Perhaps ten thousand years ago, a group of people crossed over from Asia through Alaska looking for wildlife and game to hunt and began populating North America. They continued across the continent and formed various societies along the way.

Several of these groups that were less nomadic settled down throughout the Mississippi Basin and were known as the Middle Mississippian culture. They established villages near fertile land and water where they would farm and fish. Inside their village, their leaders such as the Chief and the Medicine Man would have a certain location for their house. When one of the leaders died, he was placed inside his house in a ceremony where the house was burned down. Usually dirt which was dug from a borrow pit that surrounded the village, like a moat without water, was piled onto the burned down house. A new house was soon built on top of this for the new leader. Over time, the level that the house sat on began to rise and the leaders lived on mounds that resembled pyramids with a flat top. Because of this custom they were also known as the Mound Builders.

Examples of mound building can be found throughout the Southeastern US including remains of settlements in Macon and Cherokee counties of NC. Other noteworthy well preserved examples nearby are the Etowha Indian Mounds just south of Cartersville, Ga. and the Town Creek Indian Mounds near Mt. Gilead, NC.

FUANA

CHEROKEE INDIANS

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