Chert from specific geological formations across the region was transported to Cahokia for use in tool production.

Pottery styles found at Cahokia show connections to communities across the Mississippi and Ohio river valleys.

The scale and reach of these trade networks imply something significant about Cahokia’s organizational capacity: the ability to manage long-distance exchange relationships, to produce and transport goods over large distances, and to integrate materials from dozens of different sources into the city’s economic life.

This is not the trade of simple village economies — it is the commerce of a major regional center, playing a role in the broader economy of eastern North America that is difficult to fully reconstruct but that was clearly substantial.