Mississippians Research Paper

Like the Oneida, the Cherokee men were the hunters and the women were the farmers. Although the women did most of the farming, the entire Cherokee community would come together to plant and harvest the big fields of corn, pumpkins, beans, gourds, and potatoes. The women would keep personal gardens outside their homes to have fast growing corn and other produce that they could quickly use to make a meal. The Cherokee were famous for the many dishes that they made with corn. They made breads, soups, used corn as a side dish, and used it in stew. Corn was a necessity in the Cherokee community.

|1500 CE |Early Woodland Period. Use of pottery and building of earth tombs emerges especially in the Mississippi |

The Mississippian Period divided into Middle and Upper Mississippian Traditions and was from AD 900-1600. The two Tradtions were delineated because of the climate and its affect on how people inhabited the land. The Middle Mississippian Traditions had communities that surrounded plaza areas or mounds. They ate maize, beans, and squash. They collected wild foliage, hunted small and large game, and fished. The Upper Mississippian Tradition had a more permanent lifestyle formed around lakes and ravines. They gardened, hunted and collected plants.

For farming they grew corn, beans, and squash. They used stones that they found around to grind up the corn. Another thing that they did was to tame wild turkeys. For fish they hunted salmon and marine. The salmon and the marine were smoked and dried and they were put together in large quantities for the winter. Porpise,fur,and harbor seals were eaten fresh and there skins were cured and used for whaling floats. Seal bblubber was rendered into oil which was a condiment on their food at every meal.

The chief organizes religious rituals and feast rituals relating to our spirituality. We focus on the religion of the earth, of nature, and the changing seasons. The woodhenges relate with the passage of the sun over the course of the year. Other spiritual aspects we are guided by include the four directions. We practice a spiral snake dance, and it is related to the changing seasons or solstices. The chief is the closest to the gods because he lives atop of the mounds in a temple, which is a testimony to his power over us as well as the respect we have for him as the most powerful and elite member of Cahokia. Separate from the elite, the rest of us live in wooden huts because we are not related to or as close to the

The Choctaw are the native American people originally from the modern day Mississippi, the Choctaw are descendants of the people of the Hopewell and Mississippi cultures, who lived throughout the east of the Mississippi river valley and its tributaries. About 1,700 years ago. The Choctaw coalesced as a people in the 17th Century., and developed three distinct political and geographical divisions eastern, western and southern . During the American revolution, most Choctaw supported the thirteen colonies bid for independence from the British crown. They never went to war against the untied sates prior to Indian removal. The Choctaw became known as the one of the five civilized tribes in the 19th century because they adopted numerous practices

Mississippians every day life was mostly spent outdoors. Their shelter was mostly used for protection from bad weather. They grew many crops for food. They ate lots of fruits and nuts. They also hunted. One of their main animals to catch was the

The Nation of Choctaw The Choctaws, Mississippi’s largest Indian group, traces its ancestry in the American Southeast to about 1,800 years ago. They migrated from Western-America and Mexico, eventually settling in the Mississippi River Valley Area. They were a great help to the United States Army by becoming the first Native American code talkers. They were forced to move to Oklahoma in the 1800s along the Trail of Tears. They brought with them traditions, belief, and way of life.

The Mississippians got their name because a bunch of their artifacts were found near the Mississippi river. They were the most advanced group, out of the other pre-contact groups. They were more advanced because they had better technology. Examples of their technology would be; advanced farming, a new way to fish, pottery, larger cities, and a new use for mounds.

o Mississippians were master maize farmers and lived in permanent settlements along the Mississippi flood plains.

As Indian groups started to settle in the Mississippi floodplain, their cultures and political systems began to intertwine, creating a complex sociopolitical structure (Page, 70). The largest polity to arise out of this area, known as the American Bottom, was Cahokia. At its height, it resembled a city, extending over five square miles, mounds and structures that towered over smaller dwellings, and a population, that some believe to have been the largest, north of Mexico, for its time (Page, 70). Estimates predict several thousand lived at the site of Cahokia, many of them elites, whose particular talents or skills, earned them the privileged title (Pauketat). Beyond its boundaries were smaller groups and

indians,the cahuilla and the mojave.these desert indians ate specific food and here are some things they ate,they ate corn, beans, cactus fruit, pumpkins, melon, nuts, rabbits, raccoons, and rattlesnakes too. Many tribes that have acorns around are lucky, because they could make acorn flour using acorns, water,seed beater,fire,toppings too!

A game that the indians liked to play was Slick ball. The indians in South Carolina was to eat was nuts and beery. They liked to hunt deer, and wild turkeys. They planted and grow

Family life was rather simple. Both in Mississippi and later in the West, the Choctaws were farmers whose villages were composed of log houses surrounded by cornfields. Men hunted, and women raised the crops, although men sometimes helped with clearing the fields. Each village had a chief who met with a council of elders and experienced men in a square at the center of the village. The younger men made up the hunters and warriors of the tribe. They defended their territory against the Chickasaw tribe in the north and from the Creeks on the east. Culturally, the Choctaws have always honored their women as the head of every family household. They were, and still are today, considered the care-takers of our children, our elders, and the home. As for the children, their job should have been just to go to school and get an education, and help around the house when needed. However, there was a lack of educational opportunity and poor health conditions. Few schools were open to Choctaw children, and most children were needed to work. The families worked primarily as sharecroppers, selling goods and livestock to the Europeans.

To begin with, the Cherokee tribe was one of the three primary Native American tribes in South Carolina that called themselves “the real people.” Upward in the mountains, they lived in these villages called “longhouses.” For the girls, their daily lives consisted of doing work in the field, planting and hoeing corn, then harvesting it. On the other hand, the boy’s daily lives consisted of being taught to fish and hunt. Their food was examples of fruits, nuts, corn, pole beans, squash, pumpkins, bottle gourds, and tobacco. Next, the Catawba tribe was another one of the three primary Native American tribes in South Carolina that called themselves the “river people. They used Carolina clay to make their pottery which they were known for. The Catawba dwellers lived in villages that had an open rounding on the top. The Catawbas were primarily farmers because every day they planted crops by the river, fished and hunted. Therefore, the Yemassee tribe was the third primary tribe in South Carolina that was from Spanish Florida. Throughout the summer, they lived on a beach, staying in Wigwams concealed in palmetto leaves. However, during the fall, winter, and spring they stayed in wattle and daub homes with a roof of leaves like the Cherokee. Every day they would eat clams which were part of their diet and equip the land for crops. Women were obligated for child rearing, making clothes, and served food and the men congregated the rest of the food in fishing and hunting.