Editing Cahokia (section)

===Rise and peak (11th and 12th centuries)===
In the years around 1050 CE, Cahokia experienced a “Big Bang.” The city-proper's three urban precincts: St. Louis, East St. Louis, and Cahokia were  all constructed at this time.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Pauketat |first=Timothy |last2=Alt |first2=Susan |last3=Betzenhauser |first3=Alleen M. |last4=Krutchen |first4=Jeffery D. |last5=Benson |first5=Erin M. |date=2023 |title=Cahokia as Urban Anomaly |journal=Journal of Urban Archaeology |volume=7 |pages=253–274}}</ref> At the same time, an ordered city grid—oriented to the north along the Grand Plaza, Rattlesnake Causeway, and dozens of mounds—was imposed on earlier Woodland settlements. This was accompanied by a homogenization of material culture (e.g. pottery and architectural styles) that divided the smaller settlements beforehand. Mound construction increased across the region in the 11th century in the floodplain and, for the first time, in the uplands to the east. Some mounds were built on earlier settlement locations—arguably by descendants emphasizing their particular ancestral positions in the new social order. All villages experienced either renewal and construction efforts turning them into mound centers, or were depopulated to become just a few households or a single farmstead.<ref name=":6" /> New settlement types including nucleated settlements, mound centers, small dispersed clusters of houses, and single-family farmsteads appeared throughout the region.

The city's complex construction of earthen mounds required digging, excavation and transportation by hand using woven baskets. Construction made use of {{convert|55|e6ft3|e6m3|abbr=off|sp=us}} of earth, and much of the work was accomplished over decades. Its highly planned large, smoothed-flat, ceremonial plazas, sited around the mounds, with homes for thousands connected by laid out pathways and courtyards, suggest the location served as a central religious pilgrimage city.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Bey |first=Lee |url=https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/aug/17/lost-cities-8-mystery-ahokia-illinois-mississippians-native-americans-vanish |title=Lost cities #8: mystery of Cahokia – why did North America's largest city vanish? |date=August 17, 2016 |work=The Guardian |access-date=March 30, 2020 |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}</ref>

At the high point of its development, Cahokia was the largest urban center north of the great [[Mesoamerica]]n cities in [[Mexico]] and [[Central America]]. Home to about 1,000 people before ''circa'' 1050, its population grew rapidly after that date. According to a 2007 study in ''[[Quaternary Science Reviews]]'', "Between AD 1050 and 1100, Cahokia's population increased from between 1,400 and 2,800 people to between 10,200 and 15,300 people",<ref>Benson LV, Berry MS, Jolie EA, Spangler JD, Stahle DW, Hattori EM. "Possible impacts of early-11th-, middle-12th-, and late-13th-century droughts on western Native Americans and the Mississippian Cahokians." ''Quaternary Science Reviews'' 2007, 26:336–350,</ref> an estimate that applies only to a {{convert|1.8|km2|adj=on}} high-density central occupation area.<ref name=":5">{{cite journal | last1 = Benson | first1 = L. V. | last2 = Pauketat | first2 = T. R. | last3 = Cook | first3 = E. R. | year = 2009 | title = Cahokia's Boom and Bust in the Context of Climate Change | url = http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1733&context=usgsstaffpub| journal = American Antiquity | volume = 74 | issue = 3| pages = 467–483 | doi = 10.1017/S000273160004871X | s2cid = 160679096 | url-access = subscription }}</ref> As a result of archeological excavations in the early 21st century, new residential areas were found to the west of Cahokia; this discovery increased estimates of historic area population.<ref name=":1">Glenn Hodges, "[https://web.archive.org/web/20180824183243/https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2011/01/americas-forgotten-city/ America's Forgotten City]", ''[[National Geographic]]'', January 2011.</ref> Archaeologists estimate the city's population at between 6,000 and 40,000 at its peak.<ref name=":1" /> If the highest population estimates are correct, Cahokia was larger than any subsequent city in the United States until the 1780s, when [[Philadelphia|Philadelphia's]] population grew beyond 40,000.<ref>United States Census Office, ''A Century of Population Growth from the First Census of the United States to the Twelfth: 1790–1900'', Government Printing Office, 1909, p. 11</ref> Its population may have been larger than contemporaneous [[London]]<ref>{{Cite news |last=Wills |first=Matthew |date=August 15, 2017 |title=The Mysterious Pre-Columbian Settlement of Cahokia |url=https://daily.jstor.org/the-mysterious-pre-columbian-settlement-of-cahokia/ |access-date=June 19, 2022 |language=en-US}}</ref> and [[Paris]].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Smith |first=Jen Rose |title=The US' lost, ancient megacity |url=https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20210412-the-us-lost-ancient-megacity |access-date=June 19, 2022 |language=en}}</ref>

Studies of Cahokia's rise see large-scale immigration as an essential contributor to the city's initial rapid growth.<ref name=":2">{{Citation |last=Emerson |first=Thomas E. |title=The dangers of diversity: The consolidation and dissolution of Cahokia, native North America's first urban polity |date=2015 |work=Beyond Collapse: Archaeological Perspectives on Resilience, Revitalization, and Transformation in Complex Societies |pages=147–178 |url=https://experts.illinois.edu/en/publications/the-dangers-of-diversity-the-consolidation-and-dissolution-of-cah |access-date=June 3, 2024 |series=Center for Archaeological Investigations Occasional Paper |publisher=SIU Press |isbn=978-0-8093-3400-1 |last2=Hedman |first2=Kristin M.}}</ref> At the onset of the "Big Bang," non-local ceramics begins to appear in higher frequencies across site types indicating interaction or immigration from populations around the lower Ohio Drainage ([[Yankeetown site|Yankeetown]]), Lower Mississippi Valley ([[Coles Creek culture|Coles Creek]]), Upper Midwest (below), and south-central plains ([[Caddoan Mississippian culture|Caddo]]).<ref name=":6" /> Many of these immigrants moved into outlying villages in the eastern uplands, referred to as the Richland Complex. Intensive farming<ref name=":9">{{Cite journal |last=Pauketat |first=Timothy |date=2003 |title=Resettled Farmers and the Making of a Mississippian Polity |journal=American Antiquity |volume=68 |issue=1 |pages=39–66}}</ref> and textile production<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Alt |first=Susan |date=1999 |title=Spindle Whorls and Fiber Production at Early Cahokian Settlements |journal=Southeastern Archaeology |volume=18 |issue=2 |pages=124–134}}</ref> occurred in these villages which has been interpreted as supplicant behavior directed towards the central urban core of the city. The novel practices these immigrant communities brought with them have been argued as essential to the creation of the character of Cahokia as a city.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Alt |first=Susan |title=Leadership and Polity in Mississippian Society |date=2006 |publisher=Center for Archaeological Investigations |location=Carbondale, Illinois |pages=289–308 |chapter=The Power of Diversity: The Roles of Migration and Hybridity in Culture Change}}</ref> One such example, the common mound-and-plaza pairing, was adopted from longstanding [[Coles Creek culture|Coles Creek]] organizational principles.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Steponaitis |first=Vincas |title=Medieval Mississippians: The Cahokian World |last2=Kassabaum |first2=Megan C. |last3=O'Hear |first3=John W. |date=2015 |publisher=School for Advanced Research |location=Santa Fe, New Mexico |pages=13–19 |chapter=Cahokia's Coles Creek Predecessors}}</ref>

Contacts across the mid-continent and possibly beyond are attested to have reached a peak between 1050 and 1150 CE. Mill Creek chert from [[Alexander County, Illinois|southwestern Illinois]], most notably, was used in the production of hoes, a high demand tool for farmers around Cahokia and other Mississippian centers. Cahokia's loose control over distribution, though not production, of these tools was important in emphasizing a new agricultural regime.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Cobb |first=Charles |title=From Quarry to Cornfield: The Political Economy of Mississippian Hoe Production |date=2000 |publisher=The University of Alabama Press}}</ref><ref name="SNOW2010" /> [[Mississippian culture pottery]] and stone tools in the Cahokian style were found at the Silvernale site<ref>[https://cannonvalleytrail.com/cultural/ Cannon Valley Trail]</ref> near [[Red Wing, Minnesota]], and materials and trade goods from Pennsylvania, the Gulf Coast, and Lake Superior have been excavated at Cahokia.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/daily/march/12/cahokia.htm |title=Ancient Cahokia |work=WashingtonPost.com |date=March 12, 1997 |access-date=December 16, 2021}}</ref> Cahokians traveled down to the [[Carson Mounds|Carson site]] in [[Coahoma County, Mississippi]] and built a settlement during the 12th century.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Johnson |first=Jay K. |title=Cahokia in Context: Hegemony and Diaspora |last2=Connaway |first2=John M. |date=2020 |publisher=University Press of Florida |chapter=Carson and Cahokia}}</ref> Others paddled upriver to the site of Trempleau Bluffs in [[Trempealeau County, Wisconsin|southern Wisconsin]], to create a mounded religious center at the end of the 11th century.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Pauketat |first=Timothy |last2=Boszhardt |first2=Robert F. |last3=Kolb |first3=Michael |date=2017 |title=Trempealeau’s Little Bluff: An Early Cahokian Terraformed Landmark in the Upper Mississippi Valley |journal=Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology |volume=42 |issue=2 |pages=168–199}}</ref>
[[File:Mound 72 sacrifice ceremony HRoe 2013.jpg|thumb|upright=0.9|A [[human sacrifice]] of fifty-three women at Cahokia]]
It was during the Stirling phase (1100–1200 CE) that Cahokia was at its height of political centralization. Current academic discourse has emphasized religion as a major component in consolidating and maintaining the political power essential to Cahokia's urbanity.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Alt |first=Susan |title=Cahokia in Context: Diaspora and Hegemony |date=2020 |publisher=University Press of Florida |pages=32–48 |chapter=The Implications of the Religious Foundations at Cahokia}}</ref> The Emerald Acropolis mound site in the uplands, was a site where the moon, water, femininity, and fertility were venerated; the mounds were aligned to [[Moonrise and moonset|lunar events]] in its 18.6 year cycle.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Alt |first=Susan |title=Religion and Politics in the Ancient Americas |last2=Pauketat |first2=Timothy |date=2017 |pages=51–75 |chapter=The Elements of Cahokian Shrine Complexes and the Basis of Mississippian Religion}}</ref> Immigrant ceramics early in the archaeological record argue that it was central in attracting immigrants as pilgrims. Political control was exercised in the Cahokian hinterlands at distinctive temple complexes consisting of T or L shaped structures and [[Sweat lodge|sweatlodges]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Emerson |first=Thomas E. |title=Cahokia and the Architecture of Power |publisher=The University of Alabama Press |year=1997}}</ref> Distinctive rituals have archaeologically documented at these complexes involving tobacco, red cedar, agricultural produce, and female [[Mississippian stone statuary|Cahokian flint clay figurines]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Emerson |first=Thomas E. |title=Medieval Mississippians: The Cahokian World |date=2015 |pages=54–62 |chapter=The Earth Goddess Cult at Cahokia}}</ref> Intense public rituals, like the sacrifice of dozens of women at [[mound 72]] and interment of powerful leaders in ridge top mortuary mounds, integrated populations in shared experiences and narratives of their world during the 11th and 12th centuries.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Baires |first=Sarah |title=Land of Water, City of the Dead: Religion and Cahokia's Emergence |date=2014 |publisher=The University of Alabama Press}}</ref>

One of the major problems that large centers like Cahokia faced was keeping a steady supply of food, perhaps exacerbated by droughts from CE 1100–1250.<ref name=":5" /> A related problem was waste disposal for the dense population, and Cahokia is believed to have become unhealthy from polluted waterways. Because it was such an unhealthy place to live, Snow believes that the town had to rely on social and political attractions to bring in a steady supply of new immigrants; otherwise, the town's death rate would have caused it to be abandoned earlier.<ref name="SNOW2010" />