Envisioning Cahokia: A Landscape Perspective

Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, Summer 2004 by Hagedorn, Nancy L

Envisioning Cahokia: A Landscape Perspective. By Rinita A. Dalan, George R. Holley, William I. Woods, Harold W. Watters Jr., and John A. Koepke (Dekalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2003. Pp. x, 241. Illus., appendix, bibliography, index. Cloth, $48.00, Paper, $29.50).

Ancient Cahokia in Illinois, the largest group of man-made earthen mounds in North America, has long fascinated and amazed visitors to the site. Beginning in the early nineteenth century, many of these travelers recorded their observations about the site and their astonishment at its size and scope as well as speculations about its origins. Surprisingly, despite considerable interest over the last two centuries, Cahokia and its origins have remained obscure. Further, academic and scholarly writing on the site has "failed to precipitate a long-standing familiarity with and knowledge of this paramount mound center." (11) The authors of Envisioning Cnhokia attempt to remedy this situation by entering into a dialogue with those who have gone before them. Drawing on more than fifty collective years of research at the site and integrating insights from their respective disciplines (anthropology, archaeology, geography, and landscape architecture), the authors approach their study of Cahokia from a new "landscape" perspective. They present Envisioning Cahokia as a "volume-length, holistic consideration" of the "cultural dynamics at Cahokia" (13) that portrays "the way the Cahokians engaged with the physical world." (15)

The landscape concept lies at the heart of the authors' approach to Cahokia and of the book. As they explain in the opening chapter, a landscape perspective "explicitly recognizes the relationship between landscape and culture"-it is a humanized landscape. (15) They are also concerned with how representation and landscape are related. Specifically, they employ a broad definition of the term "built environment," which includes "any physical alteration of the natural environment," and recognize the role of perception in human interaction with this environment. (41) These aspects of their approach give significant time depth to their study as they use the landscape concept to synthesize centuries of lived experience, observation, and research at the site. Their purpose is to present a broad conception of the Cahokia landscape informed by both their own experiences of the site and by data from the archeological context.

This landscape approach offers a number of benefits to the authors, but may also make the book a little confusing to the lay reader. First, while crucial from a scholarly perspective, their extensive explanation of the history of the landscape concept in the first chapter will be largely unintelligible and of only marginal interest to most non-specialists. second, their emphasis on landscape and perception across the entire lived history of the site leads them to organize their material "analogous to how we think people view landscapes" rather than chronologically. (59) Again, while it is more "appropriate, both temporally and spatially, than a chronological sequence, which presupposes development and predetermines conclusions," it may prove a bit confusing for non-specialists interested in the "history" of Cahokia. (60)

Despite these concerns, however, Envisioning Cahokia offers revealing insights about the spatial composition of the site, its construction, arid the human experience of the landscape at Cahokia. One of the most intriguing aspects of the book is the authors' clear recognition of the human scale of the site. For example, the dimensions of the central core, which contains the largest overall concentration of mounds on the site, seem to be tied to the distance from which it is possible to detect a person standing on Monks Mound (the largest mound and focal point of the entire complex) and easily hear his or her voice as it echoes off the south wall of the mound's terraces. Their sensitivity to the lived experience of the site, drawn from their own experiences there, allow them to reconceptualize the spatial organization of the site, the placement of mounds, their interrelationship and functions, the existence and alteration of neighborhoods over time, Cahokia's relationship to other Mississippian sites in the American Bottom, and the implications of all of these developments for Cahokian lifeways, rituals, and political and social organization. The book is also filled with many photographs and other images that help to explain and convey these complex interpretations. No one reading the book can escape the realization that the Cahokians' engagement with the site on a daily basis was intense as well as crucial in defining the site and giving it meaning.

Envisioning Cahokia, with its unique approach and the many new insights it offers about Cahokian cultural development, spatial design, and land use, will undoubtedly find a welcome place on many library and scholarly bookshelves. It will also serve a useful purpose in many undergraduate and graduate classrooms, particularly in anthropology and archaeology. While it might not fulfill its authors' hopes for a broader lay readership, this innovative and interdisciplinary interpretation is sure to become a landmark in the field of Cahokian studies.