Fig. 21. Canton ware pot (Tampico [subculture]) from Clear Lake village site in Tazewell County. Designs are formed with cord impressions. (From Schoenbeck collection in Illinois State Museum. Max. diam. at shoulder 18″.
Fig. 22. “Handled” pipe in form of raven with head projecting from rim, from Jersey Bluff [subculture]. After Titterington. Reduced about ½.
All these bespeak Middle Mississippian tendencies. A common conclusion, as mentioned previously, is that these features were borrowed from non-Woodland groups. The writer, however, gets the impression from his studies that the Middle [Mississippi] [phase] developed through the interplay of invention and adoption of improvements, modification and re-invention, between the Final [Woodland] subcultures in Illinois and adjacent territory. This does not mean that Illinois communities alone were responsible for the emergence of this phase but rather that they played an important dynamic role in its development. The Cahokia [subculture] of western and central Illinois probably constituted the native local tribe or nation.
Final [Woodland] [Archaeology]
Archaeologically these peoples are in the Final [Woodland] [phase] of [culture]. The [Final Phase] yields tobacco pipes and crude [flint] [arrowheads], its [chief] artifactual differences with the Initial phase. The clay of their pottery was generally mixed with grit or sand to prevent firing cracks in the vessel walls. The customary vertically-elongated pot with a conical or pointed bottom was accompanied by new forms—the globular or flattened globular with “round” (spherical) bases, the “coconut shell” cup or larger vessel, and shallow bowls. The flattened globular pots and the bowls were occasionally decorated with two or four knobs or with “raised points” on the rim, sometimes giving a squarish appearance to the mouth. In some instances these decorative projections were crudely modeled ears and snout which give the effect of animals’ heads facing out and foreshadowing the Middle [Mississippi] [effigy] shallow bowls. An important invention, the bow and arrow, appears in Illinois for the first time in this [period]. Judging by the crudity of the chipped flint arrowheads, these [people] were poor archers and preferred the spear and [spearthrower] in hunting and fighting. Pipes, like most [artifacts] except weapon heads, are rare. The “elbow” or L-shaped pipe is generally representative of the culture.
The six recognized Final [Woodland] subcultures with their diagnostic (though not very significant) traits are (1) [Effigy Mound] named for its distinguishing characteristic; (2) Tampico with pottery decorated with designs formed by cord-impressions, in northern Illinois; (3) [Stone] Vault with stone mounds containing walled tomb chambers; (4) Jersey Bluff with its unique “handled” tobacco pipes, in the west; (5) Raymond, best characterized by the generalized Woodland nature of its [artifacts]; and (6) Lewis with incised spiral designs on pottery, in southern Illinois.
A SECOND PLANT-RAISING [CIVILIZATION]—THE MIDDLE MISSISSIPPIANS (1000-1500 A.D.)
The Middle [Mississippi] [culture] seems to have arisen, as previously suggested, in the area where several important highways of aboriginal travel converged—the region surrounding the Ohio and Mississippi rivers from the mouth of the Wabash to the mouth of the Illinois. Whether or not its development was stimulated by the contracts of Muskhogeans and Algonkians or whether it was due to interplay between the cultures of the Final [Woodland] petty tribes is unknown.
Two slightly differing subcultures of the [Middle phase] appeared in the state. One, known archaeologically as the [Cumberland] (Tennessee-Cumberland), may have embraced at one time all the southern Illinois counties between the mouths of the Kaskaskia and the Wabash. [The Angel Site near Evansville, Indiana, may belong to the Cumberland [subculture].] The other subculture, which may be termed Cahokia, flourished in counties bordering on the [Mississippi] from Union County to Wisconsin. As the two periods show few significant cultural differences, they will, except as noted hereafter, be treated as a single unit.