1. Native American Cultures
SS8H1 The student will evaluate the development of Native American cultures and impact of European exploration and settlement on Native American cultures in Georgia. (a, b, c)

2. Evolution of Native Cultures
Through archaeological study we have pieced together the development of native cultures that inhabited Georgia prior to European contact.
Early people are identified by cultural periods based on their hunting, eating, and group behavior.
Paleo, Archaic, Woodland and Mississippian

3. Paleo Indians Earliest people (paleolithic age)
Lived until about 10,000 years ago, prior to 8000 B.C.
People lived in groups of people
Nomadic hunters that followed herds
Used wooden spears and Clovis points
Diet included bison, mammoths, ground sloths and mastodons

4. Atlatl-Sling type tool which helped natives throw spears more accurately
Arrow or spear
Atlatl
Photo by C. Hackney

5. Hunter/Gatherers
Paleo Indians moved over large areas on foot or by water.
They lived in small groups of twenty-five to fifty people.
Paleo Indians were hunter-gatherers. They used tools to cut, hunt, and chop.
When food supplies were gone, they migrated to a new area. Paleo Indians moved many times over the course of a year.

6. Archaic Period These natives lived about 8000 B.C. to about 1000 B.C.
Hunted smaller game like deer, bear, turkey, rabbit, and fish
Used smaller spears, stone points; invented choppers, drills and other tools from deer antlers; and fish hooks from animal bones
Moved during the different seasons to collect berries, nuts and fruit
Less nomadic and began to save seeds for cultivation of plants and trees

7. Photo by C. Hackney

8. Woodland Indian Period
About 1000 B.C. to about 1000 A.D.
Tribes developed, several hundred families banding together.
Began to build houses or large huts
Created the bow and arrow for better hunting
Created pottery for storage of food
Diet included: squash, wild greens, sunflowers, berries, nuts, fish and game
Traded among different tribes
Burial mounds suggest religious ceremonies

9. Etowah Indian Mounds Historic Site Georgia Department of Natural Resources Cartersville, GA

10. Snapshots of Mississippian-Indian Life

11. Mississippian Period
Culture started around 700 A.D. until around 1600.
Known as Temple Mound period, lived in villages of several thousand families with guard towers and palisades
People grew most of their food, corn (maize), beans, pumpkins, squash and tobacco
Religious people with beads, tattoos, and headdresses
Photo by C. Hackney

12. The Mississippian Period
The Europeans are coming soon!
The Mississippian Period
Dates
800 A.D. – about 1600 A.D.
Weapons
All tools and weapons from previous periods – only better-made and more effective
Food
Grew most food
Corn, beans, pumpkin, and squash
Used slash-and-burn technique
Stored food in storehouses for a constant supply
Dwellings
Large-scale communities w/ palisades and moats
Several 1,000 families living together
Wattle and daub houses made of clay, wood, and forest brush
Mound communities like Etowah and Ocmulgee Indians Mounds in Macon.
Religion
Priest-chief presides over religious ceremonies
Religious aspects controlled by govt.

13. End of Prehistory?
Prehistory ends in Georgia with the arrival of Spanish-Explorer Hernando deSoto. (around 1539)
Beginning of traditional European written records of GA