The Archaeology of Rockshelters on Fountain Creek, Maury County, Tennessee

The purpose of this study is to describe and compare 11 archaeological assemblages recovered from six rockshelters located along Fountain Creek, a major tributary of the Duck River in Middle Tennessee. A theoretical model of forager and hunter-gatherer subsistence-settlement organization provide a framework for the evaluation of the rockshelter assemblages. The analytical and comparative procedures indicate that (1) there are significant differences in the content of contemporaneous assemblages, and (2) there is a significant increase in assemblage variability and breadth of activities represented at the rockshelters through time. It is suggested that this patterning may reflect a gradual change in subsistence-settlement organization from more residentially mobile foraging systems to a more logistically oriented hunter-gatherer organization in the study area.