New Research Shows LSU Mounds as the oldest known man-made structures in the Americas

quote:

---

New research reveals more information about the LSU Campus Mounds, including the discovery of thousands of years old charred mammal bone fragments and a coordinated alignment of both mounds toward one of the brightest stars in the night sky. This new information offers more insight into the oldest known man-made structures in the Americas.

---

quote:

---

Ellwood and colleagues collected sediment cores from the two mounds that are located on LSU’s campus along Dalrymple Drive to learn more about them. The cores revealed layers of ash from burned reed and cane plants, as well as the burned mammal bones. Radiocarbon dating of the layers of material indicates the mounds were built over thousands of years. These findings show that people began to build the first mound about 11,000 years ago. The scientists think that sediment for the southern mound, which they’ve named “Mound B,” was taken from a location immediately behind LSU’s Hill Memorial Library, because there is a large depression in the ground there. The mound was built up over a few thousand years, layer by layer, to about half of its current height.

---