War Paths, Peace Paths An Archaeology of Cooperation and Conflict in Native Eastern North America

by Dye, David

• ISBN13: 9780759107465
• ISBN10: 0759107467
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-02-16
• Publisher: AltaMira Press

Summary

Archaeologists, ethnohistorians, osteologists, and cultural anthropologists have only recently begun to seriously address the issue of Native American war and peace in the eastern United States. New methods for identifying prehistoric cooperation and conflict in the archaeological record are now helping to advance our knowledge of their existence and importance. Focusing on four major issues in prehistoric warfare studies - settlement patterns, skeletal trauma, weaponry, and iconography - David H. Dye presents a new interpretation of ancient war and peace east of the Mississippi. He considers evidence for raiding and more organized forms of warfare, accounts of native warfare witnessed by sixteenty-century Europeans, and the various causes of warfare, such as revenge, competition for resources, and ideology. War Paths. Peace Paths offers an innovative analysis of cooperation and conflict in the prehistoric eastern United States. Book jacket.

Author Biography

David H. Dye is associate professor of archaeology in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Memphis

Table of Contents

List of Figures	p. ix
Foreword	p. xi
Preface	p. xv
Acknowledgments	p. xix
Cooperation and Conflict in Native Eastern North America	p. 1
Archaeology and the Study of Violence and Cooperation	p. 19
Sidebar: The Origin of War: Is War Making Integral to Our Ancestry?	p. 31
Family-Level Foragers and the Resolution of Homicides	p. 35
Sidebar: Paleoindian Foragers and Pleistocene Extinctions	p. 36
Complex Hunter-Gatherers and the Origin of Feuding	p. 51
Sidebar: The Poverty Point Site and Complex Hunter-Gatherers	p. 60
The Rise of Agriculture and the Elaboration of Feuding	p. 69
Sidebar: Shamans: Warriors and Diplomats	p. 86
Cooperation and Conflict in Late Woodland Societies	p. 89
Sidebar: Hilltop Enclosures: Ritual or Defense?	p. 91
Cooperation and Conflict in the Northeast	p. 105
Sidebar: Iroquois Ambassadors	p. 117
Cooperation and Conflict in the Upper Midwest	p. 125
Sidebar: Matrilocal Warriors	p. 134
Cooperation and Conflict in the Lower Midwest and Southeast	p. 141
Sidebar: Heroic Warriors	p. 152
The Paths of War and Peace in Eastern North America	p. 167
References Cited	p. 179
Index	p. 207
About the Author	p. 217
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