Long-nosed god maskette

In the 1950s Stephen Williams and John Mann Goggin proposed the existence of an early Mississippian Long nosed god horizon based on the distribution and chronological positioning of the finds.

[7] In 1989 Jon Muller of Southern Illinois University proposed reorganizing the classification of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex into five horizons, with each as a discrete tradition defined by the origin of specific motifs and ritual objects.

The first horizon he defines for his Mississippian Ideological Interaction Sphere is the Developmental Cult Period which went from 900 to 1150 CE and is marked by the appearance of the Long nosed god maskettes.

[8] The long-nosed god maskettes may have functioned in the Early Mississippian Period of the eastern United States within an adoption ritual much like that of the Calumet ceremony of the historic period.----to create fictions of kinship between the powerful leader of a large polity and his political clients in outlying areas.

[5] Hall, an expert on Native American belief systems, theorised that the maskettes were used to identify individuals involved in the adoption rituals with the figures of Red Horn (who was also known as "He-Who-Wears-Human-Heads-As-Earrings") and his sons.