Raised Walls and Broken Bones: An Analysis of Defensive Architecture and Violent Skeletal Trauma in Late Prehistoric Eastern North America

ABSTRACT\ud RAISED WALLS AND BROKEN BONES: AN ANALYSIS OF DEFENSIVE\ud ARCHITECTURE AND VIOLENT SKELETAL TRAUMA IN LATE\ud PREHISTORIC EASTERN NORTH AMERICA\ud by\ud Lance L. Blanchard\ud Master of Arts in Anthropology\ud California State University, Chico\ud Spring 2011\ud While the causes, practices, and effects of prehistoric warfare have long\ud been speculated on by archaeologists in eastern North America, only recently has our\ud understanding of prehistoric violence been informed by a close examination of the evidence.\ud An intensification of bioarchaeological research on violent conflict has taken\ud place in the last two decades, while studies relating to defensive architecture, weapons,\ud and iconography remain rare. This thesis represents an initial attempt to evaluate the\ud relationship between two of these lines of evidence, defensive architecture and violent\ud skeletal trauma. The results of this thesis also call into question many of the assumptions\ud that have driven previous interpretations of prehistoric warfare in eastern North\ud America.\ud Data on defensive architecture and violent skeletal trauma were compiled\ud and reassessed from previously published sources spanning the last century of archaeological\ud research in the Central and Lower Mississippi Valleys and the eastern Gulf\ud Coastal Plain. A total of 56 sites containing 8,586 individuals dating to either the Late\ud Woodland (A.D. 500-1000) or Mississippian (A.D. 1000-1500) periods were included\ud in this research. Frequencies of violent skeletal trauma were compared between a number\ud of variables relating to defensive architecture presence, chronology, geographical\ud location, site size, age and sex groups, and the availability of complete skeletal preservation\ud data.\ud A significant decrease in the overall frequency of violent skeletal trauma\ud was observed through time, questioning the assumption that the widespread construction\ud of defensive architecture across eastern North America at the onset of the Mississippian\ud period signaled an intensification of warfare. The prevalence of violent skeletal\ud trauma also decreased significantly with the presence of palisades, ditches, and platform\ud mounds. However, a similar pattern in the frequencies of the types of violent skeletal\ud trauma was observed between sites with and without defensive architecture, suggesting\ud that new warfare strategies were not required once sites were protected by defensive\ud architecture. This result, combined with the patterns of trauma observed between age\ud and sex groups suggests that small-scale raiding against small isolated work parties or\ud lone individuals was the primary strategy employed in Late Woodland and Mississippian\ud warfare. Finally, the high variability in the results seen between sub-regions indicates a need for further research to address the multitude of social, political, and environmental\ud factors affecting the patterns of prehistoric violent conflict.CSU, Chic