Rethinking the Role of Shifting Cultivation in Mississipian Agriculture

Anthropologists, ethnobotanists, and historical ecologists have asserted that Mississippian Period farmers grew maize and associated crops using shifting cultivation. Some have further surmised that maize-based cropping systems under shifting cultivation were inherently unstable and may have played an important role in the decline of Cahokia and other Mississippian communities. But a more thorough examination of the components of shifting cultivation, coupled with an analysis of soil properties, suggests that shifting cultivation may not have been a pervasive cropping strategy for Mississippian farmers.     Since declining soil fertility is a key rationale for farmer to fallow their fields in shifting cultivation, I look specifically at soil fertility parameters to enhance our understanding of these early maize systems.