Cahokia - Emergent Mississippian I

  General Description   The Sponemann-Collinsville-Loyd Period at Cahokia (750-900 CE) is significant for being a foundational period for later social developments at Cahokia. At this time appears the first signs of warfare, an increase in social complexity and more widespread consumption of farmed crops like maize.
The increase in social complexity was reflected in settlements with houses clustered into court-yard groups. ^[1] While there is little evidence for warfare in the preceding Middle Woodland ^[1] from c800 CE there is evidence of inter-group violence as human bones have been recovered with arrow points embedded into them in individual and group burials. ^[1] Some settlements even gained palisades and ditches ^[1] , although at this time they were present at only a tiny fraction of all sites (0.5% between 800-950 CE ^[2] ). After 700-800 CE there was a dramatic intensification of food production, particularly of maize farming, which brought higher yields and enabled more food to be extracted from a smaller territory and would lead to population growth. ^{[1] [3] [4]}
The evidence suggests communities experienced increased differentiation of social roles, with individuals dedicated to "community defense, organization of labor, and communal storage of maize in secure central places". ^[1] The Upper Mississippi region was populated by a number of small communities. The population of largest settlement was probably in the region of 500 people - although this population was not resident at the site that later became Cahokia.

[1]: (Blitz and Porth 2013, 89-95) J H Blitz. E S Porth. 2013. Social complexity and the Bow in the Eastern Woodlands. Evolutionary Anthropology. 22:89-95. Wiley.

[2]: (Milner, Chaplin and Zavodny 2013) G R Milner. G Chaplin. E Zavodny. 2013. Conflict and Societal Change in Late Prehistoric Eastern North America. Evolutionary Anthropology. 22:96-102. Wiley.

[3]: (Iseminger 2010, 26) W R Iseminger. 2010. Cahokia Mounds: America’s First City. The History Press. Charleston.

[4]: (Milner 2006, xx) G R Milner. 2006. The Cahokia Chiefdom: The Archaeology of a Mississippian Society. University Press of Florida. Gainesville.