|
The
Headpots of Northeast Arkansas and
Southern Pemiscot County, Missouri
James F. Cherry
Foreword by Robert C. Mainfort Jr.
Rare and mysterious pottery
from the Mississippian Culture
“A volume of lasting value to professional and avocational
archaeologists, museum curators, art historians, and collectors
of Precolumbian artifacts . . . indispensable to researchers
interested in the late prehistory of the Midsouth.”
—Robert C. Mainfort Jr., From the Foreword
“Jim Cherry has produced a monumental work that will
be of inestimable value to archaeologists and those interested
in American Indian artifacts and art. The copious, clear photographs,
along with detailed descriptions and background information
on each headpot, make this a valuable reference that can never
be superseded. This is the first chance anyone has had to
look at all known headpots at once, and the comparisons of
art styles and nuances of design are thought-provoking. Even
the stories behind the discovery of many of the vessels are
fascinating. Dr. Cherry’s decades of careful research
have yielded a book that will be an instant classic, absolutely
essential for researchers working in the Mississippi Valley
and beyond.”
—Jeffrey M. Mitchem, Arkansas Archeological Survey
In 1981, James F. Cherry embarked on what evolved into a passionate,
personal quest to identify and document all the known headpots
of Mississippian Indian culture from northeast Arkansas and
the bootheel region of southeast Missouri. Produced by two
groups the Spanish called the Casqui and Pacaha and dating
circa AD 1400–1700, headpots occur, with few exceptions,
only in a small region of Arkansas and Missouri. Relatively
little is known about these headpots: did they portray kinsmen
or enemies, the living or the dead or were they used in ceremonies,
in everyday life, or exclusively for the sepulcher?
Cherry’s decades of research have culminated in the
lavishly illustrated The Headpots of Northeast Arkansas and
Southern Pemiscot County, Missouri, a fascinating, comprehensive
catalog of 138 identified classical style headpots and an
invaluable resource for
understanding the meaning of these remarkable ceramic vessels.
James F. Cherry
is a retired physician who has been researching headpots for
over twenty-five years. He lives in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
Robert C. Mainfort Jr.
is an archaeolgist with the Arkansas Archeological Survey,
a professor of anthropology at the University of Arkansas,
and the author of Sam
Dellinger: Raiders of the Lost Arkansas.
March
8 1/2 x 11, 384 pages
828 color photographs, 232 illustrations, index
$59.95 (s) cloth
ISBN 978-1-55728-897-4 | 1-55728-897-6
|
