But the direct connection between those oral traditions and the specific community that built Cahokia cannot be established with certainty.

This epistemic humility — this recognition of how much we do not know — is important to maintain in any serious account of Cahokia.

The archaeological evidence is substantial and growing.

The interpretations based on that evidence are reasonable and often well-supported.

But they are interpretations of physical remains, made by people from a very different cultural tradition, using analytical frameworks developed in the context of that tradition.

The specific meanings and experiences of the people who lived at Cahokia are not fully accessible to us, and acknowledging that limitation is part of taking the city’s people seriously as historical actors rather than objects of study.