ABSTRACT
Prior to 1492, the history of the peoples in the moundbuildmg region was unique in many respects. They lived in permanent settlements before they began to cultivate plants. Long before they became dependent upon corn and other crops first domesticated in Mesoamerica, they cultivated indigenous plants, produced their own pottery, and participated in an exchange system of nearly continental proportions. Canoe traffic plied the rivers, and both people and the goods they could carry moved through the woodlands along overland trails. Ceremonial centers knit the various peoples together in a web of grand dimensions. Throughout the region people buried their illustrious dead with the finest goods available from the Rocky Mountains to the beaches of Florida. Later, after A.D. 400, the bow and arrow became the principal weapon, corn became the mainstay of the diet, and palisaded towns became the centers of ceremony and exchange. Thus were the cultural continuities of the moundbuilding region created, without the aid of bronze, iron, chariots, cavalries, or any beast of burden.
