Final installment of a two-part series on the Mississippian Indian culture in Alabama.

The Mississippian people, regardless of their location, occupied their time gathering and growing food for their families. They farmed open ground and cleared more by using a slash and burn technique that allowed them to expand their efforts. They also hunted the game animals of the forests and fished the streams, rivers and bays near their communities. Like their ancestors before them, they took advantage of the seasonal abundance of natural fruit and berries as well as shellfish and other aquatic staples.

In Alabama, the Mississippian people grew a variety of foods that became their year-round staples. Foods such as corn, a variety of beans, squash, pumpkins and sunflowers were grown as a routine part of the native diet. The women in the communities usually managed the garden, while the males within the society continued to hunt or fish in order to provide the meat component in the Mississippian diet.

To store any surplus, the people of this era engineered pottery from the sandy soil of the river delta and from the clay that could be found in abundance along the eastern shore of Baldwin County. To tend to their fields, the Mississippian people used a variety of celts (stone implements).

Fields were used until their yield was depleted at which time new fields were opened up for use. In many instances, the local population learned that burying fish and then planting on top of the fish improved the yield. In essence, the Mississippians had fallen upon the idea of fertilizer use without fully understanding the concept.

Even though much of the daily lives of the Mississippians did revolve around planning for the future, they also understood the necessity to enjoy their lives and did so in numerous ways. Games of all sorts were played by most, if not all, of the Mississippian people. The most popular of these games was called Chunkey.

The game was generally played between two players, one rolling a stone disc across a field while the other attempted to throw a spear as close as possible to the area where the stone stopped. Traditionally the game would continue until both players were exhausted.

The game is believed to have originated around 600 CE in the Cahokia area of the Mississippi River Valley. The game continued to be played even after the decline of the Mississippian culture. As a matter of fact, the popularity of the game increased among the more familiar tribes such as the Creek, Chickasaw and Choctaw. They continued the tradition playing on large flat fields and spending their time practicing during the warmer months of the year.

The Mississippian world came to a rather abrupt end once Europeans determined to claim North America for their own. Those that did not succumb to disease, inadvertently brought by the Europeans, fell victim to the more apparent violent interaction with men like De Soto and De Vaca who set about claiming the territory they explored for their king and country.

And based on archaeological evidence, the death of the Mississippian society may have begun even before the arrival of large numbers of European settlers. Whether it was drought, disease, warfare or crop failures, the sites seemed to be in a precarious position by the middle of the 15^th century and almost eliminated by the middle of the 16^th century. Nevertheless, as soon as the first European colonists made their settlements work, the world of the native changed dramatically, quickly and permanently.