Shell gorget

[7] Adena cultures created gorgets from slate and copper, but the Hopewell Exchange System brought exotic shells from the Gulf northward.

[8] A Glacial Kame culture marine-shell gorget from the Great Lakes dates from 1000 BCE and features an engraved bear or opossum with an umbilical cord.

Extremely common designs include the triskele, coiled rattlesnake, spider, chunkey player, and birdman, sometimes called a Falcon Impersonater.

Coiled rattlesnake gorgets were often found in the graves of young people and are believed to relate to age as opposed to status.

[16] The forked-eye motif, commonly identified as markings from a peregrine falcon, dates back to the Hopewell exchange, and the symbol references excellent vision and hunting skill among Muscogee Creek people.

[5] "Strength of Life" design is interpreted by Kvokovtee Scott and Phillip Deer (Muscogee medicine man) as referencing a whirlwind and dancing movement.

[10] There are over 30 pre-contact examples of the Cox Mound gorget style, found in Tennessee and northern Alabama and dating from 1250 to 1450 CE.

[1] The Cox Mound gorget style features four woodpecker heads facing counter-clockwise, a four-lopped square motif, and a sometimes a cross within a rayed circle.

The four-looped square, or guilloche, is considered by some to be a "whirling sun" motif, or a priestly or chiefly litter;[17] by some, the earth held up by cords to the Sky Vault at the four cardinal points;[18] and by others, the path of life with four stages of maturity.

"[19] Some agreement can be found in interpreting the cross-in-circle design, which references the sun[10] and the ceremonial fire, fed by four logs aligned to cardinal directions.

[20] In the late 19th century, women from tribes along the Colorado River, such as the Quechan wore defenestrated gorgets made from bivalve shells and strung on vegetal cordage.