Ancient Native American Mounds in Louisiana (2022)
It is difficult to overestimate our dependence upon the natural environment. Entrenched within busy careers and lives, though, only a catastrophic event, such as a devastating hurricane or massive river flooding, can remind many folks of this dependency.
Most of us don’t know much, and don’t think often, about the science and often centuries of development that led to many of our common household, transportation, communication and entertainment devices. We can fail to grasp the underlying reliance of many of these developed resources on our natural environment.
Perhaps better appreciation of the critical value of our natural environment can come from more awareness of the lifestyles and challenges of our early human ancestors. Our ancestors might have lived in Africa, Asia, Europe, or the Americas a millennium or more ago. My own family tree apparently includes at least one Native American branch that extends from the Creek tribe in Georgia more than two centuries ago. Let’s go back earlier, though, to the native people who started settling in locations along the lower Mississippi River deltas by about 6,000 to 7,000 years ago.
We are fortunate in this state to have learning resources and interpretive centers at the Poverty Point World Heritage Site and at the Marksville National Historic Landmark. The Louisiana Ancient Mounds Trail is five-hour vehicle tour with stops at these centers as well as many other mound sites in northeast and central Louisiana. The Ancient Mounds Trail Guide provides site descriptions and directions to state historical markers at 39 sites. Further information and a brochure on the Ancient Mound Sites of Louisiana is available at Poverty Point or online. Both the trail guide and brochure were published by the Louisiana Division of Archaeology. Prior to mound site visits, I’d recommend reading several online resources, such as Amélie A. Walker’s “Following the Trail of Ancient Louisianians,” Archaeology Magazine Archive (2004).
Louisiana and Mississippi each have more than 800 discovered mound sites. Native mound building started as ancient people became at least seasonally located in a site that afforded them abundant fishing, hunting and gathering resources. The earthen mounds were used for different purposes depending on the particular native culture and time period. Mounds and in some cases long, curved ridges, such as at Poverty Point, certainly provided community residents at least some protection from occasional, moderate flooding that occurred at these sites usually located very near bayous and other waterways. There is evidence 3,500 or more years ago that these waterways started to open trading opportunities for natives to obtain additional resources from places far distant.
A few mound sites, such as Watson Brake along the Ouachita River south of West Monroe and the Campus Mounds at LSU in Baton Rouge, appear to have been constructed as early as 6,000 years ago. This was long before the construction of Stonehenge in England and the first Egyptian pyramids. Archaeological work only a few decades ago at the Watson Brake site led to new conclusions concerning its early mound builders. The mounds and ridges at Poverty Point, by comparison, were built later at around 1700 BCE, while the Marksville mounds were of more recent appearance in about 1CE. Mounds were apparently still being constructed in parts of Louisiana in 1500 CE and possibly later.
It has been claimed that Poverty Point had at least several thousand residents at its population peak. One mound there appears to have been the largest earthen construction (72 feet in height today) for many centuries in what is now the USA. Built by toting basket loads of earth from nearby borrow pits, estimates have been made that this one mound construction took about 15.5 million basket loads of 50-pounds in weight.
The 2.6-mile walking trail around the Poverty Point site near Epps allows visitors a chance to ascend this high mound as well as discover other mounds and landmarks there. A road option for visitors is also available. Use of The Hiking Trail Guide for Poverty Point, published by Advocates of Poverty Point, has made my own experiences there more reflective and rewarding ones.
Poverty Point and other state mound sites were eventually abandoned. Site abandonments have been explained as likely due to shifts in climate and more frequent, severe flooding along the waterways in the Lower Mississippi Valley.
Ancient Native Americans before 1000 BCE had a much closer and more direct relationship with Louisiana’s natural environment. They didn’t have the technological means to detach or disassociate themselves from many changing environmental consequences. Technological advancements give us so many benefits that these ancients didn’t have. Our technological reliance can blind and make many of us arrogant, though. We can be blind to imperatives fostered by our changing natural environment and arrogant to assume that our evolving technologies will simply solve these problems sometime down the road.
Climate scientists disagree somewhat concerning the timeframe that we have yet to marshal the many technological and other resources necessary to reduce terrible human suffering from climate consequences. Some give us a window of less than ten years; others claim that we’ve already waited years too late. We have the scientific resources now to avert many climate catastrophes, but do we have the collective will and wisdom to do so soon? If we experienced the day-to-day, direct, and personal environmental impacts that of our ancient ancestors in this state did, we might better sense these environmental changes and have more visceral survival instincts. The ancients just didn’t have the diverse technological and other means to prepare and act effectively.
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