Background on Fort Ancient

I think it's time I gave a little more information about the Native Americans whose site I've been working on, especially since I keep making references to all these time periods and artifacts found that may not seem to make much sense out of context.  I already gave some information about the Fort Ancient Indians (and yes, that is what all the archaeologists call them, since I suppose they're a little too lazy to say "Native Americans" or prefer to stick to traditional terms), especially time period (1300-1500 CE) and at least one location where they're found, which is located at the park we excavate in.  Fort Ancient Indians thrived more realistically in the Ohio and Kentucky valleys closer to 1000-1650 CE.  Their villages were usually in the circular shape as seen in the site with rectangular houses (which we saw when excavating post holes) and a central plaza for more public and shared activities, indicating a more sedentary lifestyle.  There has been some burial mounds by the Fort Ancient Indians, but that dwindled as time went on and they shifted their burials to a more cemetery setting.  Fun fact: last year, we accidentally uncovered a feature that we thought was a typical trash pit or the like, but discovered that it was actually an area full of burials, which would be a highly political ordeal if we totally uncovered those features due to protective laws over Native American burials.  Through the Cincinnati Museum Center, we tend to leave those alone in order to deal with less paperwork and being greeted with upset natives.  Much of the agriculture was maize-based, which we could see from all of the burnt corn kernels and corn cobs we find in the dirt when excavating.  Fort Ancient Indians were once thought to be a branch of Mississippian cultures, which could be supported with some evidence of Mississippian pottery sherds found in features on occasion, but the overall style of pottery and flint-knapping indicate a more direct connection with Hopewell cultures.  The pottery is recognized as Fort Ancient (especially during the Madisonville period) by being cordmarked along the rim and the neck of each vessel.  Each projectile point has a "Hahn hump" in the middle of the flint that makes it distinctive as a Fort Ancient knapped flint, though the reason for the hump has yet to be explained.  The predominant time period of focus is the Madisonville period, which is the latest time frame which, like the earlier time periods, did not indicate interactions with Europeans, but did point to a high point in culture and activity.  Hopefully with this information you will be able to gain a better feel for the context from which we extract the story of the Fort Ancient Indians out of the ground layer by layer.