Pollen Studies in Southern Illinois

Report intended for inclusion in a volume on the archaeological salvage program undertaken in the Cahokia area of the American Bottoms under University of Illinois direction (Charles Baeris) in 1960-63. Said volume was never produced. This report identified an American Bottoms pollen sequence for Mississippian Culture occupation horizons, it offered absolute date estimates for those horizons on the basis of radiocarbon and pollen cross-dating for segments of the sequence, and it advanced interpretations of the effects of environmental fluctuations on cultural patterns. Palynological evidence that the "Old Village" and "Trappist" ceramic complexes of Mississippian archaeology were coincident, not sequential (so represented sociological, not temporal, cultural units) was an extremely controversial and poorly regarded aspect of this report when it was presented to the project leadership.