Deck 14: An Explosion of Complexity: North America

Question 1

The site of Cahokia was:

A) an ancient, prehistoric, Native American city
B) an outpost of ancient Maya traders just east of the modern city of St. Louis
C) a Native American ceremonial center with a very small population
D) the geographic focal point of a powerful Native American chiefdom

Answer 1

D

Question 2

At its peak, Cahokia's population was likely in the range of:

A) 1,000-2,000
B) 5,000-10,000
C) 30,000-50,000
D) 100,000-150,000

Answer 2

B

Question 3

Cahokia was at its peak in terms of population size and influence about when?

A) A.D. 1200
B) A.D. 1000
C) A.D. 800
D) A.D. 600

Answer 3

A

Question 4

At its peak, greater Cahokia was the equivalent of a:

A) large village
B) port city
C) fiefdom
D) city-state

Question 5

What characteristics did Cahokia possess that warrant its inclusion in the ranks of complex chiefdom and early state societies?

A) monumental works, elite burials
B) writing, mathematics
C) military rulers, urbanization
D) all of the above

Question 6

Two mound-building cultures that preceded the temple mound builders like those at Cahokia were the:

A) Mogollon and Hohokam
B) Etowah and Moundville
C) Adena and Hopewell
D) Archaic and Woodland

Question 7

The purpose for most of the larger mounds-like Monks Mound-built at places like Cahokia was:

A) to serve as burial places for the elite
B) to serve as platforms for temples built at their summits
C) to enclose the elite precincts of the community
D) to serve as archaeoastronomical viewing places

Question 8

Mound 72 at Cahokia was:

A) a platform mound on top of which a great temple once stood
B) an effigy mound in the shape of a snake
C) the burial site of one of Cahokia's elite
D) the oldest Adena burial mound

Question 9

The oldest large earthen mounds in North America date back to:

A) 500 years ago
B) 1,000 years ago
C) 2,500 years ago
D) 5,000 years ago

Question 10

The oldest earthen mounds in North America have been found at which site:

A) Cahokia
B) Hopewell
C) Poverty Point
D) Watson Brake

Question 11

The settlement of Aztalan in Wisconsin may have been:

A) a distant colony established by the people at Cahokia
B) a rival of Cahokia in the lower Mississippi Valley
C) a Mexican source for resources relied on by Cahokia's artisans
D) the place where effigy mounds originated

Question 12

The focus of the diet of the first mound builders in North America was on:

A) corn, beans, and squash
B) gathered wild plants, hunted animals, and fish
C) domesticated native seed crops
D) Pleistocene megafauna

Question 13

The purpose for the larger mounds built by the Adena and Hopewell people was to:

A) serve as burial places for the elite
B) serve as platforms for temples built at their summits
C) enclose the elite precincts of the community
D) serve as defensive works

Question 14

The Adena and Hopewell people constructed mounds:

A) in the center of their large, densely populated settlements
B) in sparsely populated ceremonial centers
C) adjacent to rivers where their summits served as safe havens from floods and enemies
D) far from their urban centers

Question 15

Much of the Hopewell diet consisted of:

A) wild foods
B) cattle
C) llamas and alpacas
D) all of the above

Question 16

A significant component of Hopewell subsistence was:

A) maize, beans, and squash
B) locally domesticated native seeds crops
C) sea mammals
D) Pleistocene megafauna

Question 17

Sunflower, squash, maygrass, knotweed, and goosefoot are all:

A) crops domesticated in Mesoamerica before maize
B) wild plants that made up the diet of the inhabitants of Mesa Verde
C) crops introduced by the Spanish explorers of the American Southeast
D) crops domesticated by Native Americans in the Midwest, Mid-South, and Southeast

Question 18

Non-native, exotic raw materials found in Hopewell burial mounds include:

A) obsidian from the Rocky Mountains
B) copper and silver from the Great Lakes region
C) quartz crystals and mica from the Appalachian Mountains
D) all of the above

Question 19

Archaeologist Brad Lepper has hypothesized that the Hopewell:

A) were influenced by ideas filtering from the Maya area to the south
B) constructed ceremonial roads connecting some of their most important ceremonial sites
C) were part of a group of non-Indian settlers to the New World who were wiped out by the ancestors of modern American Indians
D) built temple mounds as artificial mountains, a tradition traceable to east Asia

Question 20

Among the later mound builders of North America, Cahokia was:

A) absolutely unique; there are no other large mound-building sites
B) the only large mound site to show clear evidence of contact with the complex civilizations of Mesoamerica to the south
C) not the largest but the first of the urban-like settlements
D) by far the largest but not the only impressive, densely settled, mound-building community

Question 21

Subsistence at Cahokia was based primarily on:

A) local, native crops domesticated by Native Americans beginning about 4,000 years ago: sunflower, goosefoot, lamb's quarter
B) maize and squash
C) fishing
D) beans

Question 22

Archaeologist Timothy Pauketat views Cahokia as being:

A) a central place in a three-tiered hierarchy of communities
B) an ancient city on the Mississippi with a population of close to 30,000 people
C) a ceremonial center without a substantial resident population
D) the capital of an extensive Native American kingdom

Question 23

When the first Spanish explorers traversed the American Southeast in the sixteenth century:

A) mound-builder society had already collapsed
B) the mound builders had already migrated to Mexico
C) some mound-builder societies were still flourishing
D) the mound builders were living in large cities

Question 24

What impact did the Hernando de Soto expedition have on the mound builders?

A) the Spanish, with their superior weaponry, defeated the mound builders in a protracted, four-year war
B) these Spaniards may have inadvertently introduced smallpox and other infectious diseases against which Native Americans possessed no immunity, resulting in epidemics and a dramatic reduction in native population
C) it was de Soto and his men who introduced the idea of constructing mounds in the first place
D) none; mound-builder culture had already collapsed before the arrival of the de Soto expedition

Question 25

The chronicler of the sixteenth-century De Soto expedition:

A) made no mention of witnessing Indians building or using mounds
B) wrote that the Indians told him that mysterious white settlers had built the mounds
C) claimed that De Soto's large group of soldiers had built the mounds as fortifications
D) clearly described the construction and use of mounds by the Indians he had witnessed

Question 26

The dominant earthwork forms found at Town Creek Mound, Etowah, Komoki, and Moundville are:

A) temple mounds
B) burial mounds
C) effigy mounds
D) enclosure mounds

Question 27

The dominant mound form found at Mound City in Ohio is:

A) temple mounds
B) burial mounds
C) effigy mounds
D) enclosure mounds

Question 28

The Hohokam homeland is best described as a:

A) tropical rainforest
B) desert
C) mountainous region
D) tundra

Question 29

Hohokam complexity flowered when:

A) A.D. 700-A.D. 1100
B) A.D. 1000-A.D. 1500
C) A.D. 1200-A.D. 1640
D) A.D. 1300-A.D. 1380

Question 30

The Hohokam were able to survive in the environment of their homeland by:

A) focusing on riverine resources
B) subsisting on wild plants abundant in the desert
C) trade
D) constructing an elaborate system of canals

Question 31

Hohokam villages consisted of:

A) cliff dwellings
B) pit-houses
C) multiple sets of separate courtyard groups
D) all of the above

Question 32

Snaketown was a large settlement of which culture:

A) Hohokam
B) Mogollon
C) Ancestral Puebloan
D) Basketmakers

Question 33

The Mogollon homeland is best described as a:

A) tropical rainforest
B) desert
C) mountainous region
D) tundra

Question 34

The early Mogollon lived in

A) cliff dwellings
B) pit-houses
C) multiple sets of separate courtyard groups
D) all of the above

Question 35

Grasshopper Pueblo is a large settlement of which culture:

A) Hohokam
B) Mogollon
C) Ancestral Puebloan
D) Basketmakers

Question 36

Southwestern kivas were (and are) used for:

A) food storage facilities
B) dwellings
C) care of the elderly
D) religious ceremonies

Question 37

The Great Houses of Chaco Canyon represent which culture:

A) Hohokam
B) Mogollon
C) Ancestral Puebloan
D) Basketmakers

Question 38

The flowering of the Ancestral Puebloans occurred about when:

A) soon after A.D. 1000
B) A.D. 750
C) A.D. 100
D) soon after A.D. 1540

Question 39

The largest of the Great Houses were built by which culture:

A) Hohokam
B) Mogollon
C) Ancestral Puebloan
D) Basketmakers

Question 40

Archaeologist John Kanter suggests that the Chaco road system seems to have had what kind of primary purpose:

A) ritual
B) economic
C) political
D) military

Question 41

Mesa Verde is characterized by:

A) cliff dwellings
B) pit-houses
C) multiple sets of separate courtyard groups
D) Great Houses

Question 42

The prehistoric pueblo builders of the American Southwest are considered to represent what level of socio-political complexity?

A) band
B) tribe
C) chiefdom
D) state

Question 43

The so-called "great houses" of the American Southwest show the:

A) capacity of some non-state societies to organize the labor of a large population
B) impact of Mesoamerican civilizations on their cousins to the north
C) enormous effect of the Spanish missions on the architecture of the sixteenth-century Southwest
D) great wealth and power of the kings who lived in the great houses

Question 44

The great houses at Chaco canyon date to about when:

A) 4,000 years ago
B) 2,200 years ago
C) 1,700 years ago
D) 900 years ago

Question 45

Pueblo Bonito is:

A) an Anasazi cliff dwelling
B) an 800-room great house at Chaco Canyon
C) a large ceremonial structure called a kiva
D) a Spanish mission in the American Southwest

Question 46

The Room 33 burial at Pueblo Bonito has been interpreted by some as that of:

A) slaves
B) Spanish colonists
C) a ruling family at Chaco Canyon
D) victims of cannibalism

Question 47

DNA extracted from the remains of those interred in the Room 33 burial at Pueblo Bonito shows that the people buried there most likely were:

A) not Indians
B) close blood relatives
C) members of the same family that settled in Mesa Verde
D) all children whose deaths were the result of sacrifice

Question 48

Which of the Southwest US societies constructed ceremonial ball courts?

A) Hohokam
B) Mogollon
C) Sinagua
D) Ancestral Puebloan

Question 49

About how many ceremonial ball courts have been identified in the American Southwest?

A) 20
B) 200
C) 2,000
D) 5,000

Question 50

The complex societies of the northwest coast of North America are best described as:

A) horticulturalists
B) pastoral nomads
C) affluent foragers
D) irrigation farmers

Question 51

Historically, the native societies of the northwest coast of North America were ruled by:

A) democratically elected chiefs
B) absolute monarchs called "Sun Kings"
C) powerful, hereditary chiefs
D) warrior priests

Question 52

The example of the complex societies of the northwest coast of North America indicates that, in order for complexity to arise, a society must:

A) be able to produce a food surplus
B) be agricultural
C) be located adjacent to a coast
D) all of the above

Question 53

The rejection by European thinkers of a local, native source for the complex societies of the mound builders as well as for the construction of Great Zimbabwe was based on:

A) archaeological evidence
B) historical records
C) oral traditions in those areas showing that the native people themselves believed that they had nothing to do with those cultures
D) racism

Question 54

The so-called myth of the mound builders was:

A) based on the belief that Native Americans had been incapable of building the monumental earthworks found in North America
B) based on the memoirs of those on the de Soto expedition who maintained that the Indians knew nothing of mound construction
C) based on the discovery of stone tablets in the mounds with characters derived from Old World alphabets
D) all of the above

Question 55

To the satisfaction of virtually all scientists, the "mystery" of who had built the mounds in the American Midwest and Southeast was solved:

A) in the 1600s
B) just a little more than 125 years ago
C) by Thomas Jefferson in the eighteenth century
D) fewer than 50 years ago with the development of radiocarbon dating

Question 56

Discuss the site of Cahokia. How big was it? What does the archaeological record there show about the nature of life at the site?

Question 57

On what basis do archaeologists assert that greater Cahokia was a city-state?

Question 58

Did Cahokia possess an egalitarian or socially stratified society? How do we know?

Question 59

What does Mound 72 tell us about the social, economic, and political nature of the Cahokia city-state?

Question 60

Discuss the evolution of the mound builders. When did mound building in North American begin? How did the purpose of the mounds change through time?

Question 61

What does the construction of the mounds like those at Cahokia signify in terms of the social and political organization of the mound builders?

Question 62

Was Cahokia unique? If so, how so?

Question 63

What was the purpose of the Adena or Hopewell burial mounds? In terms of their social and political position, who do archaeologists think was buried in the mounds? On what do they base this hypothesis?

Question 64

Archaeologist Brad Lepper describes the period after 2,800 years ago in the American Midwest as one of "dramatic, if not revolutionary, cultural transformation." In what ways were these changes dramatic or revolutionary? In what ways were these changes or transformations more evolutionary than revolutionary?

Question 65

How does archaeologist Brad Lepper explain the alignments at the Newark earthworks in Ohio?

Question 66

How have the records of Spanish explorers contributed to our understanding of the mound builders?

Question 67

What were the impacts of Spanish explorers on the indigenous chiefdoms of the American Southeast?

Question 68

Describe the archaeological record of the Mogollon, Hohokam, and Ancestral Puebloan.

Question 69

What physical evidence is there for social and political complexity at Hohokam, Mogollon, and Ancestral Puebloan villages?

Question 70

What is a Kiva? What is a "Great Kiva"? What does the appearance of Great Kivas signify?

Question 71

Discuss the Room 33 burial at Pueblo Bonito. What does the DNA tell us about the relationships among the people buried there.

Question 72

What were the purposes of the ceremonial roads of the Hopewell and of the Ancestral Puebloans? What does the construction of these roads signify about their societies?

Question 73

Why is the use of the term "Anasazi" controversial? Why do some of the descendants of the people who built the Great Houses and cliff dwellings object to the use of this name commonly used by archaeologists?

Question 74

What was the economic base of ancient northwest coast society? How did that economic base contribute to the development of complexity there? How does this differ from most of the other examples provided for the development of complexity?

Question 75

Initially, many Europeans rejected the possibility that the mounds of North America had been built by Indians as well as the notion that Great Zimbabwe had been built by Africans. What was behind this? Why did many Europeans think it impossible that local, indigenous people had produced these sites?

Question 76

What was the "myth of the mound builders?" How was the myth busted?

Question 77

Discuss the burials at Mound 72, focusing on the remains found in Mound 72sub1.

Question 78

Using the Messages from the Past section of this Chapter as a jumping off point, how can you visit the past in the present? Seriously, based on the brief discussions of many, many sites in this book, are there any you'd put on your bucket list of places you'd like to see? Why would you like to see them?