La ceràmica incisa ramey de cahokia (il, eua). Transmissió i adaptació d'un missatge iconogràfic i implicacions sociopolítiques
- Autores: Melissa Mattioli
- Directores de la Tesis: Victòria Solanilla Demestre (dir. tes.)
- Lectura: En la Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona ( España ) en 2021
- Idioma: catalán
- Tribunal Calificador de la Tesis: Immacolata Valese (presid.), Anna Gómez Bach (secret.), Carolina Orsini (voc.)
- Programa de doctorado: Programa de Doctorado en Historia del Arte y Musicología por la Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona
- Materias:
- Enlaces
- Tesis en acceso abierto en: TDX
- Resumen
Cahokia is the earliest and largest settlement of pre-Columbian North America. Located in the American Bottom floodplain, a few kilometers from present day St. Louis, MO (USA), this archaeological site had risen to be the greatest Mississippian settlement by the middle of the 11th century until its abandonment at the end of the 14th century. The archaeological investigations led at the site have involved only a small part of its extension. One of the most extensive excavations took place in the Merrell Tract and has been led by the University of Bologna (IT) from 2011 to 2016. The results obtained by University of Bologna’s excavations, combined with data coming from previous researches led in that same area since the 1920s, enabled us to formulate a new hypothesis concerning the settlement dynamics and the use of space in the interested area, as well as its contextualization in the wider picture of the history of this Mississippian center. The aim of the research is to use the sum of archaeological and iconographic data for artistic and socio- political investigation purposes, focusing on a specific typology of pottery and using it as main research tool. The Mississippian culture is characterized by a set of distinctive traits, including the adoption of the shell-tempered Ramey Incised pottery which, through its iconographic meaning, aided the development and the diffusion of a system of religious beliefs known as South-Eastern Ceremonial Complex. These pots had a huge geographic distribution and they have been frequently found in both ceremonial and domestic contexts, highlighting their value and significance in the Mississippian communities. Traditionally, it is granted that the presence of Cahokia-style cosmograms outside of the American Bottom represents an expression of Cahokian religious ideology as adopted by hinterland groups, revealing a local desire to participate in the Cahokian cultural phenomenon. Through the comparative analysis of a variety of iconographic and archaeological data, it was proved that peripheral inhabitants, from northern American Bottom area to the South-eastern of the United States surely were in contact. However, these populations did not passively adopt the practices of more powerful core polities but in some way reinterpreted them according to local knowledge, understandings and histories. By supporting this theory and extending the same inquiries to the Amerindian area, the author concludes that at the moment we cannot confirm the cultural contact between the Mississippian and the Amerindian areas. However, with the support of the evidences provided we were able to demonstrate the circulation, across the Pre- Columbian American territory, of the same socio-political meaningful concepts accompanied by their iconographic contextualized representations, and so we were able to re-open the debate on this interesting topic and to suggest some reflections for further investigations.
