spiro mound artifacts

Probably, most of these valuable objects are lost, but some have been returned through donation and have been documented by scholars. If you liked this story, sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter called "The Essential List". THE SPIRO MOUNDS DIG. Spiro's bounty is now spread among more than 65 museums across the US, Europe and Asia, and researchers are still discovering additional galleries and people possessing its riches. An earspool is a circular object that adorns extended ear holes, much like a modern day earring, and is decorated with different designs. Anthropologists have tried in recent years to interpret the meaning of the ritual artifacts and artistic imagery found at Spiro and other Mississippian sites. "These pieces are sacred," he said. Spirometry, from the Latin spiro "to breathe" and the Greek metron "measure" is one of the oldest and most commonly ordered tests of pulmonary function. $20. It is believed that this site was the seat of regional politics during this period as it maintained a close trading relationship with Cahokia and the other mound sites in the Cumberland Valley. al. The mounds barely rate a mention in textbooks, he said, while noting that some years, nearly half his students have Native American heritage. "The Spiros were family with us," said Chase Earles, a Caddo artist from Ada, Oklahoma, whose contemporary pottery and historical illustrations are included in the new exhibit. The interpretive centre itself feels like a time warp, where a nearly 40-year-old introductory slide is shown by request. Large bifaces from Craig Mound, Spiro Mound site. cutout copper sheet human head effigy with repousse designs. Even so, the men kept digging illegally, and in August 1935 with three months left on their lease, they broke into the burial chamber and proceeded to plunder it. Visitors to Spiro Mounds might not immediately sense the importance of the site (Credit: Larry Bleiberg). It is the site of the first human skeleton in Oklahoma. Sign up for our newsletter and enter to win the second edition of our book. pictured in Figure 23. spiromound-0023- Figure 23: Read about our approach to external linking. In economic terms, Spiro seems to have been a gateway town that funneled valuable resources from the Great Plains and other western regions to the main Mississippian ceremonial centers farther east. Founded around AD 1050, this site is divided into five separate phases: Lohmann (AD 10501100), Stirling (AD 10001200), Moorehead (AD 12001275), Sand Prairie (AD 12751350), and Oneta (AD 13501650). This profile was part of a cache that included These were sold to Mr. Cooperrider of On the long list of Oklahoma's historical gems, the Spiro Mounds Archaeological Center in Spiro has earned its place near the top. The economic basis for most of the Mississippian centers was the harvesting of flora (plants) and fauna (animals). In . incredible cache of around 3,000 arrowheads. The artefacts they discovered were immediately sold around the globe. Image credit: Pete Bostrom. cover of the Prehistoric American Volume XXXVII Funded by the Works Progress Administration (WPA), archaeologists from the University of Oklahoma excavated parts of the site between 1936 and 1941. The heart of the site is a group of nine mounds surrounding an oval plaza. Dr. Robert E. Bell said the cache would fit in his "There would have been thousands of people here every day for trade, but also just to be here because this was the elite area. It has been depicted with a beaked face on unearthed artifacts from Cahokia to Georgia. The concept of an axis mundi the point where different cosmic domains converge is found in many cultures around the world. Spiro Mounds Archaeological Center This piece is now at the Ohio Artifacts from the Craig Mound at Spiro, Oklahoma. ", U.S. National Register of Historic Places, Mississippian Ideological Interaction Sphere, Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, Wichita and Affiliated Tribes (Wichita, Keechi, Waco and Tawakonie), "National Register Properties in Oklahoma", Caddo Fundamentals: Spiro and the Arkansas Basin., "Spiro Mounds-A Ceremonial Center of the Southern Cult", "Caddo Fundamentals: Spiro and the Arkansas Basin. [4] The cultivation of maize during this period allowed accumulation of crop surpluses and the gathering of more dense populations. During this period, known as the Mississippian period, Spiro leaders were developing political, religious, and economic ties with people from the Gulf of California to the Gulf of Mexico and from the coast of Virginia to the Great Lakes. It is also shown in This artifact was recovered from This photograph shows the And on a June afternoon, as birds chirp in the nearby woods and a hawk glides silently above, a visitor can walk across a once-great city and, perhaps, just for a moment, catch a glimpse of its glorious past. [15], Most authorities agree that the people of Spiro were Caddoan speaking, but their descendants in historic times are difficult to identify. Historical Society, the result of an exchange with Robert Bell Typically, the history of the Spiro culture is divided into archaeological phases: Residential construction at Spiro decreased dramatically around 1250, and the people resettled in nearby villages, such as the Choates-Holt Site to the north. Mar 16, 2022 3 4. On top of each mound sat various public and religious structures as well as the chiefly residence. They are shown sitting on . Temple Mound, Spiro, 1936, showing the ragged destruction by the looters. Scholars have determined that Battle Mound, lying along the Great Bend of the Red River in southwest Arkansas, was a larger site than Spiro. Bronze statue marks the spinach capital of the world. [8] When the commercial excavators finished, they dynamited the burial chamber and sold the commercially valuable artifacts, made of stone, pottery, copper, and conch shell, to collectors in the United States and overseas. Permanent settlement at Spiro lasted from the year 800 until 1450, when the population suddenly declined and dispersed. The story behind the artefacts is just as compelling. who owned a tract that included Craig Mound. The largest Mississippian ceremonial center known today is Cahokia. Living on the western edge of the Mississippian world, the Caddoan may have faced fewer military threats from their neighbors. Spiro Mounds people participated in what cultural anthropologists and archaeologists call the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (SECC), a network of ceremonial centers sharing the Mississippian culture and similar spiritual beliefs, cosmology, ritual practices, and cult objects. This photograph shows ten of the "I always heard a little bit about it, but we never really paid attention," said Wesley Cloud, a school track coach who grew up in the nearby town of Spiro, which gives the site its name. Spiro and the Arkansas Basin. Much of the Spiro culture is still a mystery, as well as the reasons for the decline and abandonment of the site. The longest blade in this Spiro's treasures include engraved conch shells from the Florida Keys, copper breastplates from the Great Lakes and beads from the Gulf of California. An artifact displayed a the Spiro Mounds exhibit. Among the artifacts found at the Spiro Mounds site in Spiro, Oklahoma was a group of earspools. This developing interest and enthusiasm in the Spiro site has been stimulated in various ways; by examination of artifacts in private collections or in museums, by an increasing reference to Spiro materials in the literature, and through recognition of Spiro as a grandiose example of the so-called "Southern Cult" complex. "This is something they can have pride in.". [4] As in other Mississippian-culture towns, the people built a number of large, complex earthworks. [6] The mound area was abandoned about 1450, but nearby communities persisted until 1600. These differences in food cultivation and mound construction often leave scholars defining this region, and site, as Caddoan and not specifically Mississippian. It came from the Spiro Mound or the Great Mound in LeFlore County, Oklahoma. Excellent condition. . Bell arranged the transaction and, for $100, the frame was Paired groups of mounds along the plazas edge were associated with specific clans, arranged according to social power and prestige. Historical Society. The looting of Spiro, exhibits explain, was driven by the desperation of the Great Depression. These materials included colored flint from New Mexico, copper from the Great Lakes, conch (or lightning whelk) shells from the Gulf Coast, and mica from the Carolinas. The modern languages in the Caddoan family include Caddo, Wichita, Kitsai, Pawnee, and Arikara languages. They shared horticulture, elaborate ceremonies, mound building, and an iconographic writing system with more than sixty different tribes. Without concern for scientific research, they exposed a hollow burial chamber inside the mound, a unique feature containing some of the most extraordinary pre-Columbian artifacts ever found in the United States. And in the destruction, one-third of the mounds were lost. Located in Le Flore County, Oklahoma, Spiro is one of North Americas most important, but little known, ancient cultural and religious centers. One believer transformed a local curiosity into proof of Vikings on the Great Plains. Although various groups of people camped on or near the Spiro area over the previous 8,000 years, the location did not become a permanent settlement until AD 800 and was used until about AD 1450. Artifacts . long. The following articles are featured: An Interpretation of the Place of Spiro in Southeastern Archaeology by James B. Griffin. Hours Witnesses say the air hissed as it escaped from a burial chamber that had been sealed for 500 years. The complex was a vast trading network that distributed exotic materials from all across North America that were used in the making of ritual objects. Corn, or maize, was the dominant crop, but other plants, whether grown or gathered, such as beans, squash, sump weed, acorns, and sunflowers, played an important role. [citation needed], Archaeologists found that one of the conch shell cups from Craig Mound had a black residue in the bottom. It tells of a people desperately trying to adapt to a changing climate that would ultimately destroy their society. The Spiro people probably were speakers of one of the many Caddoan languages. Harry T. Bell- Robert Bell's father, an artifact collector from Marion, Ohio. A nearly forgotten people who created one of the most highly-developed civilizations in the Americas. C. Townsend, Jr. purchased the Bell collection. Now an exhibition at The Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame brings this to life. During the 1930s commercial, and later academic, excavations revealed one of the greatest collections of artistic and utilitarian prehistoric American Indian artifacts in the United States. Spiro Mounds Archaeological Center is located on Lock & Dam Road, 4 1/2 miles north of Oklahoma Highway 9 in Spiro (Highway 9 is the Oklahoma extension of Interstate 540 in Fort Smith). We depend on ad revenue to craft and curate stories about the worlds hidden wonders. This plant-based diet was supplemented with large and small game, such as bison, deer, and rabbit, as well as fish. Explore the religious and ceremonial activities, farming and hunting practices and daily life of the Spiro people. [19] The Caddoan languages once had a broad geographic distribution, but many are now extinct. The Kansas City Star heralded the discovery of a "'King Tut' Tomb of the Arkansas Valley.". . Repousse male profile in copper with two earspools. Context & History WHEN SPIRO WAS FIRST SETTLED during the Evans Phase (900-1050), Toltec Mounds in central Arkansas was a prominent spiritual center, and early Spiro pottery resembles that found at Toltec Mounds and at Caddo sites along the Red River. The fact that the Great Mortuary at Spiro was built with cedar (or cedar elm) posts suggests that the burial chamber was meant to be a point of departure from one spiritual domain to another, as cedar was a sacred wood. Etowah is unique because it saw repeated instances of abandonment and repopulation. He acquired many fine Spiro artifacts, that eventually went to Earl Townsend. feather but that it is intended to show a sheet copper plume hair The hope was that the ceremonial burying of sacred property would return the city to its previous state, bringing back the steady rains and long growing seasons that had let Spiro flourish. This break can be identified by a small shadow in the Together it included about 3 million people from more than 60 tribes, speaking 30 different languages. Spiro Mounds was unearthed by a group of local men in the 1930s who looted it (Credit: Larry Bleiberg). But visitors to Spiro Mounds can be forgiven if they don't immediately sense the importance of the site, located off a quiet farm road that zig-zags by former cotton fields. Where Elvis Presley received his first Army buzz cut. Greg Perino named these points in 2001 from a small group that surfaced in a private collection and documented several years ago by Dr. Robert Bell. Spiro, located on the Arkansas River, sat at a natural passage between the east and west, and grew as a trade centre. One of the most important American Indian sites in the nation, the Spiro Mounds are world renowned because of the incredible amount of art and artifacts dug from the Craig Mound, the site's only burial mound. By AD 1375, archaeological investigations indicate that the region was consumed with warfare and the city sacked. Why the Spiro culture disappeared and why the site was abandoned remain a mystery, although the Caddoan language lived on with the modern Wichita, Kichai, Caddo, Pawnee, and Arikara, suggesting that the Spiro people broke off into smaller tribes. Spiro and other Mississippian towns clearly looked to the great city of Cahokia, in what now is southern Illinois, as a cultural model to be emulated. Cahokia was also the likely epicenter of an artistic tradition referred to as Braden. The Mississippian people (AD 8001650) were the largest and most complex society to develop in the eastern half of North America. camera bag (See Photograph 12). The compatriots pushed their way through the debris into a Native American mound, amazed by what they saw. [20] Wichita and Kitsai are both extinct. The picture was shown to Mr. Schwem who managed The exhibit just finished its run at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum, and moves to the Birmingham Museum of Art in Alabama in October 2021, before making its final stop the following March at the Dallas Museum of Art in Texas. Engraving of a Birdman found in Spiro Mound. Spiro Mounds had been unearthed by a group of local men who called themselves the Pocola Mining Company. While Cahokia declined, however, Spiro's importance was increasing greatly, thanks to its strategic location on the Arkansas River with easy access to both the Plains and the Woodlands. 2023 Atlas Obscura. The conditions in this hollow space were so favorable that objects made of perishable materials such as basketry, woven fabric of plant and animal fibers, lace, fur, and feathers were preserved inside it. Spiro has been the site of human activity for at least 8,000 years. When commercial excavators dug into Craig Mound in the 1930s, they found many beautifully crafted ritual artifacts, including stone effigy pipes, polished stone maces, finely made flint knives and arrow points, polished chunkey stones, copper effigy axes, Mississippian copper plates (Spiro plates), mica effigy cut outs, elaborately engraved conch shell ornaments, pearl bead necklaces, stone earspools, wood carvings inlaid with shell, and specially made mortuary pottery. Arrowheads are the most identifiable archaeological artifact in the world, the triangular tips of arrow shafts used for hunting and warfare. It would be smoky because everyone was burning fires. The Spiro mound collection in the Museum Burnett, Edwin Kenneth ; Clements, Forrest E. ; Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, 1945 These beliefs dictated all ritual activities and are depicted symbolically on various ceramics, stone statues, pipes, engraved shell gorgets, and copper plates, symbols seen throughout the exhibition on nearly every object. It is in present-day Georgia and sits on the banks of the Etowah River in Bartow County, just south of Cartersville. Since the original Spiro Mound amateur excavations resulted in the scattering of the contents into numerous private collections, the Heye Museum of the American Indian produced this publication to catalog the objects that were . The artifacts included works of fragile, perishable materials: textiles and feathers that had been uniquely preserved in the conditions of the closed chamber. Today, the Spiro Mounds site and artifacts are among Oklahoma's richest cultural resources. [16], Under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma and the Wichita and Affiliated Tribes (Wichita, Keechi, Waco and Tawakonie) are recognized by the U.S. Federal government, cultural anthropologists, and archaeologists as the cultural descendants of the builders of Spiro Mounds.[17]. Between 1933 and 1935, Craig Mound was excavated by a commercial enterprise that had bought the rights from local landowners to excavate and to keep or sell the artifacts they recovered. In addition, archaeologists have found more than twenty related village sites within five miles of the main town. Archaeologists have shown that Spiro had a large resident population until about 1250. Together it included about 3 million people from more than 60 . "The most distinctive feature of the site (Spiro Mound) was the saddle-shaped mound known as The Spiro Mound or the Great Temple Mound, (It has been renamed the Craig Mound---)." It also was not palisaded, as were the ceremonial centers of Cahokia, Moundville, and Etowah. Later, some of the artifacts sold by treasure hunters were returned to regional museums and the Caddo Nation, but many artifacts from the site have never been accounted for. Braden is a highly refined artistic style known for its representation of Morning Star and Earthmother as well as its depictions of plants, animals, and humans with references to body painting and tattooing. [10] Using these valued materials, Mississippian artists created exquisite works of art reflecting their cultural identity and their complex spiritual beliefs. An item that was dropped off at a western New York Goodwill site turns out to be an ancient artifact from eastern Oklahoma that . A.T. Wehrle from Lear Howell. This artifact was recovered from The Spiro Mound, reportedly by Bill Heydon Vandagriff, and purchased for $15.00 on the spot by Robert E. Bell for his father's collection. From a bend in the Arkansas River, the Spiro people led Mississippian culture over nearly two-thirds of what is now the United States. The archaeological site of Spiro is famous for a range of aritfacts including effigy pipes, engraved shell artifacts, embossed copper sheets, bead necklaces, and ear spools that were discovered in the "Great Mortuary" context. This region had easy access to salt and mineral springs, which made it a powerful trade zone. Spiro and the Art of the Mississippian Worldseeks to answer these questions and more in the first major museum exhibition on the Spiro Mounds of southeast Oklahoma. What If She Never Existed? It is located approximately 1,500 feet (460m) southeast of the plaza. When it rose once more, it was under the rulership of a new chiefdom. The exhibition also showcases contemporary Indigenous art pieces that explore the ideas of origin and connect the art and artistry of the Spiro people to their modern descendants. Ohio and later donated to the Ohio Historical Society. fathers collection. long narrow blades from the Wehrle Cache. A. The Oseberg ship is a particularly ornate Viking vessel made of oak, and it could be sailed or rowed. The Mississippian societies shared elaborate rituals, a pictographic writing system, and mounds built from earth around central plazas. It included what now is eastern Oklahoma, western Arkansas, northeastern Texas, and northwestern Louisiana. When looting threatened to destroy and disperse everything at the mounds, Oklahoma became one of the first states to preserve and scientifically research archaeological sites. [9] Other Mississippian centers also traded in these prized resources, but apparently, Spiro was the only trading center that acquired obsidian from Mexico. There may have been other pieces originally in the cache All rights reserved. Aside from the cultural importance of the . The goal of exhibition is to share the history of the Spiro culture from its humble beginnings to its rise as one of the premier cultural sites in all of North America. Nearly a century later, the incident remains the worst looting of an archaeological site in US history. Also, Spiro Mounds (34 LF 40) is major Northern Caddoan Mississippian archaeological site located in Eastern Oklahoma. There may have been a few additional A cavity created within the mound, approximately 10 feet (3.0m) high and 15 feet (4.6m) wide, allowed for almost perfect preservation of fragile artifacts made of wood, conch shell, and copper. The residents drifted off, their descendants joining today's Caddo Nation and the Wichita and Affiliated Tribes, whose territories once included parts of the US states of Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Kansas. this 13 1/8 inch flint lance has a maximum thickness at one The new scheme divides the SECC into five periods, or horizons, each defined by the appearance of new ritual objects and cultural motifs connected with new developments in politics and long-distance trade. "Resting Warrior", side view, effigy pipe of Missouri flint clay, Effigy pipe of figure smoking from a frog effigy pipe, Missouri flint clay, Effigy pipe of a man smoking a pipe, Missouri flint clay, 2 jasper and 1 Mill Creek chert ceremonial bifaces (from southern Illinois), Engraved whelk shell cup with raptor heads. This picture shows an 11 Tuesday through Saturday 9 a.m. to noon1 to 4 p.m. Blade and mace cache: Part 2. They were dug out of mound #72 at Cahokia mounds in Illinois. Mar . Author . Thus, the overall geographic area of the Mississippian world was subdivided into stylistic regions. Spiro's 12 mounds resemble little more than bumps on the landscape, most covered with trees and brush. figure in the cutout can be seen wearing such an earspool. The singular ruins of a mysterious lost city. The blade was broken in one place and B. On exhibit through May 14 at the National Cowboy Museum. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. Spiro Mound. The story of the long-forgotten Spiro settlement seems particularly timely. 918-962-2062 The vast majority of Mississippian mounds in other places are no more than 3 m (10 ft) high. The largest mound, Mound A, had a base of two acres and was approximately twenty feet high. Hamilton, Henry, Jean Tyree Hamilton, & Eleanor Chapman. Similar beings were the subject of myth in historic times among the Micmac, Huron, Kickapoo, Cherokee, Muscogee Creek, Caddo, and other Native American tribes, appearing in tribes of at least three major language families. This is the oldest piece of gold jewelry ever . A group of six local men hoped they could make money by selling Native American artefacts, and formed a company named after the nearby town of Pocola. This event was likely environmental and brought on by what is known today as a Little Ice Age. $300. The population rapidly diminished, the number of burials increased, and the large defensive walls were demolished. Spiro continued to be used as a ceremonial and mortuary center through 1450. the leaders at Spiro Mounds thrived. Offer subject to change without notice. (Permission Oklahoma Historical Society) . de Soto's forces also encountered numerous Caddo villages. remaining items from the Wehrle Cache shown in Figure 22. In return, it received valuable goods from those other centers. the local S.S. Kresges 5 & 10 store in Bells When Mound 3 at the site was excavated it yielded fourteen copper plates, deposited in the . E.K. Spiro Mound. and Robert Phelps of Marion, Ohio, arranged by Henry C. Shetrone, What was once a center of prehistoric power is now reduced to 12 earthen mounds. he was not a collector, he asked Bell to purchase the frame for 35.311731, -94.568431 It's one of the finest Viking artifacts ever discovered. 11k followers. Archeological studies have revealed that Mississippian culture extended from the Great Lakes to the Gulf Coast, along the Ohio River, and into both the lowland and mountain areas of the Southeast. The weather was warm but slightly overcast and threatening rain. in April 1935. Join more than three million BBC Travel fans by liking us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter and Instagram.

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