A Local Analysis of Early-EighteenthCentury Cherokee Settlement

To be quite honest I found the majority of this information to be very confusing. What I believe that I have learned from reading this information is that the results of the original analysis of Cherokee town placement and population c. 1721 are presented. The period and contemporary information were analyzed using local statisticsto produce multivalued, mappable characterizations of the intensity of the processes of town placement and population. Each analysis focuses on the scale and the space in which these processes took place among the Cherokee in order to open the way for examining the legacy of human-induced environmental change in southern Appalachia. There are numerous reported eyewitness descriptions of the eighteenth-century Cherokee Indians of southern Appalachia by traders, missionaries, and military personnel. Political and economic changes that took place among them during the eighteenth century. The study of colonial Cherokee settlement can be characterized as drawing circles or jelly beans around clusters of sites where archaeologists have found similar material remains. This is surprising since the various events of the eighteenth century not only led to changes in the social structure of the Cherokee but reworked the geography of social relations within and beyond the region occupied by them. It is commonly stated in the Cherokee literature that there were some 60 simultaneously occupied Cherokee towns in the early eighteenth century. Towns are further stated to have contained between 100 and 600 individuals distributed into 10 to 60 households and covering 10 to 80 hectares. One difficulty in translating these statements onto the southern

Appalachian landscape the Cherokee occupied is that there is no single historical list or map that either contains or places 60 towns. Analysis of settlement intensity of town placement and population to assess the effect of first-relative to second-order processes. The number of Cherokee towns and their associated population occurring in one year, 1721, in the heartland depended on the size and shape of this area. Intensity of either the placement or the population process at a given point is a useful way to convert the presence/absence information to a surface so the entire area, rather than just the point, can be evaluated. Once all Cherokee towns had been placed according to the available historical information, they finalized their placement using contemporary sources and a set of criteria based on historical, and archaeological evidence. Towns were generally stated to be placed close to a river or creek to provide ready access to rich alluvial soils that were easily worked with simple agricultural tools. The nearby woodlands provided wild fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and herbs as well as hunting opportunities, building materials, and fuel.