Southern States--Antiquities.

This thesis examines Woodland settlement patterns at the Brickhill Bluff site on Cumberland Island, Georgia. Aspects of Woodland habitation and social organization are not well understood along the Georgia coast. Using shell and artifact distribution data from excavations at Brickhill Bluff, this thesis attempts to discern how Woodland populations, specifically Deptford and St. Johns cultures, utilized the site between 1000 B.C. and A.D. 1000.
This study also examines the efficacy of the midden typology already established for the South Atlantic Coastal Plain by statistically comparing the artifact assemblage from Brickhill Bluff to samples from sites used to develop this midden typology. The aims of this research are to identify past cultural activities at Brickhill Bluff - specifically seasonal oyster collecting, general hunting and gathering strategies, and residential density. These criteria are compared with an established matrix designed to discern how past groups utilized southeastern coastal shell midden sites.

This thesis attempts to demonstrate quantitatively that Mississippian populations in the prehistoric North American Southeast utilized deer as a functional domesticate. "Functional domesticate", a term developed specifically for this study, is defined as a subsistence source that is consistently and readily accessed, both spatially and temporally. The concept of "domestication" extends to those economies which do not have animal domesticates but have access to procurement areas where animal resources can be continually and efficently harvested. The hypothesis is validated by using Bruce Smith's faunal model developed in the 1970s. His model in quantified by developing regression equations, indexes, and by creating "a Mississippian faunal use pattern." A literature review shows no previous attempt to use Smith's model to prove quantitatively the "deer as a functional domesticate" hypothesis. More importantly, the hypothesis is established without using analogies to the ethnohistoric/ethnographic literature, providing a useful instrument for studying prehistoric societies.