UNIVERSITY MUSEUM WILL PRESENT PUBLIC LECTURE ON ARTIFACTS SUNDAY

A slide lecture on the culture of lowland farmers of the Mississippi Valley will be presented at 2:30 p.m. Sunday at the Southeast Missouri State University Museum.

The lecture marks the re-establishment of the Thomas Beckwith Memorial Lecture Series at the university. The museum is in Memorial Hall.

Patrice Teltser, assistant professor of anthropology at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale will present the lecture. Teltser's specialty is ceramic vessels of the Mississippian Indian culture.

The collection of ceramic pots that Teltser will focus on was excavated around the turn of the century by Beckwith near Charleston. It provides representative examples of the dynamic culture and complex civilization of the lowland farmers of the Mississippi Valley.

Teltser's lecture will provide insight into the pre-history culture and an opportunity to view the museum's collection first-hand. A reception at the museum follows the lecture. The public is invited to both.

The Mississippian period began in 900 A.D. and lasted about 600 years. There is evidence of large towns and villages stretching as far north as the Aztalan Site in Wisconsin, up the Ohio River to the Angel Site in Southern Indiana, and south to the Moundville Site in Alabama.

Large town sites containing platform mounds, plazas and residential areas were thought to be the homes of priestly chiefs who supervised the surrounding villages and small farming hamlets. Cahokia, Ill., was the largest of these Mississippian centers.

Somewhat smaller regional centers were spaced along the Mississippi River, including the Towosahgy Site in Southeast Missouri. Part of the Beckwith Collection was excavated from the Towosahgy Site.