Visualizing the Sacred: Cosmic Visions, Regionalism, and the Art of the Mississippian World (Linda Schele Series in Maya and Pre-Columbian Studies)

by George E. Lankford

flurry of painting and activity occurred at this site, probably between AD 950 and AD 1050. This information hints at the possibility that the genesis of the SECC/MIIS may even precede the construction of Cahokia. Late Woodland images from Illinois (see Brown 1989) and Picture Cave on the Lower Missouri River support the hypothesis that the symbolism is quite ancient. It could be that the oral traditions and rituals that most likely accompanied at least some of the pictograph production helped serve to formulate a “congress” of Late Woodland people whose cooperative efforts resulted in the development of the western Mississippian centers at the confluence of the Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio Rivers—that is, the St. Louis Mounds, East St. Louis Mounds, and Cahokia Mounds and the major sites in Mississippi and New Madrid Counties, Missouri.