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The making of ceramics has an ancient tradition in the Southeastern United States The earliest known pottery produced in the entire Western Hemisphere has been found on Stallings Island in the Savannah River of Georgia. It dates from at least 2500 BC. By 500 BC there were permanent agricultural villages in several parts of the Southeast, and by 100 AD large towns with temple mounds. Southeastern Woodland pottery was fairly simple in form, but often decorated with complex and sophisticated designs created from stamping by wooden paddles. Most human figures were solid and generally lifelike. However, certain anatomical features (such as ears) were often stylized.
Mississippian is the official archaeological classification of the cultural peak of Pre-European cultures in the Southeast between 900 AD and 1350 AD. It was an epoch when aristocratic elites directed the building of massive earthern mounds and large temples. There was a vast variety of ceramic shapes produced. The designs of the ceramics show similarities with Mexican cultures, but the motifs tend be simpler. Southeastern Mississippian pottery is much more sculptural and less colorful in nature than the contemporary pottery that was being produced in the Southwest. The town dwelling cultures of the Southeast were very fond of jars and bowls in the shape of animals and people - varying from being very realistic to being highly abstract. Color pigments were ususally limited to iron, manganese and copper oxides plus variety of clay slips. Ceramics were either made from red, brown, white or buff clays.
Late Mississipian is the official archaeological classification of the period from 1350 AD to 1560 AD, when the aristocractic societies appeared to have collapsed and been replaced by more egalitarian cultures. The emphasis of architecture shifted from large structures for the elite to communal buildings for town meetings and celebrations. The extreme variety of ceramic forms and styles of earlier centuries diminished, but the pottery was still of high quality and sophisticated design.
During the European Contact Period, (1560 AD - 1620 AD) there was a incredible holocaust caused by Spanish diseases and swords which killed at least 95% of the population in a matter of a few decades. Artistic skills and cultural symbols collapsed as the few dazed survivors wandered about trying to find locations safe from oppression by Spanish Conquistadors & missionaires,
plus freqent raids from marauding bands of Mid-Atlantic Indians armed with muskets, who were hired by English colonists to capture slaves for plantations. Very little ceramics of significance was produced during this era.
Artistic skills blossomed again in a simpler form during the Historic Period (1620-1832). The Creek Indians, known by themselves as “The People of One Fire,” are actually an alliance of the survivors of the Native American Holocaust. They were never in “tribes,” but rather were organized into townships known as “talwas” - a large mother town of 1-5000 citizens with a cluster of satellite villages. The People of One Fire were virtually invincible until manipulated into a civil war during the War of 1812 - after which they soon lost most of their lands in the Southeast. Historic Creek Style pottery is simple, elegant, well-made and usually fired from red clay. The pieces are either plain, have geometric incised bands or painted with abstract monochrome motifs.
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