Aztalan: Cahokia’s Failed Colony

Take back your personal data with Incogni! Use code [Barnhart] at the link below and get 60% off annual plans: https://incogni.com/barnhart Aztalan was a short-lived Mississippian city in what is now Wisconsin, built along the Crawfish River and believed to have been connected to the much larger city of Cahokia. Occupied broadly between 1000 and 1200 CE, Aztalan was surrounded by a massive palisade and contained a central plaza, earthen platforms, and houses arranged within the walls. In this video, Ed Barnhart explores why archaeologists believe Aztalan may have been a Mississippian outpost or colony rather than a typical Mississippian city. He looks at the evidence connecting Aztalan to Cahokia, including its architecture, trade goods, copper from Upper Michigan, and other cultural changes that appeared rapidly at the site. Ed also examines the people who already lived in the region—the Late Woodland communities responsible for Wisconsin's famous Effigy Mounds—and the evidence for interaction between these local populations and the Mississippians who settled at Aztalan. The story of Aztalan is also a mysterious one. The settlement was short-lived and was eventually burned to the ground around the same period that Cahokia was abandoned. Outside the main settlement, archaeologists also discovered a remarkable burial containing thousands of shell beads, adding another layer of mystery to the site's history. Finally, Ed looks at how Aztalan was rediscovered and investigated, from its early documentation in the 19th century to modern archaeological research and the efforts to preserve the site today. #Aztalan #Cahokia #MississippianCulture #Archaeology #AncientAmerica #AncientHistory #EffigyMounds #WisconsinHistory #NativeAmericanHistory #EdBarnhart