From Mastodon Hunters to Mesquakie: Celebrating the Wild Tribes of
Iowa
Glacial Iowa
Paleoindian Cultures in Iowa
Archaic Culture
Woodland Culture
Historic Indians
Glacial Iowa
There have been four major ice ages in the earths past
800-600
million years ago
460-430
million years ago (minor series)
350-250
million years ago
2.5
million-10,000 years ago (Pleistocene)
Glacial Iowa
The warmer period between colder times is called an
interglacial.
We are in an interglacial period now.
Typical interglacial periods last ~12,000 years but can be much longer.
Some estimates suggest that our current interglacial period
might last 50,000 years or longer.
Glacial Iowa
What causes ice ages?
Atmospheric
composition (carbon dioxide, methane)
Changes in the
earths orbit (Milankovitch cycles)
Location of
the continents (continental drift)
How often do ice ages come?
During 3.0-0.8
mya the period was 41,000
years
During the
past 800,000 years it has been every 100,000 years
Milankovitch
theory predicts a 41,000 year cycle.
Glacial Iowa
What was the Iowa landscape like when the ice receded?
Tundra was
found along the south edge of the ice front.
Taiga was
found below the tundra.
Savannah
habitats would be found at the southern extremes
.parkland forests
open forests
interspersed with grasslands
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500 ybp)
Who are the first
people to arrive in Iowa?
Clovis culture is the earliest well defined
archeological culture known in North America.
Clovis is named after the city in New Mexico where
the first projectile point was found.
Clovis points have a central groove (flute) along
both faces and finely worked edges.
The
fluted nature of the point allows attachment to the spear and detachment of the
point.
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500 ybp)
Typical blades are 10-13 cm long by 4cm in width and
are made from chert or obsidian.
Clovis sites typically contain lancelolate points and
butchering tools.
Clovis is a big-game hunting culture that survived on
the large, ice age mammals
the megafauna.
Anzick biface (12.5" long) and
Rutz point
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500 ybp)
How did the Clovis people get
here?
Clovis First Theory
A wave
of Clovis people migrated from Asia across Beringia
.the land bridge exposed
between modern day Bering Strait/ between Siberia and
Alaska.
Once
Clovis people entered North America they passed through the Ice Free Corridor
.a
break in the continental ice sheet in western Canada.
The
Clovis people reached the tip of South America only 1000 years after leaving the
Ice Free Corridor in Canada.
Distribution of Clovis Culture
12,000 ybp
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500 ybp)
The Blitzkrieg
Hypothesis (Overkill/Wavefront)
C. Vance Haynes, Jr.
Clovis hunters
decimated the megafaunal mammals (some 33 genera; some 70% of the existing big
game animals)
The Coastal Hypothesis
(Pre-Clovis)
Knut
Fladmark
Immigrants used the
coastline as refugia and hopped down the coast to North America. When they reach Panama some continued
south and others crossed over to the Atlantic side and moved up the Atlantic
coast.
Some proponents believe
people may have been on the continent 30-40,000
ybp!!!
A few archeologists
have proposed a SE US origin of Clovis peoples based on sites in
Florida.
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500
The Solutrean/Clovis Hypothesis
Dennis Stanford and Bruce
Bradley/Smithsonian
Solutrean flint knapping technology is identical to
Clovis
The
Solutreans lived 22,000-16,500 ybp in northern Spain
The
Solutreans may have passed by sea around the north Atlantic edge of the glacier
to North America.
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500
n
Clovis hunters used an atlatal (also
spelled atlatl) to throw spears.
The atlatal is used as a lever/spring that lengthens the arm of the
thrower. The atlatal allows 200
times as much power and 6 times the range of a spear thrown by the bare
hand.
n
The
atlatal may have been the primary technological development that allowed hunters
to kill large megafaunal mammals.
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500
n
The
earliest archaeological evidence of an atlatal is 25,000 ybp!
Different types of
atlatls
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500 ybp)
What were the Clovis
people hunting?
The megafaunal mammals
seem to be the primary food source of Clovis peoples.
These animals
include:
Mastodons,
Mammoths
Giant Ground
Sloths
Giant
Bison
Camels
Muskox
Giant
Beaver
Western
Horse
Many other
mammals
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500 ybp)
n
The
largest Clovis site in Iowa is the Rummells-Maske site west of Tipton in Cedar
County. A plow-disturbed cache of
Clovis points was found at this site.
n
The
oldest Clovis skeleton found carbon-dated at 10,680 ybp (Anzick site; Wilsall,
north of Livingston, Montana; Park County, Montana)
n
Please see The Voices of
Bones by Doug Peacock/Outside Magazine and the papers by Dr. Larry Lahren
for details.
Paleoindian Cultures In Iowa
(12,000-9500 ybp)
n
Folsom Culture followed Clovis
culture (11,000-10,000ybp).
n
Folsom projectile points are smaller
than Clovis points and indicate a shift in the animals harvested.
n
Folsom culture arose as the glaciers
receded about 10,000 ybp.
Clovis/Folsom Sites in
Iowa
Archaic Period (9500-2500 ybp)
The
Archaic Period is viewed as a transitional stage between cultures relying on big
game and cultures with a more rounded forager
adaptation.
Populations depended on bison in
western Iowan and on deer and elk in eastern Iowa.
Climate was warming during this
period (Atlantic episode or Hypsithermal) and populations gravitated to the
wetter river valleys.
Archaic Period (9500-2500 ybp)
During the hypsithermal (8,000-4,000
ybp) great masses of silt filled river valleys and many Archaic sites are buried
in these alluvial sediments.
Toward the end of the Archaic period
population densities were increasing as evidenced by the use of communal
cemeteries.
The
end of the dry hypsithermal made many previously unsuitable areas attractive for
settlement.
Archaic Period (9500-2500 ybp)
Increased exploitation of aquatic
resources and nuts is indicated by the presence of bone fishhooks, net weights,
nutting stones and other specialized tools for obtaining and processing these
foods.
Woodland Period (2500-1000 ybp)
Developments during
this period include:
bow
and arrow hunting
pottery
production
plant domestication and
cultivation
burial mound
construction
Woodland peoples
developed their hunter-gatherer lifestyles using fish and clams in the major
rivers and continuing to harvest deer, elk and bison.
Woodland Period (2500-1000 ybp)
Woodland farmers
domesticated varieties of native plants long before corn or beans became
important.
n Early cultivated
plants included gourds, sumpweed, goosefoot, sunflower, knotweed, little barley
and maygrass.
n Woodland
communities throughout the Midwest were linked by an extensive trade network
referred to by archaeologists as the Hopewell Interaction
Sphere.
Woodland Period (2500-1000 ybp)
Hopewell culture in
Illinois and Ohio spread into Iowa from settlements along the Mississippi River
and may have also come into Iowa from a Hopewellian center near Kansas
City.
Raw materials were
traded from wide distances.....Knife river flint from North Dakota, obsidian
from the Yellowstone area, gulf coast marine shells, Great Lakes copper,
pipestones from Minnesota, Illinois and Ohio.
Woodland Period (2500-1000 ybp)
Corn was introduced
around 800 ybp but did not become a staple item until
later.
Mound building was
common in the Woodland Period. The
most significant sites in Iowa are the groups of linear, effigy and conical
mounds found near Harpers Ferry/Marquette....what is now Effigy Mounds National
Monument.
Woodland Period (2500-1000 ybp)
The monument is
2,526 acres with 195 mounds of which 31 are effigies.
The mounds are
sacred burial sites that have been dated from 2500-400 ybp.
Effigy Mounds National
Monument
Sny Magill Mounds (southern
portion)
Sny Magill Mounds (northern
portion)
Little Bear Effigy
Mound
Great Bear Mound Group
Marching Bear Group
Late Prehistoric Period (1000-350
ybp)
Plains Village Cultures -
characterized by a distinct adaptation to the tall grass prairie/short grass
prairie ecotone of South Dakota, Nebraska, western Iowa and southern
Minnesota.
Improved corn varieties, garden
surpluses, earthlodge houses, complex social organization were common to these
communities.
e Late Prehistoric Period (1000-350
ybp)
Bison meat was common in the
diet. Bison hides were used for
clothing, robes and coverings for the lodges.
Bison bones were modified into a
variety of tools such as scapula hoes using in gardening and
digging.
Late Prehistoric Period (1000-350
ybp)
Oneota Culture - Oneota culture
dominated much of eastern Iowa as well as parts of central and northwestern
Iowa.
Oneota villages were large. They could be permanent or semipermanent
sites.
Houses varied from small dwellings
to longhouses that could hold many families.
The
subsistence economy was based on agriculture, fishing, hunting and
foraging.
Oneota groups are believed to be
ancestral to several midwestern tribes (Siouxan language group): Iowa, Oto, Missouri and
Winnebago.
Historic Tribes
What tribes have lived in Iowa?
Siouan Speaking (Ioway, Oto, Winnebago/Ho-Chunk, Sioux,
Omaha, Ponca)
Algonquian Speaking (Mesquakie/Fox, Sauk,
Potawatomi,Ojibway/Chippewa, Huron/Wyandot, Ottawa, Miami, Kickapoo, Menominee,
Peoria, Moingwena
Historic Tribes
Almost all the tribes listed above lived in the lands
to the east of Iowa and were displaced by intertribal conflicts and
settlement.
During the early 17th century, the Huron
were a major supplier of furs to the French.
Many tribes were pushed west and sought temporary
refuge in Iowa or were displaced permanently.
Historic Tribes
Who are the Ioway
Indians?
Ayuhwa is a Dakota name meaning, sleepy
ones
The
Ioway called themselves, Paxoche which translates as , dusty noses or dusty
heads.
Marquette and Joliet learned of the Ioway from the
Peoria in 1673.
The
Ioway were located on the Upper Iowa River at the time of first contact by the
French traders (Perrot, 1685)
Historic Tribes
The Ioways story is
one of almost constant relocation from the time of first contact with white
people to the 20th century.
After 1685 the Ioway moved to western Iowa and
eventually settled on the Missouri River in NW Iowa.
In
the 1760s the Ioway moved east and were located in two settlements on the
Mississippi River.
They
settled where the Iowa River and Des Moines River enter the
Mississippi.
The
Ioway were displaced after attack by the Sauk and Fox in 1777 to the Iowaville
area on the Des Moines River.
Historic Tribes
The Sauk, led by Chief Blackhawk, attacked the Ioway
again in 1821.
The Ioway ceded all their original land claims
in Minnesota, Iowa and Missouri
between 1824 and 1838.
The Iowa were moved to the Great Nemaha River
Reservation in NE Kansas/SE Nebraska
Historic Tribes
Between 1841-1845 a group of 14 Ioway Indians toured
Great Britain with the painter, George Catlin.
Catlin painted some 300 portraits of 50 different
tribes between 1832-1840.
During the later half of the 19th century
a portion of the Ioway tribe moved to Oklahoma.
Today there are two groups of Ioway recognized by the
federal government: the Iowa Tribe
of Kansas and Nebraska and the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma.
Historic Tribes
The Mesquakie (Fox) and Sauk
The
French had first contact with the Mesquakie in 1656. The tribe estimated to have 12,000
members at that time.
The
French called them Renard (Fox) because they met members of the Fox clan
of the tribe.
The
Mesquakie are related linguistically/culturally to other Central Algonquian
peoples, the Sauk and the Kickapoo.
Historic Tribes
Mesquakie
Origins
Mesquakie oral
tradition says the tribe was created by Wisaka, the Elder Brother. Wisaka created the first humans
from red earth or clay. The
Mesquakie are the Red Earth People.
The largest clans are
the Bear, Fox, Thunder and Wolf.
War chiefs came from the Fox clan and peace chiefs from the Bear
clan.
Mesquakie tradition
suggest they arose along the eastern coast of the continent. The archeological record seems to show
they were most recently located around the central Great Lakes in eastern
Michigan.
The Mesquakie, like the
Sauk, Kickapoo, Mascouten and Potawatomi, moved westward during the middle of
the 17th century.
Historic Tribes
The Mesquakie resided
in the Fox River basin in Central Wisconsin by the late
1670s.
Between 1712-1737 the
French attempted to exterminate the Mesquakie because of their loyalty to the
British.
In 1730 the Mesquakie
lost about 1000 men, women, and children as they fled the French and their
allies.
The Mesquakie and Sauk
were forced to flee across the Mississippi into Ioway territory and successfully
defended themselves against French attack.
In 1737 the French
government pardoned the Mesquakie and ended their pursuit.
The village of Saukenuk
was established in the late 1700s on the Rock River.
Historic Tribes
Zebulon Pike described
three Mesquakie villages in 1805
West Bank of the
Mississippi North of the Rock River Rapids
Mines of Spain
area
Confluence of the
Turkey River and Mississippi
Julien Dubuque was
granted a treaty from the Mesquakie for mining lead in 1788 (Mines of Spain). The French ceded the western portion of
the upper Mississippi valley to the Spanish in 1782. The land was returned back to the French
in 1800.
The Louisiana Purchase
in 1803 allowed territorial settlement to proceed. Movement of people into Iowa proceeded
quickly.
Historic Tribes
Pressures from
settlement after 1825 forced the Sauk along the Mississippi to leave western
Illinois and relocate to southeast Iowa.
The exception was Black
Hawks band of Sauk at Rock Island.
The Black Hawk War of 1832 resulted in defeat for the
Sauk.
The government
appointed Keokuk as the head chief of the so-called Sauk and Mesquakie nation
after Black Hawks defeat.
The tribe was forced to
give up 2.5 million hectares of the eastern part of Iowa (the Black Hawk
Purchase)
Keokuk was granted a
small territory along the Iowa River (called the Keokuk
Reserve)
Historic Tribes
The Fox and Sauk
remained in Iowa until 1842 when the ceded their lands for a reserve in Kansas
just south of present-day Topeka.
Some of the Fox left
Kansas after selling their herd of horses for Iowa.
In 1856 the Iowa
Legislature authorized the Mesquakie to purchase 80 acres of land in Iowa near
Tama ($12.50/acre; 10X what the Mesquakie were originally given; 2X the actual
cost of farmland in Iowa at the time).
Today Mesquakie tribal
holdings are about 5,000 acres.