Excavation of the truncated mound at the Walling site: Middle Woodland culture and Copena in the Tennessee Valley

Knight, Vernon J.

book chapter

Excavation of the truncated mound at the Walling site: Middle Woodland culture and Copena in the Tennessee Valley

University of Alabama, Alabama State Museum of Natural History, Division of Archaeology • [University] • Published In 1990 • Pages: i-xix, 1-115, 157-187

By: Knight, Vernon J..

Abstract
This document describes the excavations and analysis of a truncated, rectangular mound at the Walling site. The site contains a small trucated mound located near the western margin of a village midden; both are presumed to be contemporary with the Copena burial mound to the east. The truncated mound had some excavations conducted on it in 1941 as part of the Tennessee Valley Authority/Alabama Museum of Natural History archaeological program for the Wheeler Basin. The older excavations were re-found and are also described. The majority of the artifacts consisted of ceramic sherds and flaked lithic artifacts. Knight uses the ceramics to propose the Walling phase for the period ca. A.D. 100-350. The mound may have been the focus of communal feasting and there is evidence for the manufacture of goods, perhaps for ritual display and exchange. There is no evidence for mortuary activity on the platform mound and the Walling site was not a 'vacant' ceremonial center as the village appears to have been a small, formal village of six or seven houses. Knight also places the Walling site in its regional context with a discussion of other pre-Mississippian truncated mound sites throughout the southeast.

Identification

Reviews and critiques

Organization and analysis of results of research

Archaeological excavation methods

Ceramic technology

Lithic industries

Religious and educational structures

Settlement patterns

General tools

Visual arts

Burial practices and funerals

Cultural stratigraphy