The year 1170: Cahokia Mounds burning and Netherlends is flooded

[Andrian]

So there are these 2 events that occurred in the year of 1170:

The first event occurred in the USA around where St. Louis stands nowadays, a mysterious huge blaze burnet the Cahokia Mounds, a great Indian city of that time, here a little backround:

...The city that once existed in St. Louis' current footprint is known today as Cahokia, and its creators are commonly called the Mound Builders because of the 120 or so enormous mounds they left behind. Shaped much like the stone pyramids of the Maya civilization to the south, these mounds rose up hundreds of feet, and were often built on top of tombs. At their summits were ceremonial buildings made from wood and thatch. Unfortunately, many of these magnificent creations were destroyed in the nineteenth century when St. Louis was built. The first evidence of a settlement in the Cahokia area is from the year 600 CE, at a time when the Maya civilization would have been at its peak. But it wasn't until after the largest cities of the Maya began to fall in the 1000s that Cahokia came into its own. It's estimated that the city center held as many as 15,000 people (making it comparable in size to European cities of the same era), and reached the height of its productivity between roughly 1000-1300 CE.

And right around the middle of that time period, in about 1170 CE, a devastating fire ripped through the main ceremonial plaza at the center of the city. After the fire, it appears that the city was a changed place: New architectural designs sprung up, along with new defensive walls. There was also a sudden influx of clay plates featuring sun symbolism. What happened? Who started that fire?

The second event occurred the same year in Netherlends on the holiday of All Saints day, it was one of the greatest floods in Netherland, this is what i found:

The All Saints' Flood of 1170 was a catastrophic flood in the Netherlands that took place in 1170. Large parts of the Northern Netherlands, and Holland territories were overflowed. This is the flood that created the Zuiderzee. "Lake Flevo" was once a fresh water lake, but after this flood a sea channel opened a connection from the North Sea into the lake through 'Creiler Forest', and turned the lake into the salt-water sea known as the Zuiderzee. The Creiler Forest vanished forever under the waves.

The sea area increased inside the Netherlands and large peat areas developed, which were easily washed away.

So, i was wondering could both events have something in common?

I remember reading in Mike Baillie's book Exodus to Arthur, if i'm not mistaking here, that, in that period of time, some parts of the US suffered greatly from fires, droughts and other unexplained earth changes for some time, and the cause may have been the meteorites that broke off the comets that were passing near our planet at the time.

Could the cause of the 2 events mentioned above have a cosmic origin?

 

[Oxajil]

Very interesting Andre. I did some searching around on the Cahokia fire, and found these tidbits:

What did cause the mysterious fire which destroyed America's greatest ancient city?

According to a study, published this month in the Journal of Field Archaeology, strange new evidence is leading to exciting theories about the fire.

At the new dig in east St Louis, archaeologists found luxury items such as clay pots and animal bones used in ceremonies.

The homes that were destroyed in the fire - around 100 in all - appeared to have been temporary structures.

The scientists now believe that instead of the fire being an accident or being set by an enemy, it was in fact a mass sacrifice.

The inhabitants left no written records beyond symbols on pottery, shell, copper, wood and stone.

However one clue that led researchers to this theory is that evidence shows that the homes which were burned were not rebuilt.

Previous digs in Cahokia showed that if houses burnt down, then dwellers would rebuild on top however in this instance, the ashes were swept into piles and left untouched.

Another clue, is that home design changed dramatically in the wake of the fire.

In the original city, the rich and powerful lived in large homes whereas following the blaze all the structures became more regulated and smaller.

Archaeologists believe that it is possible a group of rebels started the fire and took over the city. The use of the sun imagery may have been symbolic of a new religion or political leadership.

The fire was a major event in the city's existence and by 1400, there was almost no one left. It lost power and never regained its reputation.

So they're saying it's probably not a natural disaster, that it was some kind of sacrifice instead. However, perhaps there was a wildfire as there still might have been a drought at the time (see below quote).

The Lost City of Cahokia

In a paper published in a 2009 issue of the journal American Antiquity, a research team led by Larry Benson of the U.S. Geological Survey presented climate-related evidence that "a series of persistent droughts occurred in the Cahokian area" which may have contributed to the city's abandonment:

"By A.D. 1150, in the latter part of a severe 15-year drought, the Richland farming complex was mostly abandoned, eliminating an integral part of Cahokia's agricultural base. At about the same time, a 20,000-log palisade was erected around Monks Mound and the Grand Plaza, indicating increased social unrest. During this time, people began exiting Cahokia and, by the end of the Stirling phase (A.D. 1200), Cahokia's population had decreased by about 50 percent and by A.D. 1350, Cahokia and much of the central Mississippi valley had been abandoned."

Its Wiki page appears to say however: "The decline of the city coincides with the little ice age, although by then the three-fold agriculture remained well-established throughout temperate North America.", it also mentions two major floods. Perhaps it faced one extreme weather condition/event after another.

FWIW, I also checked whether there were any sightings of fireballs around that time, but only could find two possible events, one from 1168 "In Britain, a globe of fire was seen in the sky", and in 1170 "a bow of burning fire" was seen in Ireland. (According to the book 'Fireballs: A History of Meteors and other Atmospheric Phenomena')

Whether the event in the US and the one in the NL are related in a way I dunno, but they do sound like big natural disaster events (if the first one was one).