Poverty Point, near Epps, LA

Poverty Point is a National Monument, and state historic site of a mound-builder Native American community which dates to 1650-750 BC. The site covers a square mile, and you can see the remains of the rows of elevations where the homes were, in a half circle pattern with the bayou on the long side. Behind these, there is a large mound that was originally in the shape of a bird, the outspread wings, head and tail can still be seen. I got there too late in the day (seems to be my pattern) and had to hurry through it, but I had time to climb the bird monument and stand where people from over 3,000 years ago stood and that was pretty awesome. Even more awesome to think that they dug and carried and shaped the earth to build this mound, which is even now pretty tall and wide, and it has to be worn down by time. Archeologists are trying to figure out the purpose of the mound, as it does not have artifacts in it to show that it was used for burials or ceremonies. A state road cuts through the site; it was not discovered until the early 1900’s, when the patterns of the earthworks showed up on aerial photographs. You can see the half-circle rows, even after all the years and the land having been plowed and used. There are ‘ghost houses’, small tent like structures, set around the outer ring of the housing earthworks, to show the scope of it. There are also low posts set in the ground in two places where they have found circular areas that served an unknown purpose. At the visitor center there is a scale model of the site, which originally covered 400 to 500 acres. Altogether a fascinating site, when you consider what they built with what they had to do it with. Another one I’d like to go back and spend more time at.