Dogs of War: Potential Social Institutions of Conflict, Healing, and Death in a Fort Ancient Village

Abstract

AbstractInterpreting ritual activity at ancient sites, such as Sun Watch Village in the Middle Ohio Valley, can be difficult without clear and specific historical connections to later groups. This Fort Ancient site yielded evidence of ritual use of dogs and wolves that resemble those documented for several Central Algonquian and Siouan/Plains tribes. Although these ethnographic groups have not been conclusively linked as direct descendants of Middle Ohio valley populations, this information can be used as multiple specific analogies for understanding such “culturally unaffiliated” cases. At Sun Watch Village, local customs of dog and wolf ritualism became established at a time of increasing warfare and the appearance of Mississippians in the Fort Ancient region. Mississippians may have contributed to developing authority positions in individual villages that were coping with local population growth and in-migration of peoples within an increasingly hostile social landscape.