Jaketown Site ( 22 HU 505) is an

archaeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology a ...

with two prehistoric earthwork mounds in Humphreys County,

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. While the mounds have not been excavated, distinctive

pottery Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other ceramic materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. Major types include earthenware, stoneware and ...

shards found in the area lead scholars to date the mounds' construction and use to the Mississippian culture period, roughly 1100 CE to 1500 CE. The site was a complex regional trade center that developed and was inhabited much earlier, from 2000-600

BCE Common Era (CE) and Before the Common Era (BCE) are year notations for the Gregorian calendar (and its predecessor, the Julian calendar), the world's most widely used calendar era. Common Era and Before the Common Era are alternatives to the or ...

, during the

Poverty Point culture The Poverty Point culture is the archaeological culture of a prehistoric indigenous peoples who inhabited a portion of North America's lower Mississippi Valley and surrounding Gulf coast from about 1730 – 1350 BC. Archeologists have identified ...

within the Late Archaic period of the United States. This culture is seen in more than 100 sites on both sides of the Mississippi River, from present-day Louisiana to Mississippi; it also was linked to more distant areas through a trading network. The site has evidence of trade in raw materials and manufacture of finished items that were distributed through the network throughout the Eastern United States. The largest and most elaborate earthwork complex of the period is at

Poverty Point Poverty Point State Historic Site/Poverty Point National Monument (french: Pointe de Pauvreté; 16 WC 5) is a prehistoric earthwork constructed by the Poverty Point culture, located in present-day northeastern Louisiana, though evidence of t ...

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

. The mounds were constructed as part of a later, succeeding culture, built to mark the political and religious center of a

chiefdom A chiefdom is a form of hierarchical political organization in non-industrial societies usually based on kinship, and in which formal leadership is monopolized by the legitimate senior members of select families or 'houses'. These elites form a ...

. There would have been numerous elite residences nearby, as well as structures to support certain crafts. Because of its importance of a regional trade center of the Poverty Point culture in the Archaic period, and long human occupation, the site was declared a

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...

in 1990. The mounds are listed on the

Mississippi Mound Trail The Mississippi Mound Trail is a driving tour of 33 sites adjoining U.S. Route 61 where indigenous peoples of the Mississippi Delta built earthworks. The mounds were primarily built between 500 and 1500 AD, but are representative of a varie ...

. It is managed by the state of Mississippi.

Mississippi Highway 7 Mississippi Highway 7 (MS 7) runs generally north–south from the Tennessee state line in Benton County to Belzoni, Mississippi. It travels approximately , serving Humphreys, Leflore, Carroll, Grenada, Yalobusha, Lafayette, Marshal ...

is routed near the site, which is approximately seven miles north of Belzoni. Artifacts found in the area near the site are featured on display in the Jaketown Museum in Belzoni. Dating of the artifacts has demonstrated that the Jaketown site was occupied by

indigenous peoples Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...

from 1750 BCE to 1500 CE, making it one of the oldest continuously inhabited sites in the region."Belzoni Visitor Attractions"
, Belzoni-Humphreys Development Foundation, accessed 26 Oct 2009 Archeological investigations have found that the smaller mounds nearby were hundreds of years older than the surviving two; they were built by peoples of a preceding culture. They were destroyed by plowing and being razed for use as fill for road construction in the early 20th century. The largest

platform mound Platform may refer to: Technology * Computing platform, a framework on which applications may be run * Platform game, a genre of video games * Car platform, a set of components shared by several vehicle models * Weapons platform, a system or ...

at the site, Mound B, is in height with a base of by . It has a projection on its eastern side that is thought to have been a ramp once used as a stairway. To its northwest is Mound C, another platform mound with a height of .

References

External links

Jaketown Site
- National Park Service
Lee Arco: Geoarchaeology at Jaketown

UM Museum of Anthropology
{{Registered Historic Places Plaquemine Mississippian culture Poverty Point culture Mounds in Mississippi National Historic Landmarks in Mississippi Protected areas of Humphreys County, Mississippi Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in Mississippi Mississippi Landmarks National Register of Historic Places in Humphreys County, Mississippi

See also

References

External links