Further Reading
Title:
The Savannah River Chiefdoms: Political Change in the Late Prehistoric
Southeast
Author:
David G. Anderson
All information on this book taken from the
Southeast Archeological Center web site at:
http://www.cr.nps.gov/seac/chiefdom.htm
Description:
This volume explains how complex chiefdoms in the Late Prehistoric
Southeast emerge and collapse, and how this process, called cycling,
can be examined using archaeological, ethnohistoric, paleoclimatic,
paleosubsistence, and physical anthropological data.
Other Information:
The University of Alabama Press, Tuscaloosa, 480 pp., 1994.
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Title:
Political Structure and Change in the Prehistoric Southeastern
United States
Editor:
John F. Scarry
All information on this book taken from the
University Press of Florida web site at:
http://www.upf.com/arch_books.html#political
Description:
The great societies that flourished during the late precolumbian period
disappeared shortly after European contact, leaving a legacy across
the southeastern United States. Using archaeological discoveries and
historical documents, this book presents up-to-date information about
their political structures, offering new perspectives on "cycling"—the
growth, collapse, and reappearance of chiefdoms. It also illustrates
the value of studies of the Mississippian societies for addressing
general anthropological questions.
Review:
•This book is a must for those interested in the period—and
highly recommended for archaeologists who are not southeasterners.
--James A. Brown, Northwestern University
Other Information:
Ripley P. Bullen Series/Florida Museum of Natural History
University of Florida
304 pp. 42 figs. 1433-6
1996
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Title:
Coosa:The Rise and Fall of a Southeastern Mississippian Chiefdom
Author:
Marvin T. Smith
All information on this book taken from the
University Press of Florida web site at:
http://www.upf.com/Fall2000/smith.html
Description:
Writing about a powerful Native American society at the dawn of European
contact, Marvin Smith, in a colorfully illustrated book, traces the
rise and collapse of the chiefdom of Coosa, located in the Ridge and
Valley province of northwestern Georgia and adjacent states.
From humble beginnings, Coosa became one of the most
important chiefdoms in the Southeast, dominating a territory from
present eastern Tennessee to central Alabama. Following contact with
three Spanish expeditions in the 16th century, Coosa began its rapid
descent. Disease, population movements, political collapse, and changes
in subsistence and technology enveloped the population in the ensuing
years. By the beginning of the 18th century, the once powerful chiefdom
had been reduced to a few towns in the Creek Confederacy.
Explaining for the first time this remarkable demise,
Smith blends historical and archaeological evidence to tell the complex
story. Written for a general interest audience, it also will be a
valuable reference work for the study of the material culture of the
contact period.
About the Author:
Marvin T. Smith is professor of anthropology at Valdosta State
University in Georgia. He is the author of more than 70 scholarly
publications, including The Archaeology of Aboriginal Culture Change
in the Interior Southeast: Depopulation during the Early Historic
Period (UPF, 1992). In 1992 he received the C. B. Moore Award
for Excellence presented by the Lower Mississippi Survey at the annual
meeting of the Southeastern Archaeological Conference.
Reviews:
•A masterful integration of archaeological and historical information.
--George R. Milner, Pennsylvania State University
•A convincing account of where these people came
from, and what happened to them in the shadowy years after their fateful
encounter with De Soto’s Spanish army.
--Vernon J. Knight, University of Alabama
Other Information:
2000. 176pp. 6 X 9
25 b&w illustrations, 8 color photos, bibliography, index.
0-8130-1811-0
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Title:
The View from Madisonville: Protohistoric Western Fort Ancient
Interaction Patterns
Author:
Penelope Ballard Drooker
All information on this book taken from the
University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology web site at:
http://www.umma.lsa.umich.edu/Pub/main/list/mem.htm#anchor92218
Description:
Madisonville was one of the key settlements of the Ohio Valley Fort
Ancient people, and the subject of James Griffin's 1943 classic, The
Fort Ancient Aspect, is a site rich in burials and artifacts documenting
the earliest European influences. Drooker reexplores a century of
excavation to explain how Contact Period events affected Madisonville
inhabitants and their links to eastern Ft. Ancient, northern Ohio,
Iroquoian, Oneota, and Mississipian groups.
Other Information:
1997. 378 pp
ISBN 0-915703-42-4]
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Title:
The Caddo Nation: Archaeological and Ethnohistoric Perspectives
Author:
Timothy K. Perttula
Foreword by Thomas R. Hester
All information on this book taken from the
University of Texas Press web site at:
http://www.utexas.edu/utpress/books/percad.html
Description:
First published in 1992 and now updated with a new preface by the
author and a foreword by Thomas R. Hester, The Caddo Nation
investigates the early contacts between the Caddoan peoples of the
present-day Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Arkansas region and Europeans,
including the Spanish, French, and some Euro-Americans.
Perttula's study explores Caddoan cultural change from
the perspectives of both archaeological data and historical, ethnographic,
and archival records. The work focuses on changes from A.D. 1520 to
ca. A.D. 1800 and challenges many long-standing assumptions about
the nature of these changes.
About the Author:
Timothy K. Perttula is a consulting archaeologist living in
Austin, Texas.
Reviews:
•A welcome addition to the sparse literature on this important
Native American society.
--American Antiquity
•Perttula's book is an essential reference for
the specialist in Caddo culture and Caddo archaeology (the comprehensive
bibliography alone is worth the price of the book). It offers much
to a wider audience, however. Anyone who has ever studied the impacts
of European/Native American contacts and the decline of native societies
will welcome this as an excellent case study that succeeds in bridging
the gap between historic documents and archaeological data. . . .
It should eventually find its way into the classroom as a text, not
only for the study of the Caddo, but for the study of European impacts
on native people in general.
--Heritage
Other Information:
1992
6 1/6 x 9 1/4 in., 352 pp.,
14 figures, 18 maps, 27 tables
ISBN 0-292-76574-6
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Title:
The Caddo Indians: Tribes at the Convergence of Empires, 1542–1854
Author:
F. Todd Smith
All information on this book taken from the
Texas A&M University Press web site at:
http://www.tamu.edu/upress/BOOKS/1995/smithft.htm
Description:
In 1542 members of the thriving Caddo Indian culture came face to
face with Spanish explorer Luis de Moscoso and his party. From then
on, their history was heavily influenced by interaction with the adventurous
emigrants from various European empires.
This work is the first to focus intensively on the Caddos
of the Texas-Louisiana border area and to include all three of the
Caddo confederacies—Kadohadacho, Hasinai, and Natchitoches. Primarily
from the perspective of the Caddos themselves, it traces their relations
with each successive claimant of their land.
Caught between Euro-American nations, the Caddos consolidated
the confederacies and eventually sacrificed their independence and
much of their culture to gain the benefits offered by the invaders.
Falling victim to swindlers, they lost their remaining lands and were
moved to a reservation.
This new view of the Caddos offers insight into European
and American dealings with native peoples and how even the most sophisticated
tribes' efforts to cope successfully with the new order of their world
were futile.
About the Author:
F. Todd Smith's articles on Caddo history include two prize-winning
studies. He earned his doctorate from Tulane University and is now
assistant professor of history at Xavier University of Louisiana.
Reviews:
•. . . exquisitely researched and written . . . All told, this
is a choice reference.
--East Texas Historical Journal
•. . . a succinct chronological account of the
Caddo Indians. . . . He ably details the Caddo decline from a power
position, and the maps he provides are a definite bonus. Readers of
The Caddo Indians will be rewarded with a new understanding of the
contest for control of the Texas-Louisiana borderlands and of the
Caddo people who lived there first.
--Journal of American History
Other Information:
Number Fifty-six: Centennial Series of the Association of Former Students,
Texas A&M University
ISBN 0-89096-981-7
LC 94-41590. 6x9. 240 pp. 6 maps. Bib. Index.
American History. Native American Studies. Multicultural Topics. Southern
History.
Publication Date: April 1995.
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