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Timeline / Era of First Nations / 4500 BC: Mound builders keep gardens along the Mississippi River

4500 BC: Mound builders keep gardens along the Mississippi River

Ancestors of the Muscogee people build circular earthwork mounds—the earliest evidence of human habitation in North America—in what is now known as Watson Brake in northeastern Louisiana. They live year-round at the mounds and also keep gardens that are now documented in the archaeological record.

Theme
Land and Water
Region
Southeast

View of the Watson Brake earthwork mounds, the oldest circular structures in North America

Courtesy Lousiana Division of Archaeology, photograph by Thomas Eubanks