Investigating a Caddo Mound Site in the Ouachita River Valley

Abstract

Archeologists from the Natural Resources Conservation Service and Arkansas Archeological Survey employed multiple techniques to investigate a newly recorded mound site (3DA673) in the Ouachita River valley in southern Arkansas. Topographic mapping documented a large two-stage mound. Geophysical surveying around the mound revealed anomalies in the gradiometry and resistance data, and soil coring detailed floodplain soils. A test unit was excavated in a large circular anomaly that corresponded to a low topographic rise north of the main mound. While very few artifacts were found, a burned zone and a post mold feature suggest the anomaly was a burned structure covered with fill, and show the potential for buried cultural deposits at the site. Based on the 2010–2011 investigations, 3DA673 and the neighboring site 3DA403 represent the archeological residues of a Middle to Late Caddo period community (ca. A.D. 1400s)

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