Editing History of Alabama (section)

==Indigenous peoples, early history==

===Precontact===
[[File:Moundville aerial HRoe 2020.jpg|right|thumb|270px|Artists conception of [[Moundville Archaeological Site|Moundville]], a [[Mississippian culture]] site on the Black Warrior River in Hale County]]

At least 12,000 years ago, Native Americans or [[Paleo-Indian]]s appeared in what is today referred to as "[[Southern United States|The South]]".<ref name=guy_prentice>
{{Cite web | url = http://www.kikisweb.de/basteln/basteln.htm  | access-date = February 11, 2008  | last = Prentice  | first = Guy  | year = 2003  | publisher = Southeast Chronicles
| title = Basteln Bastelanleitung Bastelanleitungen Bastelvorlagen Bastelideen }}</ref> Paleo-Indians in the Southeast were [[hunter-gatherer]]s who pursued a wide range of animals, including the [[Megafauna#Mass extinctions|megafauna, which became extinct]] following the end of the [[Pleistocene]] age. Their diets were based primarily on plants, gathered and processed by women who learned about nuts, berries and other fruits, and the roots of many plants.<ref name=guy_prentice /> The [[Woodland period]] from 1000 BCE to 1000 CE was marked by the development of pottery and the small-scale horticulture of the [[Eastern Agricultural Complex]].

The [[Mississippian culture]] arose as the cultivation of [[Mesoamerican]] crops of corn and beans led to crop surpluses and population growth. Increased population density gave rise of urban centers and regional [[chiefdoms]], of which the greatest was the city known as [[Cahokia]], in present-day [[Illinois]] near the confluence of the Illinois and Mississippi rivers. The culture spread along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers and their tributaries. Its population of 20,000 to 30,000 at its peak exceeded that of any of the later European cities in North America until 1800. Stratified societies developed, with [[hereditary]] religious and political elites, and flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from 800 to 1500 C.E.

Trade with the Northeast indigenous peoples via the [[Ohio River]] began during the Burial Mound Period (1000&nbsp;BC–AD&nbsp;700) and continued until [[European colonization of the Americas|European contact]].<ref name="NewYorkTimesAlmanac">{{cite web |url = http://travel2.nytimes.com/2004/07/15/travel/NYT_ALMANAC_US_ALABAMA.html |title = Alabama |access-date = September 23, 2006 |date = August 11, 2006 |work = The New York Times Almanac 2004 |url-status = dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20131016195242/http://travel2.nytimes.com/2004/07/15/travel/NYT_ALMANAC_US_ALABAMA.html |archive-date = 2013-10-16 }}</ref> The agrarian [[Mississippian culture]] covered most of the state from 1000 to 1600 AD, with one of its major centers being at the [[Moundville Archaeological Site]] in [[Moundville, Alabama]], the second-largest complex of this period in the United States. Some 29 earthwork mounds survive at this site.<ref>{{cite book |last = Welch |first = Paul D. |title = Moundville's Economy |publisher = [[University of Alabama Press]] | year = 1991 |isbn = 0-8173-0512-2 |oclc = 21330955}}</ref><ref>{{cite book | last = Walthall | first = John A. |title = Prehistoric Indians of the Southeast-Archaeology of Alabama and the Middle South |publisher = [[University of Alabama Press]] |year = 1990 |isbn = 0-8173-0552-1 |oclc = 26656858}}</ref>

Analysis of [[Artifact (archaeology)|artifacts]] recovered from [[archaeological]] excavations at Moundville were the basis of scholars' formulating the characteristics of the [[Southeastern Ceremonial Complex]] (SECC).<ref>{{cite book |last = Townsend |first = Richard F. |title = Hero, Hawk, and Open Hand |publisher = [[Yale University Press]] |year = 2004 |isbn = 0-300-10601-7 |oclc = 56633574|title-link = Hero, Hawk, and Open Hand }}</ref> Contrary to popular belief, the SECC appears to have no direct links to [[Mesoamerica]]n culture, but developed independently. The Ceremonial Complex represents a major component of the religion of the Mississippian peoples; it is one of the primary means by which their religion is understood.<ref>{{cite book |editor1= F. Kent Reilly |editor2=James Garber  |title = Ancient Objects and Sacred Realms |publisher = [[University of Texas Press]] |year = 2004 |isbn = 978-0-292-71347-5| oclc = 70335213|title-link = Ancient Objects and Sacred Realms }}</ref>

The early historic [[Muscogee people|Muscogee]] are considered likely descendants of the Mississippian culture along the [[Tennessee River]] in modern [[Tennessee]],<ref name=Finger_2001>{{Cite book| last = Finger | first = John R. | title = Tennessee Frontiers: Three Regions in Transition | title-link=Tennessee Frontiers: Three Regions in Transition | pages = 19 | publisher = Indiana University Press | year = 2001 | isbn = 0-253-33985-5}}</ref> Georgia and Alabama. They may have been related to the ''[[Utinahica]]'' of southern Georgia. At the time the Spanish made their first forays inland from the shores of the [[Gulf of Mexico]], many political centers of the Mississippians were already in decline, or abandoned.<ref name=north_ga>{{Cite web  | url = http://ngeorgia.com/history/early.html  | title = Moundbuilders, North Georgia's early inhabitants  | access-date = May 2, 2008  | author = About North Georgia  | date = 1994–2006  | publisher = Golden Ink  | archive-date = 2001-06-04  | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20010604085627/http://ngeorgia.com/history/early.html  | url-status = dead  }}</ref>

Among the historical tribes of Native American people living in the area of present-day Alabama at the time of European contact were the [[Muskogean]]-speaking [[Alabama (people)|Alabama]] (''Alibamu''), [[Chickasaw]], [[Choctaw]], [[Creek people|Creek]], [[Koasati]], and [[Mobilian Jargon|Mobile]] peoples. Also in the region were the [[Iroquoian]]-speaking [[Cherokee]], from a different family and cultural group. They are believed to have migrated south at an earlier time from the Great Lakes area, based on their language's similarity to those of the Iroquois Confederacy and other Iroquoian-speaking tribes around the Great Lakes.<ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.accessgenealogy.com/native/alabama/ |title = Alabama Indian Tribes |access-date = September 23, 2006 |year = 2006 |work= Indian Tribal Records |publisher= AccessGenealogy.com}}</ref> The history of Alabama's Native American peoples is reflected in many of [[List of place names in Alabama of Native American origin|its place names]].