page_title: Mississippian copper plates
section_title: Illinois plates
hierarchical_section_title: Mississippian copper plates / Known locations / Illinois plates
caption_attribution_description: English: A illustration of the Mississippian culture Upper Bluff Lake Dancing Figures (also known as the Dancing Birdmen[1]) repoussé copper plate found at the Saddle Site in Union County, Illinois.[2]
context_page_description: Mississippian copper plates, or plaques, are plain and repousséd plates of beaten copper crafted by peoples of the various regional expressions of the Mississippian culture between 800 and 1600 CE. They have been found as artifacts in archaeological sites in the American Midwest and Southeast. The plates, found as far afield as Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Wisconsin, were instrumental in the development of the archaeological concept known as the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex. Some of the more notable examples are representations of raptorial birds and avian-themed dancing warriors.
context_section_description: Outside of Cahokia, Illinois has seen the discovery of many Mississippian culture copper items including copper maces, ear spools, several avian plates, a wooden copper covered mask (known as the Emmons mask), and headdress pieces. Three copper plates have been found, one of them been identified as being from the same workshop as the Wulfing plates and others as having stylistic similarities with the Wulfing, Spiro and Etowah plates.
  The Edwards falcon plate is a 37.8 centimeters (14.9 in) by 11.3 centimeters (4.4 in) copper avian plate found at the Material Service Quarry Site in La Salle County, Illinois. Before it was deposited as a grave good it had its head riveted on in the reverse position. It is one of several plates found in Illinois believed to have been made by the same workshop as the Malden plates.
  The Peoria Falcon is a unique avian plate found in 1856 on the shore of Peoria Lake. It is a 7 inches (18 cm) by 9 inches (23 cm) copper plate depicting a naturalistic peregrine falcon. It is part of the collection of the National Museum of Natural History, but it is on long-term loan to the Lakeview Museum of Arts and Sciences in Peoria, Illinois where it is on display.
  The Upper Bluff Lake plates are two plates found at the Saddle Site (11U284) in Union County, Illinois in the 1880s, in the same stone box grave. One of the plates is avian themed and the other a unique double birdman design, but still within the corpus of the S.E.C.C. The Upper Bluff Lake falcon plate is a 25.7 centimeters (10.1 in) by 8.25 centimeters (3.25 in) avian themed Wulfing style plate. It has a mostly intact tail, which the Malden plates do not, and has helped archaeologists understand what the tails of the other pieces would have looked like. The Dancing Figures plate is a rectangular 15.5 centimeters (6.1 in) by 16.5 centimeters (6.5 in) plate depicting two Birdman figures holding ceremonial chipped flint maces, possibly dancing, and shielding themselves from a possible liquid or ropelike motif falling from the top center of the plate. Stylistically the Dancers plate has been linked to the Classic Braden style associated with Cahokia and it bears stylistic similarities  to Craig A style shell objects found at the Spiro site. Both the plates date from 1100 to 1300 CE. Both of the Upper Bluff Lake plates are now in the collection of the National Museum of Natural History.
caption: Upper Bluff Lake Dancing Birdmen plate
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