Ancient site · Earthwork
Watson Brake
An oval ring of eleven earth mounds, up to about 7.5 metres high and joined by ridges, in the floodplain of the Ouachita River in Louisiana. Built in stages from about 3500 BCE for some 500 years, it is the oldest known mound complex in North America, older than Egypt's pyramids.
Its builders were hunter-gatherers who fished and collected wild foods, which surprised archaeologists who had thought only farming societies could organise such work. The site is on private land and not open to visitors.
- Dates
- c. 3500–3000 BCE
- Still standing
- Yes
- Location
- 32.37° N, 92.13° W
How we know
No writing existed; the mounds are dated by 27 radiocarbon dates published in Science in 1997.
Nearby sites
- Poverty Point c. 1700–1100 BCE
- Blackwater Draw (Clovis type site) Clovis level c. 11,100–10,800 BCE
- Great Serpent Mound built c. 300 BCE (Adena) or c. 1000 CE (Fort Ancient) — disputed
- Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks (Newark) c. 1–400 CE
- Grave Creek Mound c. 250–150 BCE
- Teotihuacan c. 100 BCE – 550 CE (centre burned); declined to c. 650 CE