Research reveals new insights into ancient mound complex of Poverty Point

[Judi Lynn]

Image Credit : Jeffrey M. Frank - Shutterstock

A joint project by the University of Louisiana Monroe (ULM) and the Minnesota State University Moorhead (MSUM) has revealed new insights into the ancient ceremonial mound and ridge complex of Poverty Point, located on the Bayou Macon in present-day Louisiana in the United States.

Poverty Point, named after a 19th-century plantation was built over several phases, with the earliest archaeological evidence suggesting that construction began sometime from 1800 BC during the Late Archaic Period, continuing though to 1200 BC.

Previous Studies have determined that the builders of the complex levelled the landscape to create a central plaza, surrounded by a series of earthen ridges and mounds that covers an area of around 345 acres.

The builders were an indigenous society of hunter-fisher-gatherers, identified as the Poverty Point Culture that inhabited stretches of the Lower Mississippi Valley and surrounding Gulf Coast. Over 100 sites have been attributed to the Poverty Point Culture, with anthropologists proposing that they descended from immigrants who came to North America across the Bering Strait land bridge approximately 12,000 to 15,000 years ago.

More:
https://www.heritagedaily.com/2022/01/research-reveals-new-insights-into-ancient-mound-complex-of-poverty-point/142571