INTRODUCTION

From June 7 to July 1, 2004, Cobb Institute researchers conducted investigations at the Pocahontas Mound A site (22Hi500) in northeastern Hinds County, MS. Cobb Junior Research Associate Jeffrey Alvey served as Field Director for the project. He also served as Co-PI along with Cobb Senior Researchers Janet Rafferty, Evan Peacock and S. Homes Hogue. The field crew included Paula Andras (MSU MA 2003), Brad Atkins (MSU BA 2002), Russ Reed (MSU BA 2003), Robert Myrick (MSU AN student), and Justin Byrnes (MSU AN student). The project was funded by the Mississippi Department of Transportation (MDOT). The investigations were necessitated by MDOT plans to transform the Pocahontas Mound A site into a roadside park. The Pocahontas site is a Mississippi Landmark, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The park will include an educational center designed to provide information to the public concerning the site’s cultural and historical importance.

FIELD WORK

Field work was designed to provide an understanding of the site’s boundaries and the location of intact cultural deposits of prehistoric significance. The objective was to provide information for use by MDOT planners so that construction activities would not adversely impact the site’s intact cultural deposits. The field design involved a two-stage strategy including magnetic gradiometer survey and systematic shovel-testing across the project area on a 20 meter grid. The gradiometer survey employed use of a remote sensing instrument (Geoscan FM-256 fluxgate gradiometer) that measures the magnetic properties of subsurface features such as prehistoric houses, palisade walls, and pits, and maps their locations.

These investigations proved quite fruitful, providing a more holistic picture of the site’s structure and significance. The recovered evidence suggests that the Pocahontas Mound A site was not simply a ceremonial center, visited only periodically for ceremonial purposes. The investigations revealed evidence of midden deposits, midden filled pits, postholes, and vast amounts of animal bone and fired clay: all indicators of more intense, sustained occupation. The radiocarbon dates and artifact evidence from the site suggest that Pocahontas was occupied first in the Middle-Late Archaic period (4000-1000 B.C.). This evidence also suggests that substantial occupation at the site appears to have begun during the Coles Creek period and continued well into the Plaquemine period, spanning a period from around A.D. 800 to 1300.

PROJECT'S CURRENT STATUS

The Pocahontas project is currently in the process of re-analyzing the ceramic, faunal and floral materials recovered by Marc Rucker of MDOT during the mid 1970s. From a midden deposit located just east of Mound A, Rucker recovered large samples of ceramics and well preserved floral and faunal materials. This re-analysis will allow for a more thorough understanding of the subsistence practices of the site’s occupants and how site function changed through time. A report on our findings from the summer 2004 investigations has been submitted to MDOT to assist their planners in the construction of the roadside park. Another report will be submitted to MDOT by March 2006 which will combine our findings from summer 2004 with those from the re-analysis of the materials acquired during Rucker's investigations.

A subsequent phase of the project will involve the design and creation of illustrative and interpretive materials to be installed at the site. Dylan Karges, newly appointed to the Cobb staff as graphics specialist and exhibit designer, will assist the investigating team in preparing these materials.

POCAHONTAS BIBLIOGRAPHY