While Caddo Indians flourished in northwestern Louisiana, those in the
rest of the state by approximately A.D. 1000 had a slightly different
way of life. Many of the latter were part of the Plaquemine Culture, who
like the Caddo, were descendants of Troyville-Coles Creek Indians. In
keeping with the patterns established by their ancestors, Plaquemine
people built large ceremonial centers with two or more large mounds
facing an open plaza. The flat-topped, pyramidal mounds were constructed
in several stages, and eventually measured more than 100 feet on a side
and 10 feet high. Sometimes they were topped by one or two smaller
mounds.
[Illustration: Medora Site]
The Plaquemine Culture was so named because the Medora Site, typical of
the period, is near Plaquemine, Louisiana, in West Baton Rouge Parish.
The site had two mounds approximately 400 feet apart with a plaza in
between. One was a flat-topped pyramid 125 feet on a side 13 feet high
with a small domed mound three feet high and 25 feet in diameter on top.
The other one was two feet high and 100 feet in diameter. Eighteen
thousand pieces of broken pottery were found at Medora, along with a few
stone tools.
Plaquemine Indians often built the mounds on top of the ruins of a house
or temple, and constructed similar buildings on top of the mound. In
earlier times, buildings were usually circular, but later they were
likely to be rectangular. They were constructed with wattle and daub,
and sometimes with wall posts sunk into foot-deep wall trenches.
At times, the Indians dug shallow, oval or rectangular graves in the
mounds. These might be for primary burials of individuals, but more
frequently they were for the reburial of remains originally interred
elsewhere. Some graves contained only skulls, and one of these had 66
skulls. Burial offerings included pottery, pipes, stone points, and axes
made of ground stone.
One type of pottery occasionally placed in the graves is called “killed”
pottery. This type has a hole in the base of the vessel that was cut
while the pot was being made, usually before it was fired. The
Plaquemine Indians also decorated their pots in other characteristic
ways. They sometimes added small solid handles called lugs, and textured
the surface by brushing clumps of grass over the vessel before it was
fired. They often cut designs into the surface of the wet clay, and like
their Caddo contemporaries, the Plaquemine Indians engraved designs on
pots after they were fired. Plaquemine Indians also had undecorated pots
which they used for ordinary daily tasks.
[Illustration: (⅓ actual size)]
Not surprisingly, the ordinary people lived much as the average Caddo
Indians. They participated in festivals and ceremonies at the mound
centers, but spent most of their time with families and neighbors
collecting and producing food, or participating in village activities.
During the early part of the period some hunters still used atlatls, but
soon bows and arrows predominated. The Indians hunted deer, bear,
rabbit, squirrel, raccoon, turkey and duck; fished for gar and drum; and
collected mussels. Although the Plaquemine Indians tended gardens of
corn, squash, pumpkins and beans, they still collected many wild seeds,
roots, nuts and fruits.
At approximately the same time as Caddo and Plaquemine Indians were
living in Louisiana, Mississippian Culture people in the St. Louis area
had developed the largest prehistoric center in the United States. This
was a ceremonial, residential, and trading center with a population of
35,000-40,000 people. The Mississippian Culture spread throughout the
southeastern United States, and was characterized by huge earthen temple
mounds, widespread trading networks, and a ceremonial complex
represented by elaborately shaped pottery and stone, bone, shell and
copper objects.
[Illustration: Plaquemine: a. Clay Pipe; b, Stone Gaming Piece; c,
Stone Celt; d-g, Stone Points; h-j, Clay Ornaments (½ actual size)]
[Illustration: Mississippian: a, Vessel Rim Sherd; b, Effigy Vessel
(⅓ actual size)]
As far as we know, no major Mississippian centers developed in
Louisiana, although ones were established in Georgia at Etowah and in
Alabama at Moundville. There is evidence that sometime between A.D. 1000
and A.D. 1600 small groups of people from the eastern Mississippian
centers made their way to Louisiana. They came to the Avery Island area
to collect and refine salt, and to other parts of the state to search
for other materials. Perhaps through repeated contacts, a few groups of
Louisiana Indians learned classic Mississippian techniques of making
pottery and other ceremonial objects. Some Indians in the southeastern
and northeastern parts of Louisiana may even have established close ties
with their eastern neighbors and added Mississippian customs to the
Plaquemine Culture. Louisiana groups that may have descended from those
Mississippian groups are those who speak the Tunican, Chitimachan, and
Muskogean languages. Those who probably descended from Plaquemine
Culture Indians are the Taensa and Natchez.