The spatial patterning of the Adams site, a Mississippian town in western Kentucky

This study examines relationships between parts of a western Kentucky Mississippian town and how observed spatial relationships reflect human ones both within the town and between town occupants and outsiders, providing a basic model of Mississippian town development in the region. The site is consistent with chiefdom social organization conceived in the non-evolutionary framework of Adams' (1975; 1977; 1981) theory of social power and with Clay's (1976) strategic or operations sites.; Data from a nearly 100% controlled surface collection are used to investigate the internal patterning of the Adams site, to (1) locate and identify activity areas; (2) determine whether and how the town was spatially divided; (3) estimate the size and variation of its population during its final occupation phase; and (4) delineate patterns of site growth and maintenance. The surface collection analysis uses spatial autocorrelation and variance/mean statistics, and introduces a sum of squares method to delineate artifact distribution patterns. Architecture and site plan provide additional spatial data on engineering patterns: e.g., use of particular architectural features or units of measure; and possible alignments with geographical features, cardinal directions, and rising or setting points of celestial bodies.; Domestic activity areas predominate and appear redundant, regularly spaced, and associated with lithic manufacture/repair and other activities--perhaps reflecting substantially self-sufficient households that produced for themselves most things needed or wanted. House spacing is consistent with Smith's (1987) formula, leading to a population estimate of about 600. The town's plan is much like the St. Francis site type defined by Phillips et al. (1951), but its long depositional history and certain design characteristics force a re-examination of the St. Francis type. Surface collection and site plan analyses suggest that during the Mississippi period, the Adams community may have been divided along both functional and social lines; basic functional divisions lay along lines separating public and domestic space, but social divisions are reflected in both kinds of space.