🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Fort Ancient Earthworks
Hopewell 1–450 CE · Hopewell tradition
Largest hilltop enclosure: 40 ha with 67 gateways, Hopewell 1–450 CE, UNESCO 2023.
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9 places to sift through. Narrow by kind, country, period or how firmly each one is established — contested and pseudoarchaeological claims are labelled here, never hidden.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Hopewell 1–450 CE · Hopewell tradition
Largest hilltop enclosure: 40 ha with 67 gateways, Hopewell 1–450 CE, UNESCO 2023.
🇺🇸 United States · Temple complex
Chacoan Phenomenon 828–1126 CE · Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi) Chaco
Pueblo Bonito – Chaco's 800-room D-shaped great house (828–1126 CE), 4 stories, 650 rooms, theatral central plaza and 32 kivas, aligned to cardinal directions and Chaco meridian.
🇺🇸 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 · Archaeological wonder
Pueblo II–III 850–1250 CE (Chacoan fluorescence 1020–1140) · Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi) / Chacoan
Chacoan canyon with 15 monumental Great Houses (Pueblo Bonito 650 rooms, 35 kivas) and engineered roads, built 850–1150 CE by Ancestral Puebloans as ritual and trade center for San Juan Basin,…
🇺🇸 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
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 · 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 · Earthwork
Late Archaic 1700–1100 BCE (peak 1500–1200 BCE) · Poverty Point culture
Late Archaic earthwork complex (1700–1100 BCE) with six concentric C-shaped ridges (1.2 km outer diameter) and six mounds, including 22 m-high Mound A – one of largest Archaic earthworks in North…
🇺🇸 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…