculture, and the establishment of large nucleated communities in the flood plains of the major rivers. Several large villages were established in the Ohio River valley, including such well-known sites as Kincaid and Angel. Angel was excavated from 1939 on, but the lack of a fine-scale chronology limited what could be inferred. Hilgeman presents the first attempt to refine the sequence through an analysis of ceramic variation, tied to numerous carbon 14 dates. The result is a three-phase pottery sequence suggesting that settlement began after 1100 CE, with the most extensive utilization between 1325 and its abandonment at 1450. Hilgeman supplies descriptions of all the pottery styles identified, illustrated by splendid line drawings, and she provides an excellent example of the analysis of attributes for defining pottery types as well as drawing fine-scale chronological inferences from ceramic analysis. Her book, which fills a vexing gap in our understanding of the Mississippian Culture's development in the northern Midwest, will be especially useful for upper-division undergraduates, graduate students, and faculty interested in the later prehistory of North America. W. A. Longacre; University of Arizona
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
