The Archaeology of Carrier Mills describes the people who, for the last 10,000 years, lived on and around an island of high ground in the flood plain of the Saline River, near the town of Carrier Mills in southeast Illinois. It is one of the few books on Illinois archaeology written for a general audience, and though it is more technical than it might be, those interested in Illinois' prehistoric past should welcome it.

The book is based on five years of study by the Center for Archaeological Investigations of Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. Its research began when Peabody Coal Company planned to expand a nearby mine and, in compliance with laws on preservation of historic sites, contracted with SIU archaeologists to study the area. As the research progressed and popular interest grew, the archaeologists contacted Peabody officials about writing a book for the general public. In 1983, one hundred years after Peabody's founding, the company agreed to underwrite this book as a centennial project. In his introduction Richard Jefferies, who directed the research, summarizes the history of the project, its research goals and methods and the major prehistoric cultures that succeeded one another in the Midwest for the last 12,000 years. Chapter two describes the present and prehistoric environment of Carrier Mills, and the rest of the book discusses its prehistoric and historic settlements.

Although Jefferies thinks that small bands of people used the area near Carrier Mills as early as 10,000 to 12,000 years ago, the first people to leave evidence of their visits arrived between 8000 and 6000 B.C. during the Early Archaic period.

Evidence suggests that by about 4500 B.C., during the Middle Archaic period (6000 to 3000 B.C.), several families were living on the Carrier Mills sites for long periods of the year, and perhaps year round. This way of life, sustained over roughly 1,500 years, produced much of the deep midden covering parts of the sites — "the dark, greasy, organically enriched soil containing the debris and by-products of thousands of years."

A partial inventory of material recovered from this midden includes more than 1,100 Middle Archaic flaked stone tools (spear points, knives, scrapers, drill bits); various ground-stone tools (axes, hammer stones, grinding stones); more than 2,400 tools and ornaments of bone and antler (materials rarely preserved in the Midwest); plus large quantities of bone, seeds, nutshells and other food remains.

Also recovered were 223 human burials, including 154 dating to the Middle Archaic period. From research on these skeletal remains, Jefferies provides a breadth of information on the physical characteristics, health, injuries and vital statistics of the prehistoric peoples of Carrier Mills.

Jefferies also gives a full description of the Woodland (1000 B.C. to 1000 A.D.) and the Mississippian era (1000 to 1600 A.D.) peoples who occupied the site. Evidence from these cultures was mixed together when the area was plowed for farming, but information from each prehistoric period adds to our understanding of these ways of life. An account of Lakeview, a 19th century community of black settlers that existed on the sites, shows how archaeology can provide information about people living in recent historic times, particularly those too poor or powerless to have been well documented in written records.

Jefferies has explained most technical terms, has tried (not always successfully) to avoid jargon, and has included many photographs, line drawings and maps, as well as three detailed scenes of prehistoric daily life by illustrator Thomas W. Gatlin. The book is large (10" x 12"), attractive and carefully laid out and edited. Overall, Jefferies has written a scholarly, well-documented study that both he and the Peabody Coal Company can look to with pride.

Unfortunately, the book may be too detailed and cautious to whet the interest of a general audience. Take, for example, this dry description of the burial of a 27-year-old man: "... a copper wedgelike artifact was placed where the base of the skull should have been; the skull itself was missing. The skeleton of an approximately nine-year-old child accompanied the adult male." Why was the skull missing? What was the significance of the copper wedge? Who was the child and why was he or she there? Jefferies doesn't know and doesn't share his speculations. I wish he could have occasionally encouraged our curiosity with his professionally educated guesses on such matters. That would have given this otherwise fine book, as well as Illinois prehistory generally, broader appeal.

James Stuart is an associate professor of anthropology at Sangamon State University Springfield. His major research concerns the cultural ecology of current and prehistoric tropical Mexican Indian farmers. He also has a long-standing interest in American prehistory and has assisted in archeological excavations in the West and Midwest.