*Archaeologists dig for artifacts that tell us about people of the past.

*Artifacts are objects that were made, modified, or used by humans of past cultures. They help us

Paleo

Archaic

Archaic

Woodland

Mississippian

*Time: up to 10,000 years ago.

*Food Sources: large herds of animals like mammoths and bison, fished, and gathered fruits and nuts

*Weapons, Tools, Utensils: tools of stone, and long spears

*Shelter: no permanent shelter; they were nomads who lived in semi permanent camps.

*Extra: A few Paleo sites in GA Flint River, Savannah River, Ocmulgee River.

*Time: 8000 B.C. to 1000 B.C.

*Food Sources: smaller game animals (deer, bears, turtles, turkey), berries/nuts, horticulture.

*Weapons, Tools, Utensils: stone axes, drills, pottery, weighted spears, atlatls.

*Shelter: banded together into camps toward the end of the period some resided in small oval pits with coverings and stayed longer

*Extra: pottery was a great contribution to Native American culture.

*Time: 1000 B.C. to 1000 A.D.

*Food Sources: hunting, fishing, farming (cleared fields and planted crops), gathering nuts/berries.

*Weapons, Tools, Utensils: bow and arrow, stronger pottery.

*Shelter: dome-shaped huts from trees and bark, began forming tribes and living in villages

*Extra: Pottery began having designs on it, burial mounds built for dead can still be found in Georgia.

Kolomoki Mounds – Blakely, GA

1 Great Temple 2 burial 4 ceremonial

Rock EagleEatonton, GA

believed to be a burial mound

*Time: 900 A.D. – 1600 A.D.

*Food Sources: grew most food (corn, beans, pumpkins, squash, tobacco)

*Weapons, Tools, Utensils: bone hoes, digging sticks.

*Shelter: larger villages near water sources (Ocmulgee, Oconee, Chatahoochee, and Savannah Rivers).

*Extra: beads, earrings, tattoos, head dresses. Priest-chief was head of village.

*1600s mysteriously disappeared.

Etowah Mounds in Cartersville, GA

Ocmulgee Indian Mounds

Macon, GA

Ocmulgee Indian Mounds

Macon, GA

Nacoochee Mound Helen, GA

*Set up in Chiefdoms with a system of levels

*Chief- head of the tribe political and religious figures

*Nobles- large homes and special food

*Commoners- produce food and crafts as well as act a soldiers and laborers

*Some speculate the decline was because of overpopulation while others think it was that the chiefs lost control over the chiefdoms and a final theory is disease

*A barter economy is one in which items or services are traded instead of money.

*The Cherokee and Creek Indians lived in Georgia during the Mississippian Period.

*The Cherokee lived in the mountains of North Georgia.

*The Creek lived in Southern and Coastal Georgia.