Parkin Archeological State Park

The distribution of Parkin phase sites along the St. Francis and Tyronza rivers, the area the Spanish called the province of Casqui.

During the preceding periods, homesteads and small villages had developed throughout the area, but by this time endemic warfare had forced the populations to consolidate into the palisaded villages. They would leave their villages during the day to farm their fields, collect wood, and hunt, but at night return to the safety of their well-defended villages. The people of the Parkin phase were relatively isolated and protected from people of other phases to their east and southeast by swamps, which the Spanish chroniclers described as some of the worst they had crossed. The swamps acted as buffer zones between the competing, hostile phases.

As time went on, the people of the Parkin phase developed a material culture that increasingly diverged from that of the surrounding phases. Among other indicators, this distinction was characterized by changes in pottery designs and mortuary practices. The cultural changes show that the peoples of the Parkin phase were becoming isolated from their neighbors not only culturally but also physically.[7] Motifs on artifacts found at the Parkin phase sites show that the people were part of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex, an extensive religious and trade network that brought Mill Creek chert, whelk shells, and other exotic goods to the Parkin phase sites.

Maize was the main foodstuff grown by the peoples of Parkin

The people of Parkin were intensely involved in maize agriculture, as well as cultivating other food crops originating in the Americas, such as beans, gourds, squash, and sunflowers. Women managed most of the cultivation and processing, including developing varieties of maize and other vegetables. After the harvest, maize was stored in large above ground cribs for consumption during the remainder of the year. The women also gathered wild foodstuffs such as pecans and persimmons.[6]

The De Soto chroniclers described the area as being intensely cultivated, and as the most populous they had seen in La Florida. They said there were groves of wild fruit and nut-bearing trees, implying that the Parkin phase peoples must have chosen to retain them while clearing other trees for the cultivation of maize and their other crops.[4] The men hunted such game as whitetail deer, squirrel, rabbit, turkey, and mallard, as well as fishing for alligator gar, catfish, drum, turtles and mussels. The two rivers and the moat must have been a very productive source of fish, as the De Soto chroniclers often mentioned receiving "gifts of fish" from the residents of Casqui.

The people of Parkin were probably Tunican or Siouan speaking. It is known that the Tunica were in the area at the time of the de Soto Entrada. The related group of phases present in the region may have all been Tunica peoples, with Caddoan speakers to their west and south. By the time of later European contact in the 1670s and the beginning of the historic period, the area was occupied by the Quapaw, who spoke a Dhegiha Siouan language. Unsuccessful attempts have been made to connect pottery styles and words from the de Soto narratives with the Quapaw.[8]

S.E.C.C. motif mortuary pot from the Parkin site

Bust showing how inhabitants may have looked

Most pottery found at the Parkin site is of the kind known as Mississippian Plain var. Neeleys Ferry and Barton Incised var. Togo (formerly called Parkin Punctated). Pottery found at Parkin phase sites are usually utilitarian wares rather than the elaborate mortuary types found at the Nodena, Kent or Walls phase burials. The archaeologist Clarence Bloomfield Moore described pottery from St. Francis River sites with adjectives such as "lopsided", "insufficiently fired", "rude and scanty", of "inferior surface" and "great monotony". But elaborate effigy pottery has also been found at these sites, including five human head effigy pots, underwater panther effigies, elaborate fish and dog effigies, and red and white spiral, swastika and stripped bottles. The inclusion of less specifically mortuary wares found in graves seems to be a cultural difference between the Parkin peoples and the peoples of the surrounding phases.

The Parkin phase people put a bowl and a bottle into a grave with the bodies, as did the people of the Nodena, Walls, and Kent phases. Pottery made by the Parkin people was built up from strips of clay, and then smoothed out by the potter. This technique was much like that of other pottery in the Eastern America area, where the potters wheel was unknown. Slips using galena for white, hematite for red, and sometimes graphite for black were used to paint the pottery.[7] The effigy head pots give an idea of what the people of the Parkin site may have looked like, as shown by this bust on display at the Parkin site museum.

Glass chevron beads of the type used by the Spanish

On the day of our arrival, the Cacique said that inasmuch as he knew the Governor to be a man from the sky, who must necessarily have to go away, he besought him to leave a sign, of which he might ask support in his wars, and his people call upon for rain, of which their fields had great need, as their children were dying of hunger. The Governor commanded that a very tall cross be made of two, pines, and told him to return the next day, when he would give him the sign from heaven for which he asked; but that the Chief must believe nothing could be needed if he had a true faith in the cross. He returned the next day, complaining much because we so long delayed giving him the sign he asked, and he had good- will to serve and follow us. Thereupon he set up a loud wailing because the compliance was not immediate, which caused us all to weep, witnessing such devotion and earnestness in his entreaties. The Governor told him to bring all his people back in the evening, and that we would go with them to his town and take thither the sign he had asked. He came in the afternoon with them, and we went in procession to the town, while they followed us. Arriving there, as it is the custom of the Caciques to have near their houses a high hill, made by hand, some having the houses placed thereon, we set up the cross on the summit of a mount, and we all went on bended knees, with great humility, to kiss the foot of that cross. The Indians did the same as they saw us do, nor more nor less; then directly they brought a great quantity of cane, making a fence about it; and we returned that night to our camp.

— - LUYS HERNANDEZ De BIEMA, 1544[11]

Main mound and its interpretative sign at the Parkin site

In 1966, a Spanish trade bead, which matches descriptions of the seven-layer glass beads carried by the expedition, was found at the Parkin site, as well as a brass bell known as a "Clarksdale bell".[12][13] The bell was associated with a child's burial, which also contained four pottery items, all known types of Parkin phase pottery.[6] This is one of only a handful of sites in the Southeast where items from the de Soto expedition have been found in a datable archaeological context. In 1977, a large charred posthole was found at the summit of the large substructure mound at the Parkin site.[7] In 2016, a portion of a cypress log, believed to be part of the cross that De Soto erected on the site in 1541, was unearthed. It was still under study in April 2016.[14]