Archaeologists Tristam R. Kidder | ||
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Location Oak Ridge, Louisiana, Morehouse Parish, Louisiana, USA Region Morehouse Parish, Louisiana | ||
Jordan Mounds (16 MO 1) is a multimound archaeological site in Morehouse Parish, Louisiana. It is the type site for the Jordan Phase of the local chronology. The site was constructed during the protohistoric period between 1540 and 1685.
Description
The site was once an impressive mound complex, with seven platform mounds surrounding a central plaza and an associated village area. It was once located on the Arkansas River, which has a relict channel nearby. The site was constructed during the protohistoric period (1540 to 1685) after Native Americans in the area were first contacted by Europeans of the Hernando de Soto Expedition of the early 1540s. The builders were an intrusive group in the area, possibly from the Mississippi River area to the east. By the late 1600s the site was abandoned, possibly due the collapse of their society brought about by the aftereffects of European contact. The site is depicted in E. G. Squier and E. H. Davis' Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley in 1848 as Plate XXXVIII Figure 4. In the early 1840s the site was purchased by Dr. Thomas P. Harrison and A.T. Hawkins Duvall. Clarence Bloomfield Moore tried to visit the site in the early 1900s but was unable to do so because the site lacked riverine access for his steamboat the Gopher.