Towns and Temples of the Mississippian Culture-5 Sites

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• published: 22 Feb 2009
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The Mississippian culture was a mound-building Native American culture that flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 CE to 1500 CE. A number of cultural traits are recognized as being characteristic of the Mississippians. The construction of truncated pyramid mounds, or platform mounds. Such mounds were usually square, rectangular, or occasionally circular. Houses, temples or mortuaries were usually constructed on top of the mounds. 1. Kincaid Mounds Historic Site was among the largest Mississippian chiefdom centers, located at the southern tip of Illinois. It has been notable for both its significant role in native North American archaeological techniques. The area had royal or central buildings on at least 11 mounds (ranking 5th for mound-culture pyramids). 2. Winterville Mounds, near Greenville, Ms, is the site of a prehistoric ceremonial center about A.D. 1000 to 1450. Archaeological evidence indicates that the Winterville people lived away from the mound center on family farms in scattered settlement districts throughout the Yazoo-Mississippi River Delta basin. Only a few of the higher-ranking tribal officials lived at the mound center. 3. The Kings Crossing site is on the southern margin of the Mississippian cultural advance down the Mississippi River and on the northern edge of that of the Coles Creek and Plaquemine cultures of the South. It is located on a bend on Chickasaw Bayou, several miles north of Vicksburg, Mississippi. Like the Winterville Site, it would have been a mostly vacant ceremonial center, with the majority of it's population scattered across the surrounding landscape. 4. The Parkin Site was a 17 acre palisaded village at the confluence of the St. Francis and Tyronza Rivers in eastern Arkansas. In the early 1540s, the Hernando de Soto Expedition is believed to have visited several sites in the Parkin Phase, which is usually identified as the Province of Casqui. It is the only Mississippian culture site to have datable European artifacts from this time period. 5. The Province of Pacaha, ancient enemies of the Casqui, was located at the Nodena Site, several miles away from Parkin. The houses in the village were laid out in a very orderly fashion, located on the same axis as the mounds at the site, giving the whole site a planned look. Members of the de Soto Entrada described the villages of the Pacaha and Nodena peoples as being the most carefully planned and organized of all the the villages they had seen in "La Florida", which is what the Spaniards called the entire Southeast.