January 23, 2013 Lost City of Cahokia

[DanaC]

Love stuff like this. When a piece of the past suddenly presents itself like this it is really astonishing. Can overturn years of academic study overnight, or confirm things long thought unconfirmable.



[eta] That little bit of landscape could almost be in Britain. If it was a little less straight looking, more higgledypiggledy...but with the grass covered mound just nestling amongst working farmland.

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by DanaC

[eta] That little bit of landscape could almost be in Britain. If it was a little less straight looking, more higgledypiggledy...but with the grass covered mound just nestling amongst working farmland.

Exactly what I thought!

I love it when people find areas of mosiac, in tact and in situ.
And just work around something that has been there since Roman times.
Bill Bryson described one such place in Gloucestershire.

[xoxoxoBruce]

They've know it was there for a long time, part of a chain of "urban" centers stretching as far as Florida. Being off limits to amateurs, and not much chance of finding treasure, it's left to the government to explore. What the proposed bridge brought was the money and mandate to dig into the details of the layout and construction.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

They've know it was there for a long time, part of a chain of "urban" centers stretching as far as Florida. Being off limits to amateurs, and not much chance of finding treasure, it's left to the government to explore. What the proposed bridge brought was the money and mandate to dig into the details of the layout and construction.

One of my old fencing buddies is an archeologist who does these kinds of digs. It is interesting that the money to do the work is never there until a bridge, mall, or gas pipeline comes through. Projects around here have the advantage of undeveloped space to shift to. I imagine the Mississippi bridge is pretty site specific. Everything points to a much higher population density than previously thought, so I guess we have more history in America than we think.

[xoxoxoBruce]

The number of natives in the western hemisphere circa 1492 seems to be about 40 million. Working back the 25,000 years or so there seems to have been natives, it's easy to come up with maybe 100 million have lived (and left trash behind) in the Americas.

Of course most of their trash was organic, therefore long gone, but of the more durable stuff of metal/stone/bone/clay, I'd guess we haven't seen most of it.

As I understand it the Poplar St Bridge carries I-70, I-64, I-55, and sundry traffic over the river into St Louis. The new bridge will carry a rerouted I-70 over the river further north entering St Louis at Cass St. This is quite a ways from the Cahokia Mounds Park which is already penned in by I-70, I-55, I-64, I-255 and suburbia, so I don't see how this project affects that. If they're saying the Cahokia site should be much bigger, the new bridge is the least of their problems.
Methinks the Mail is hyperboling.

[Trilby]

Originally Posted by Griff

Everything points to a much higher population density than previously thought, so I guess we have more history in America than we think.

Like what Lisa said to her mother when Marge 'discovered' the internet: "I'm proud of you, mom. You're like Christopher Columbus. You discovered something millions of people knew about before you."