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Poverty Point State Historic Site/Poverty Point National Monument (French: Pointe de Pauvreté; 16 WC 5) is a prehistoric earthwork constructed by the Poverty Point culture, located in present-day northeastern Louisiana.

Evidence of the Poverty Point culture extends throughout much of the Southeastern Woodlands of the Southern United States. The Poverty Point site has been designated as a state historic site, U.S. National Historic Landmark, and UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Poverty Point site contains earthen ridges and mounds, built by indigenous people between 1700 and 1100 BCE during the Late Archaic period in North America. The 402-acre (163 ha) property now operated as the Poverty Point State Historic Site contains "the largest and most complex Late Archaic earthwork occupation and ceremonial site yet found in North America". Since the 1950s Poverty Point has been the focus of professional archaeological excavations. The earthworks are named after Poverty Point Plantation, a 19th-century slave plantation on the property.

The monumental earthworks of Poverty Point consist of a series of earthen ridges, earthen mounds, and a central plaza. The earthworks include six concentric, C-shaped ridges that extend to the edge of the Macon Ridge and several mounds outside and inside of the earthen ridges. These concentric ridges are unique to Poverty Point.

Dating to sometime after 1700 BCE, Mound B was the first earthwork built at Poverty Point.

Mound D is a rectangular earthwork having a flat summit that today contains a historic cemetery associated with the Poverty Point Plantation. Several lines of evidence suggest that Mound D was built, at least in part, by the Coles Creek culture nearly 2000 years after the Poverty Point culture occupation of the site.

A radiocarbon date on charred wood from the mound base indicates it was built sometime after ca 1280 BCE, making it the last Archaic mound added to Poverty Point.

Approximately 1.8 miles (2.9 km) south of the Poverty Point site center is the Lower Jackson Mound (16WC10) a conical structure 10 ft (3 m) in height and 115 ft (35 m) in diameter at its base. For many years, archaeologists believed the Lower Jackson Mound was built during the same time as the Poverty Point site. Lower Jackson Mound is on the same north–south line as the later Poverty Point Mounds E, A, and B.

Archaeologists have long debated the functions of the Poverty Point site.

The vast majority of artifacts recovered at Poverty Point are small, baked shapes made of loess, found in a wide variety of forms and referred to as "Poverty Point Objects" or PPOs. However, modern scientific analyses demonstrate that at least some of the copper artifacts recovered from Poverty Point were made from materials available in the southern Appalachian Mountains, where soapstone or steatite vessels at Poverty Point are also sourced.

Poverty Point was investigated and described by Clarence B. Ford and Clarence Webb, leading to the publication of Poverty Point, a Late Archaic Site in Louisiana in 1956. Kidder and Anthony Ortmann conducted research on various mounds at the site and completed a topographic survey of the Poverty Point site. The Louisiana Division of Archaeology established the Station Archaeology Program at Poverty Point in 1996 to oversee, coordinate, and conduct site research. The program remains active and has conducted numerous excavations at the site along with curating and analyzing collections from previous excavations at Poverty Point.

On June 22, 2014, the UNESCO World Heritage Committee inscribed Poverty Point as a World Heritage Site at its meeting in Doha, Qatar. Departments of the Interior and State in providing information about Poverty Point to the World Heritage Committee as they considered its nomination to the World Heritage List. The designation made Poverty Point the first World Heritage Site in Louisiana and the 22nd in the United States.

Quick Facts

• The Poverty Point site has been designated as a state historic site, U.S.
• The Poverty Point site contains earthen ridges and mounds, built by indigenous people between 1700 and 1100 BCE during the Late Archaic period in North America.
• The 402-acre (163 ha) property now operated as the Poverty Point State Historic Site contains "the largest and most complex Late Archaic earthwork occupation and ceremonial site yet found in North America".
• These concentric ridges are unique to Poverty Point.
• The vast majority of artifacts recovered at Poverty Point are small, baked shapes made of loess, found in a wide variety of forms and referred to as "Poverty Point Objects" or PPOs.

Source material: Wikipedia - "Poverty Point". Adapted and summarized for DiscoverScroll. Original contributors are credited through the linked Wikipedia article. Read original on Wikipedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes were made from the original.