CCD   HISTORY 201 - History of United States 1

Native Americans from the Pre-Columbian Era to the Present

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Cahokia Mounds
At a time when Europe was plunged into the Dark Ages and crusaders fought holy wars to gain Jerusalem for the Church, a Native American culture thrived in what is now the Midwest and Southeast United States. These Native Americans are known today as the Mississippian Mound-builders.

The Mississippian Culture began around AD 900 and lasted until just after the coming of Hernando de Soto and his accompanying band of fortune hunters in the mid-16^th century. For more than half a millennium, the Mississippian people successfully cultivated vast agricultural settlements based on corn, squash and beans. However, the Mississippians were much more than prosperous farmers. They also developed a complex and highly organized culture based on a ritual and ceremony. The most notable Mississippian civil centers were Spiro Mounds in what is now eastern Oklahoma, Moundville in Alabama, Etowah Mounds in northern Georgia, and the largest and most elaborate center at Cahokia Mounds in present-day Collinsville, Illinois.

1. Adena Mounds 1000 B.C. - 700 A.D.

2. Hopewell Mounds 500B.C. - 700 A.D. - 

Hopewell Community Organization - book review

3 Mississippian Culture 700 A.D. - 1300 A.D

Urban Indians Before Columbus Mississippian Cultures - book reviews

Mound Builder Controversy

Mississippian Mound Builders offsite link to Mississippian art

4. Taíno: Ancient Voyagers of the Caribbean - museum exhibit from El Museo del Barrio

5. Southwest US - Northwest Mexico 

• Hohokam - centered in southern Arizona in the Salt and Gila River drainages 
  (later home to the Pima Alto & Tohono O'Odham people, believed by some 
  archaeologists to be the descendants of the Hohokam)
• Mogollon - centered in southwestern New Mexico & northern Sornora & Chihuahua 
  (believed by some anthropologists to be the ancestors of the modern-day Zuni & 
  other upper Rio Grande River Puebloan peoples)
• Anasazi - centered on the Four Corners area of Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, Colorado 
  (modern Puebloan peoples are considered by many anthropologists as the direct lineal 
  descendants of the Anasazi)

Agriculture in the west off site link

Anasazi, Hohokam, Mogollon off site links

6. California

7. Northwest Coast

9. Great Basin

Aztec Tanoan (Uto-Aztecan)

10. Algonquin

11. Siouan - Iroquoian - Caddoan

12. Gulf

A note about Socio-Political Organization 
how we use terms like band, tribe, chiefdom, state