Northeast Subsistence-Settlement Change: A.D. 700 –1300

the layout of the village as a whole may be seen as
homologous to the plan of an ideal dwelling, with the
entrance to the village compared to the doorway of
the community’s “home” (Fletcher and La Flesche
1911:137-138).
Settlements constructed according to models of
concentric dualism usually have a centrally located
open plaza area. Clearly, the plaza area is central to
the spatial organization of ring-shaped villages not
only because it has a sacred nature, but because its
creation plays a central role in the establishment and
planned layout of villages (Altman and Gauvin
1981:296). The plaza area in its entirety or a specific
location within it may act as an axis mundi, or center
of the world, linking the village to the cosmos. The
attempts by villagers to replicate the axis mundi within
their settlement could lead to the use of concentric
models as a planning principle for ring-shaped villages
(Pearson and Richards 1994:12; Siegel 1996:317).
The axis mundi may take the form of a fire (Bushnell
1919:34, 58) or ritual post (Dorsey 1894:458) in the
plaza’s center. Though they may operate on different
levels, concentric models work in conjunction with,
rather than in opposition to, diametric models as
organizing principles for the layout of ring-shaped
villages and the arrangement of social groups within
them (Fabian 1992:63).
Dunnell (1983:147-148) points out that the distributions
of activities and physical elements within ringshaped
villages (represented archaeologically by
postholes, features, and artifacts) are not limited to
concentric or radial patterning, but could also display
circumferential patterning as well (Figure 3.5). In circumferential
patterning, the components of a ringshaped
village are arranged along the circumference
of its circular or oval occupation zone. The occupation
zone may be divided into segments of equal or varying
size, which Dunnell (1983:147) likened to pie
“wedges.” Lévi-Strauss’ concept of a diametric model
can be related to Dunnell’s notion of circumferential
patterning, if the binary division of a village is viewed
as two “wedges.”
Figure 3.4. Concentric model of a ring-shaped village
settlement.
Figure 3.5. Circumferential model of a ring-shaped
village settlement.
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