One Hundred Years of Archaeology at Gordontown: A Fortified Mississippian Town in Middle Tennessee (original) (raw)

2006, Southeastern Archaeology

Archaeological research on Mississippian culture in Tennessee’s Middle Cumberland region during recent years has provided a revised chronological sequence as well as new information about settlement shifts. Excavations at one fortified Mississippian town, Gordontown, and a reanalysis of past site investigations from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries indicate the site area included one platform mound, a substantial burial mound, and a sizable habitation zone enclosed by a palisade with bastions. Radiocarbon assays and ceramics conclusively date this site occupation to the Thruston regional period (A.D. 1250–1450). Mortuary and other analysis results reveal a dynamic, yet somewhat stressed, native population within the Middle Cumberland River Valley.

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