Hopewell tradition

The Hopewell tradition is the name archaeologists give to a web of Native American societies in the Eastern Woodlands that shared ceremonies, art styles and a vast exchange network between about 100 BCE and 500 CE, the Middle Woodland period. It was never a single nation or culture: many regional groups took part, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf coast. Its best-known legacy is the great geometric earthworks of southern Ohio, eight of which became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2023.

The term was popularised by the archaeologist Warren K. Moorehead, who explored a cluster of mounds in Ross County, Ohio, in 1891 and 1892; the site took its name from Mordecai Hopewell, on whose family's farm it lay. What the people themselves were called, and even which languages they spoke, is unknown. How the tradition began is still argued over: some scholars once traced it from western New York into Ohio, building on the earlier Adena culture, while others proposed a start in western Illinois and a spread eastwards.

Most Hopewell communities were small, often one to three households beside a river, and lived by hunting, gathering and growing plants. Little suggests large populations at the monument sites themselves, and the earthworks are thought to have been raised by communities who gathered there for ceremonies and burials. Leaders seem to have held influence rather than coercive power; some archaeologists describe them as "big men" whose standing rested on persuasion, trade and religious roles. Most of the dead were cremated, with burial reserved for a few people of importance, often accompanied by rich grave goods.

Rivers carried an exchange system that brought exotic raw materials from across much of what is now the United States: obsidian traced to Yellowstone, copper from the upper Great Lakes, mica, shells and sharks' teeth from the coasts, and grizzly bear teeth. Craftworkers in centres such as the Scioto valley turned these into finished goods, and Hopewell items such as stone platform pipes have been found in burials far beyond the Midwest. The network's reach ran from Lake Ontario to the Crystal River mounds in Florida and west to the Kansas City area, and local variants include the Havana Hopewell of Illinois, the Marksville culture of the lower Mississippi and the Goodall focus of Michigan.

The greatest concentration of ceremonial sites lies in the Scioto and Paint Creek valleys around Chillicothe, Ohio, where burial mounds stand within geometric enclosures covering tens to hundreds of acres. The Octagon at Newark covers more than 50 acres, and researchers including Bradley Lepper have argued that it is aligned with the 18.6-year cycle of lunar risings and settings, though such interpretations are still debated. Hopewell artists worked copper, pearls and sharks' teeth into ornaments, cut mica into shapes such as the celebrated "Mica Hand", and were expert carvers of pipestone; many burial mounds are full of finely carved figures and pipes.

Around 500 CE the exchange network ended, mound building stopped and the distinctive art styles ceased. No single explanation is accepted. Suggested causes include warfare, reflected in later palisaded villages, a cooling climate that moved game animals, the bow and arrow, which may have made hunting and fighting more intense, and a shift towards full-scale farming. Some regional groups, such as the Havana Hopewell, are thought to be among the ancestors of later Mississippian societies.

Our maps for 100 BCE, 1 BCE, and 100, 200, 300, 400 and 500 CE draw the Hopewell Culture as an approximate area; the outline represents a sphere of shared practices, not a state with borders. The preceding Adena culture is drawn on our maps up to 200 BCE, while later peoples of the region, such as the Miami, appear from 1492.