Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

8-2025

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

Anthropology

Major Professor

Kandace Hollenbach

Committee Members

Kandace Hollenbach, Jan Simek, Sally Horn, David Anderson

Abstract

Within the Middle Tennessee River Valley and throughout the Southeast the Late Archaic period (ca. 5,800 to 3,000 cal yr B.P.) was a time of change in resource procurement and cultural patterns. Horticulture was practiced in the region (Anderson and Sassaman 2012; Carmody 2014; Chapman and Watson 1993; Fritz 1997; Gremillion 1998, 2004; Hollenbach and Carmody 2019; Sassaman 1993; Scarry 2003; Yarnell 1993; Yarnell and Black 1985) and large accretional middens/shell mounds were formed from the remains of processed gastropods. These middens have been interpreted as both spoil piles (Marquardt and Watson 2005; May 2005; Milner and Jeffries 1998; Webb 1939, Webb and DeJarnette 1942, 1948a, 1948b, 1948c; 1948d; Webb and Wilder 1951) and as possible monumental architecture (Claassen 1996a, 1996b, 2010; Randall and Sassaman 2017; Russo 1994, 2004; Sassaman 2004). Some have interpreted the occupation of these sites as having been the result of long term semi-sedentary occupations (Lewis and Kneberg 1959; Milner 2004) while others suggest these sites are the result of cyclical occupations as part of a system of seasonal rounds (Dye 1980; Futato 1983a:417, 422). I propose that while being part of the latter, these sites are not simply seasonal occupations, but regional aggregation sites which provide a necessary point of interaction for exchange and mating networks, among other reasons. Their importance to communities transcends utilitarian function and reflects the importance of long-term tradition and corporate cohesion separate from, but likely influenced by, changing subsistence and technology.

By examining the diagnostic lithic artifacts and the chronology of the Late Archaic occupation of the Whitesburg Bridge site, contemporaneous site distribution in the surrounding area, and estimations of population density, I consider the development and evolution of monumentality in the Middle Tennessee River Valley. The goal of this effort is to understand the material culture left behind by the Late Archaic inhabitants, look to their efforts at extracurricular activities, consider their specific hunter-gatherer social dynamics, scrutinize their essentials for existence, and provide regional context and plausible explanations as to how the archaeological record they left came to be.

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