GEOARCHAEOLOGY OF THE LOWER MISSISSIPPI VALLEY

The geomorphological description of the Lower Mississippi Valley (LMV) as presented by Harold N. Fisk in 1944 differed from most other repre sentations in that morphogenesis was always implied. The intellectual climate of the times was highly conducive to the multidisciplinary app roach. Then archaeologists were accepting the premise that the cultura l history of the New World involved a few millennia rather than just s everal dozen centuries. It is fortunate that some of the most active a rchaeologists came on the scene with strong backgrounds in geology and related earth sciences. These prehistorians were sensitive to the rol e of the environment in shaping the relationships of man and land. Vir tually every archaeologist who worked in the LMV immediately came to r espect and utilize the concepts of Fisk. Because, in part, to the intr oduction of radiocarbon dating, archaeologists of the last half centur y have furthered the refinement of Fisk's chronology but the basic con cepts have remained. This is not to say that there have not been vigor ous challenges to Fisk, but they have not destroyed the usefulness of this monumental contribution.