Effigy pipes of the Lower Mississippi Valley: Iconography, style, and function

•The Bellaire style of effigy pipes from the Lower Mississippi Valley is defined.•The two most common themes are an underwater panther and a crouching human.•The style dates AD 1100–1500 and can be divided into two temporal substyles.•The more elaborate pipes were made by master carvers, likely commissioned by priests.•The pipes were used in shamanic rituals that engaged with Beneath-World powers. Based on formal analysis of a large corpus of Mississippian effigy pipes, the distinctive Bellaire style is here defined. Native to the Lower Mississippi Valley, this style encompasses multiple themes, the two most common being an underwater panther and a crouching human. The style dates ca. AD 1100–1500 and can be further divided into two substyles, Bellaire A and Bellaire B, that likely represent change through time. We argue that the more elaborate pipes were made by master carvers, and were commissioned by religious practitioners who used them in shamanic rituals that engaged with Beneath-World powers. There can now be little doubt that the Lower Mississippi Valley was home to a considerable body of representational art during Mississippian times, one that has long been overlooked.