Area 100 km² | Phone +1 417-682-2279 | |
 | ||
Address Farm road 2300, Walker, MO 64790, USA Similar Clark's Hill/Norton State Hist, Gov Daniel Dunklin's, Morris State Park, Jewell Cemetery State Hist, Nathan Boone Homeste | ||
The Osage Village State Historic Site is publicly owned property in Vernon County, Missouri, maintained by the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. The historic site preserves the archaeological site of a major Native American village, that once boasted some 200 lodges housing to 2,000 to 3,000 people. The site, designated by the Smithsonian trinomial 23VE01, was also known for many years as the Carrington Osage Village Site, under which name it was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1964.
History
The Osage Indians were first recorded in 1673 by explorers Louis Joliet and Jacques Marquette. The territory claimed by the Osage at its greatest influence was vast and consisted of what is now southern Missouri, Arkansas, eastern Kansas, and Oklahoma. Between 1700 and 1775, a group of the Osage lived on a high, open hilltop near the Osage River valley that has been preserved as Osage Village State Historic Site.
At its height, the village contained 2,000 to 3,000 people and about 200 lodges. Archaeological excavations have demonstrated that the shape of their houses was rectangular. Pottery, weapons and tools excavated from the site have provided information about the daily lives of the villagers, who hunted, planted crops, processed hides and were very successful traders with the Europeans. In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the Osage Indians accounted for more than half of the total trade in furs along the Missouri River.
After the United States government took control of the Louisiana Purchase territory in 1804, the Osage Indians were gradually forced to retreat to Oklahoma.