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CategoriesArchaeological wonders
Places that defy a simple label.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Pueblo III–present 1150 CE–present · Acoma (Keresan, ancestors Ancestral Puebloan/Zuni lineage)
Oldest continuously inhabited community in North America (since 1150 CE, oral history to 1100).
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Late Woodland effigy mound period (700–1200 CE) · Late Woodland effigy-mound builders (ancestral Ho-Chunk)
Contested submerged 'pyramids' in Wisconsin lake beside verified Woodland effigy mounds on shore.
🇺🇸 United States · Geoglyph
Late Prehistoric (Patayan) to Historic · Mojave (Aha Makav) / Quechan
18-acre windrow maze (800–1200 CE) in Mojave Valley — 600-m herringbone pale strips.
🇺🇸 United States · Geoglyph
Late Prehistoric (Patayan II–III) · Patayan / Hakataya (Yuman)
9+ Patayan intaglios (880 BP–1500 CE) on La Posa Plain north of Bouse — Colorado River style.
🇺🇸 United States · Geoglyph
Late Prehistoric (Patayan) · Yuman (Mojave/Quechan)
9-m Fisherman intaglio (900–1200 CE) on Plomosa piedmont — spearman with fish and sun.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Mississippian Spiro phases Harlan–Sprio 950–1450 CE (Craig Mortuary climax 1200–1400) · Caddoan Mississippian (Spiroan, ancestors of Wichita/Caddo)
Premier Mississippian and Caddoan necropolis and ceremonial center on Arkansas River: 12 mounds (Craig Mound – 10 m high, hollow burial chamber or ‘Spirit Lodge’ with shell-carved ‘Great Mortuary’…
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Middle Woodland Hopewell (50 BCE–350 CE) · Hopewell (Baum phase)
Hopewell rectangular enclosure (120×110 m, 1.3 ha) with habitation village overlapping embankments atPaint Creek terrace—rare instance where Hopewell domestic occupation directly associated with…
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Middle Woodland Hopewell (100 BCE–500 CE) · Hopewell (Marietta phase)
Hopewell ceremonial complex (100 BCE–500 CE) at confluence of Muskingum and Ohio Rivers, originally three enclosures: Capitolium Square (150×110 m terraced platform and graded way), Quadranaou double…
🇺🇸 United States · Rock art
Late Woodland – Fort Ancient (1000–1650 CE) · Fort Ancient (Late Woodland Mississippian)
Sandstone cliff-face bearing 37 Fort Ancient–culture petroglyphs (1000–1650 CE) incised on Mississippian Black Hand sandstone at edge of unglaciated Allegheny Plateau.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Middle Woodland Hopewell (100 BCE–500 CE) · Hopewell tradition
Unusual Hopewell (100 BCE–500 CE) enclosure complex at confluence of Paint Creek and North Fork, comprising nine geometric elements—four circles, two squares, crescents and parallel walls—covering 26…
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Ancestral Pueblo to historic 1000 CE–present (Hlauuma founded c.1000–1450 CE) · Taos Pueblo (Tiwa language, Northern Tiwa; ancestors Ancestral Puebloans)
Living Native American community and UNESCO World Heritage Site (1992) inhabited continuously for >1,000 years: two multi-storey adobe complexes Hlauuma (north house) and Hlaukwima (south house) up…
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Classic Hohokam 1150–1450 CE (Sedentary to Classic transition) · Hohokam (Ancestral Sonoran Desert, ancestors of O’odham)
Ancestral Sonoran Desert four-story Great House (18 m × 13 m, 4 storeys, 11 rooms, caliche clay walls 1 m thick, internal loopholes) – largest known Hohokam structure, preserved under 1932 modern…
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Ancestral Pueblo III–IV 1150–1550 CE (Pajarito Plateau settlement after Mesa Verde diaspora) · Ancestral Puebloan / Keresan and Tewa (ancestors of Cochiti, San Ildefonso, Santa Clara)
13,355 ha of Frijoles Canyon with tuff cliff dwellings (cavates), mesa-top Tyuonyi Pueblo (400 rooms, 1–3 storeys) and Long House cliff village (800 m long) in soft Bandelier Tuff (1.1 Ma Jemez…
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Glades IIIb–Calusa 500–1500 CE · Glades Calusa
Calusa Court of the Pile Dwellers: waterlogged painted wood Cat statuette, masks and netting 500–1500 CE.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Basketmaker II–Pueblo III 1500 BCE–1300 CE (peak 1000–1300) · Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi, Basketmaker to Pueblo III)
Largest archaeological landscape in US implying 30,000 people: 176,000-acre (71,200 ha) monument with 6,355 recorded sites – villages, cliff dwellings, kivas, towers and shrines from Basketmaker to…
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Pueblo II–III 1115–1287 CE (Chacoan 1120–1140; Mesa Verde 1200–1287) · Ancestral Puebloan (Chacoan then Mesa Verdean)
Misnamed 12th-century Great House built by Chacoan Ancestral Puebloans (Aztec West, 400 rooms, 3 storeys) and later occupied by Mesa Verdeans: E-shaped pueblo with Great Kiva (14.6 m diameter,…
🇺🇸 United States · Ancient city
Late Prehistoric Oneota (Blood Run phase 1500–1700 CE) · Oneota (ancestors Dakota-Ioway)
Largest Oneota town 1500–1700: 76 mounds and boulder enclosure, 6,000 residents on Big Sioux.
🇺🇸 United States · Ancient village
Fort Ancient 1000–1750 CE, Mississippian-influenced Late Prehistoric · Fort Ancient (Central Algonquian, Fort Ancient tradition)
Reconstructed Fort Ancient circular village (3 acres) on Great Miami River terrace at Dayton: central plaza 42 m diameter ringed by post-mold houses, stockade with bastions, and reconstructed cedar…
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Pueblo II–III Bonito 1000–1150 CE · Ancestral Pueblo (Chacoan)
Chacoan Sun Dagger butte: three slabs create dagger beam on spirals marking solstices and lunar standstill.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Pueblo III 1190–1280 CE (Ancestral Puebloan florescence) · Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi, Pueblo III)
Largest cliff dwelling in North America: 150 rooms, 23 kivas, 128–150 inhabitants in alcove 88 m deep, 27 m high below mesa top, with coursed sandstone masonry, tower structures and painted plaster,…
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Ancestral Pueblo Virgin branch Basketmaker III–Pueblo II · Ancestral Pueblo (Virgin Anasazi / Ancestral Pueblo)
100-room Virgin Anasazi pueblo complex partly drowned by Lake Mead, 300 BCE–1150 CE.
🇺🇸 United States · Rock art
Archaic to Protohistoric (7000 BP–1700 CE) · Paleoindian through Dakota
Midwest's largest petroglyph site: 4000 carvings 7000 BP–1700 CE on quartzite outcrop tracing 7000 years.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Hopewell 1–500 CE (Middle Woodland, peak 100–400 CE) · Hopewell tradition (Scioto Hopewell)
Finest Hopewell enclosure: 13-acre (5.3 ha) flat-topped earthen-walled enclosure (1,211 m perimeter, 1–1.8 m high) near Scioto River enclosing 24 conical, elongated and effigy mounds.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Ancestral Hopi (Hisatsinom) to Historic Hopi 900 CE–present · Hopi (Hisatsinom, Hopi-Tewa)
Continuously inhabited 900 CE Hopi terraced pueblo atop 300-m mesa.
