BGuthrie Photos: TN -- Shiloh Natl Military Park -- Indian Mounds

TN -- Shiloh Natl Military Park -- Indian Mounds:

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[1] SHILOM_130302_02_STITCH.JPG

[2] SHILOM_130302_06.JPG	[3] SHILOM_130302_08.JPG	[4] SHILOM_130302_12.JPG
[5] SHILOM_130302_20.JPG	[6] SHILOM_130302_24.JPG	[7] SHILOM_130302_26.JPG
[8] SHILOM_130302_33.JPG	[9] SHILOM_130302_37.JPG	[10] SHILOM_130302_41.JPG
[11] SHILOM_130302_44.JPG	[12] SHILOM_130302_47.JPG

[13] SHILOM_130527_001_STITCH.JPG

[14] SHILOM_130527_002.JPG	[15] SHILOM_130527_004.JPG	[16] SHILOM_130527_007.JPG
[17] SHILOM_130527_010.JPG	[18] SHILOM_130527_014.JPG	[19] SHILOM_130527_019.JPG
[20] SHILOM_130527_025.JPG	[21] SHILOM_130527_029.JPG	[22] SHILOM_130527_030.JPG
[23] SHILOM_130527_035.JPG	[24] SHILOM_130527_038.JPG	[25] SHILOM_130527_046.JPG
[26] SHILOM_130527_053.JPG	[27] SHILOM_130527_055.JPG	[28] SHILOM_130527_059.JPG
[29] SHILOM_130527_064.JPG	[30] SHILOM_130527_068.JPG	[31] SHILOM_130527_072.JPG
[32] SHILOM_130527_075.JPG	[33] SHILOM_130527_083.JPG	[34] SHILOM_130527_085.JPG
[35] SHILOM_130527_088.JPG	[36] SHILOM_130527_091.JPG	[37] SHILOM_130527_094.JPG
[38] SHILOM_130527_097.JPG	[39] SHILOM_130527_102.JPG	[40] SHILOM_130527_103.JPG
[41] SHILOM_130527_107.JPG	[42] SHILOM_130527_109.JPG	[43] SHILOM_130527_111.JPG
[44] SHILOM_130527_115.JPG	[45] SHILOM_130527_118.JPG	[46] SHILOM_130527_121.JPG
[47] SHILOM_130527_124.JPG	[48] SHILOM_130527_126.JPG	[49] SHILOM_130527_129.JPG
[50] SHILOM_130527_131.JPG	[51] SHILOM_130527_138.JPG	[52] SHILOM_130527_143.JPG
[53] SHILOM_130527_147.JPG	[54] SHILOM_130527_151.JPG

Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. SHILOM_130302_06.JPG: Indian mounds
2. SHILOM_130527_007.JPG: Shiloh Indian Mounds: You are entering the largest surviving prehistoric site in the Tennessee River Valley and one of the least disturbed areas of earthen mounds in the eastern United States. Early European settlers were familiar with the site. After the Civil War Battle of Shiloh, members of the 28th Illinois Infantry buried their fallen comrades in the westernmost platform mound. Their bodies were later reinterred in the National Cemetery. Thanks to its early inclusion in the military park, the site of this ancient town was never plowed. Spend some time looking at the exhibits in the shelter and take the 1.1-mile (1.8-km) interpretive loop trail through the grounds and back to the parking lot.
3. SHILOM_130527_010.JPG: Mississippian Indians: The Mississippians -- the ancient people who lived here -- were unlike their ancestors in several ways. Instead of being nomadic hunter-gatherers, they were farmers who devised an agricultural lifestyle based on corn. They settled in towns along the Mississippi, the Tennessee, and other southeastern riverways and traded goods with other American Indians in the eastern United States. Mississippians developed a leadership system of hereditary chiefdoms and built mounds for governmental buildings, temples, and notable burials. At various times leaders may have come from different, opposing clans within the community. Though the Mississippian era lasted from about the year 1000 to the early 1700s, it flourished here at Shiloh only from 1100 to 1300.
4. SHILOM_130527_014.JPG: Sifting the Evidence: Archaeologists are like detectives. They gather evidence, look for clues, and make educated assumptions. The people who lived here did not leave behind any written records. But they did leave earthen mounds, pieces of pottery, stone tools, bits of mica, and other artifacts. Archaeologists look at this evidence piece by piece and compare it with what has been found at other American Indian sites. Gradually, they develop the story of everyday life at Shiloh Indian Mounds -- a saga that continues to unfold as investigative techniques improve. Drawing Conclusions: Most of what we know about this ancient community comes from archaeological excavations in 1899, the 1930s, 1970s, and in recent years. Today, all archaeological research in the park is done in consultation with the Chickasaw Nation. The object is to get a maximum amount of information with the least amount of disturbance. Here are three examples of how archaeologists arrived at certain conclusions -- which, of course, can change with new evidence.
5. SHILOM_130527_025.JPG: A Temporary Wall: The low ridge you are about to cross is all that remains of an extensive wall that protected a small town located here from about 550 to 950 years ago. Life here was generally peaceful, but the townspeople must have felt threatened at some point and built this palisade. To build the wall, they placed wooden posts in the ground six to eight inches apart, lashed them together with slender branches, and covered branches with clay. The palisade deteriorated over a 10-to-20-year period. The residents apparently never felt the need to replace it.
6. SHILOM_130527_030.JPG: Signs of Dwellings: As you walk through the townsite, look for small earthen mounds similar to the one next to the wooden stake and the other mounds in front of you. These mounds are the remains of wattle-and-daub houses in which most of the town's inhabitants lived. Constantly Building Houses: Houses lasted only about five to ten years, so dwellings were constantly being built (as shown above). Residents placed wooden posts in the ground at four-foot intervals, bent the tops toward the center, and tied them together. They covered the roof with cane thatching or slabs of bark and wind-proofed the split-cane walls with a thin layer of clay.
7. SHILOM_130527_035.JPG: Borrow Pits: The depressions or wet-weather ponds in front of you are holes where residents dug up clay to built their wattle-and-daub houses. Here and in the nearby ravines they also "borrowed" soil to construct the large mounds you will see farther along the trail. They loosened the soil with pointed sticks or hoes, scooped up the dirt, and built the mounds basketful by basketful -- a laborious process.
8. SHILOM_130527_064.JPG: The Center of Town: You are entering the heart of this town -- a fairly level plaza stretching from here to the edge of the river bluff. The large mounds you see here served on elevated platforms for civic buildings, temples, and homes of prominent leaders. Between 1100 and 1300, this town was one of the largest and most impressive communities along the entire river. Several hundred people lived here, and others came here regularly from villages and hamlets up and down the riverway, just as people might drive to Nashville or Memphis today. Higher Ups: The Mississippean culture, like many others around the world, associated leadership and power with high elevations. In ancient Greece, temples and civic buildings were located on the acropolis, the uppermost part of the city. At Teotihuacan, in Mexico, temples were placed on high pyramids. And in Washington DC, the US Capitol sits on a hill.
9. SHILOM_130527_075.JPG: Signs of Prestige: Besides elevation, a person's social status may have been related to whether he or she lived near the center of town. A prominent family, for example, must have lived here (small house mound before the road), because their house was next to one of the large platform mounds. Small pieces of mica were found in the collapsed debris of the house. Mica, a valuable mineral used to make ornaments or pigments, comes from the southern Appalachians over 100 miles away. Flint drill bits and sandstone saw blades also were discovered here. Lower-class citizens would not have had such ornaments and tools -- or the time to make or use them.
10. SHILOM_130527_094.JPG: A Major River Town: The Tennessee River served as a major transportation artery linking this community with people from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. The chief not only ruled the river valley for 10 miles in both directions but had alliances and traded goods with people in such distant places as Cahokia, near today's St. Louis. Using dugout canoes, the people fished the riverway and raised crops on the bottomlands along the river. They exchanged food, clothing, and gifts with friends and relatives in Savannah and other nearby communities. They imported chert, or flint, hoe blades from Alabama, copper ornaments from the Great lakes region, mica and greenstone from the southern Appalachian, and coquina stone from Florida.
11. SHILOM_130527_103.JPG: A Vibrant Community: Topped off with a temple, a chief's residence, or a town hall, this mound served as the social and ceremonial focus of the community. The summit offered an unparalleled view of religious ceremonies, dances, games, and everyday activities on the plaza. The whole community, plus residents from nearby villages, gathered to celebrate the harvesting of the year's corn crop -- the beginning of a new year -- with feasting, rituals, and dancing. Crowds watched and bet on teams competing at games of chunkey and stickball. And on other days, townspeople went to the plaza to catch up on the news, to see what was happening, and to be seen. Stickball: Residents of Shiloh and neighboring towns competed in games of stickball, which was similar to lacrosse. The games were often rough and violent, resulting in serious injuries. Spectators wagered their clothing and valuables, sometimes everything they owned.
12. SHILOM_130527_124.JPG: Surviving the Winter: During the cold winter months, families lived mostly on corn, plus some dried fish and fresh meat. The women raised the corn, along with squash and sunflowers, in gardens near their homes and on the bottomlands along the river. Men hunted deer, raccoons, and turkeys in the fall and winter and devoted the warmer months to catching fish and gathering shellfish. Women used the animal hides to make clothes for their families.
13. SHILOM_130527_138.JPG: Maternal Clusters: You are standing at the edge of a cluster of small dwellings. Families lived near each other -- parents with young children, grandparents next door, and aunts and uncles nearby. Clan members were related through their female line; males and females belongs to the kin group of their mothers. Upon marriage, the groom built a house near his bride's maternal relatives. Men held the prominent public leadership posts, but homelife revolved around the women.
14. SHILOM_130527_143.JPG: Leaving Home: The residents abandoned this site about 600 years ago. Why? No one knows for sure. There is no evidence they left abruptly or were forced out by enemies. Some houses were burned, but the people cleaned out their possessions beforehand, so the fires were probably planned. Possibly, families gradually abandoned this site as the soils became depleted from years and years of raising corn. Where Did They Go? The evidence is sketchy. Small groups may have gone in various directions and joined existing towns or created new settlements. Some of them may have moved upriver near present-day Florence, Alabama -- but those villages were subsequently abandoned, about 500 years ago. By that time, ancestors of the Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Cherokee had settled in the region. Some descendants of the people who lived here may have joined the Chickasaw, who lived the closest to this site.
15. SHILOM_130527_147.JPG: Crossing the Palisade: You are about to again cross the line of the palisade marking the western edge of the Shiloh Indian Mounds community. The path continues on to the parking area. Please be careful and watch for vehicles as you cross the road and return to the 21st century.
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