Three projects took place at Cahokia Mounds this summer, and all were continuations of research that took place during last two years. Two projects were coordinated by Dr. John Kelly, through the Central Mississippi Valley Archaeological Research Institute (CMVARI), and the third was directed by Dr. William Woods of Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.

Mound 34:
Back in the mid-1950s, Greg Perino of the Gilcrease Institute in Tulsa, Oklahoma, excavated some exploratory trenches into Mound 34, a relatively small mound a few hundred yards east of Monks Mound, and which is one of a cluster of mounds that appear to define a plaza area. Perino found many exotic, or non-local, materials, including fancy pottery, copper, galena, shark's teeth, and sea shells.

The latter was most intriguing as some of the shells were fragmentary pieces of ceremonial cups that had been engraved with designs associated with the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (SECC), normally found south of here from Georgia to Oklahoma. Dr. James Brown of Northwestern University is exploring the hypothesis that the origins for some of the SECC concepts may have originated at Cahokia and spread southward, and that research into Mound 34 may elucidate information in support of this.

This exotic material led Dr. John Kelly, of Washington University, and Dr. Brown to believe this was a special elite area outside of the stockade wall-enclosed Central Precinct. Thus, they did testing to relocate Perino's old trenches with the plan to reexamine the soil profiles and features, which had not been mapped in detail, and review the context of these materials, as well as to better determine the age of the mound and its stages of construction. They led field schools from Washington University and Northwestern, and were assisted by another field school class from the University of Missouri-St. Louis under Timothy Baumann.

After two seasons of searching, the west wall of one of Perino's trenches was located last year and nearly 12 meters of the wall was exposed this year and mapped in detail. A, dark, organic, artifact laden layer defined the base of the mound, apparently soil borrowed from a nearby midden (village debris) deposit. Above this was additional mound fill of lighter soils with basket loading deposits evident. Two large pre-mound pit features were visible below the base of the mound with lots of debris in them. A couple wall trenches from structures were also evident. During the past two seasons, they also recovered more fancy pottery, nuggets of copper, a drilled shark's tooth that may have been part of a war club, a painted animal bone, mica, and marine shell, including small fragments with some engraved designs.

Perhaps the most intriguing find was what appears to have been an intentionally placed dedicatory deposit of 7 shells, possibly once in a container or wrapped up together, just below the base of the mound. One was a local mussel shell, but the others were whole or partial specimens of sea shells, including lightning whelk and fighting whelk (conch). Kelly and Brown plan to return next summer to further explore this intriguing mound.