Authority, Autonomy, and the Archaeology of a Mississippian Community

Erin Nelson's book examines the archaeological site of Parchman Place in the Yazoo Basin, shedding light on the Mississippian culture that spanned much of the United States Southeast and Midwest before the mid-sixteenth century. She argues that communities navigated tensions between authority and autonomy in their placemaking and daily lives, building mounds and other structures that re-created their views of the cosmos and expressing values of wholeness and balance.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 206 pages
Publication date: 06 August 2024
Publisher: University Press of Florida

A close look at a Mississippi archaeological site that sheds light on a major precolonial civilization This book is the first detailed investigation of the important archaeological site of Parchman Place in the Yazoo Basin, a defining area for understanding the Mississippian culture that spanned much of what is now the United States Southeast and Midwest before the mid-sixteenth century. Refining the widely accepted theory that this society was strongly hierarchical, Erin Nelson provides data that suggest communities navigated tensions between authority and autonomy in their placemaking and in their daily lives. Drawing on archaeological evidence from foodways, monumental and domestic architecture, and the organization of communal space at the site, Nelson argues that Mississippian people negotiated contradictory ideas about what it meant to belong to a community. For example, although they clearly had powerful leaders, communities built mounds and other structures in ways that re-created their views of the cosmos, expressing values of wholeness and balance. Nelson's findings shed light on the inner workings of Mississippian communities and other hierarchical societies of the period. A volume in the Florida Museum of Natural History: Ripley P. Bullen Series

Weight: 312g
Dimension: 228 x 151 x 15 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781683404347