Poverty Point
Hunter-gatherers in Louisiana move a million cubic metres of earth into concentric ridges.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 600 years
- Known to
- ± 100 years
- Era
- Bronze Age, Holocene
Poverty Point, built from around 1700 BCE, consists of six concentric C-shaped earthen ridges and several mounds, including one raised in a matter of months. Its builders were foragers, not farmers — there is no evidence of agriculture — and stone at the site comes from as far as the Great Lakes and the Appalachians. Like Gobekli Tepe, it undercuts the assumption that monumental construction requires an agricultural surplus.