🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Watson Brake
Middle–Late Archaic (3500–2800 BCE) · Middle Archaic Watson Brake culture
Oldest North American mound complex: 11 mounds 5400 BP enclosing oval plaza, hunter-gatherer monument without agriculture.
🇺🇸 United States · Ancient village
Lubbock Lake Landmark
Paleo-Indian to Late Prehistoric (Clovis to Puebloan) · Clovis, Folsom, Plano, Archaic, Late Prehistoric
11,000-year stratified Paleo-Indian site — Clovis mammoth kill to Folsom bison beds on Yellow House Draw, Texas.
🇺🇸 United States · Ancient village
Pueblo Pintado (Red House)
Chaco Bonito to Post-Chaco (Late Pueblo II–III) · Chaco (ancestral Pueblo) → post-Chaco San Juan
Southeasternmost Chaco great house outlier (c.1050–1120 CE, Bonito II–III) on Pintado Mesa overlooking Rio Chaco headwater — eastern gate of Chaco world.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Casa Grande Ruins National Monument
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 · Earthwork
Grand Village of the Natchez
Plaquemine to Historic Natchez (1200–1730 CE) · Plaquemine / Natchez (Muskogean)
Natchez historic capital (1200–1730 CE) — 3 Plaquemine mounds and plaza where French witnessed 1725 sacrifice.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Bandelier National Monument
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 · Earthwork
Monks Mound
Mississippian 900–1200 CE (peak 1050–1200) · Mississippian (Cahokia)
Largest earthen structure in the Americas north of Mexico and centerpiece of Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Key Marco Archaeological Site
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 · Mound
Obion Mounds
Mississippian (Early–Middle, Dallas) · Mississippian (Western Tennessee)
Largest western TN Mississippian: 7 mounds, 10-m platform and plaza on Obion River (1000–1300 CE).
🇺🇸 United States · Ancient village
Kin Ya‘a (Chaco Outlier Great House)
Pueblo II-III; Bonito outlier peak · Chacoan outlier (McElmo transitional)
South Road great house outlier (100 rooms, 1080–1100 CE) 35 km south of Chaco — tower kiva, 8 m wide Chaco road berm to canyon, defining regional system maximum.
🇺🇸 United States · Rock art
Paisley Caves
Pre-Clovis (Western Stemmed) · Paisley (Western Stemmed) / Pre-Clovis
14,500-year coprolite caves — oldest human DNA in Americas (14,300 BP) with Western Stemmed points, Oregon.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Canyons of the Ancients National Monument
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
Aztec Ruins National Monument
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
Blood Run Site
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 city
Fort Center
Woodland Glades 450 BCE–1700 CE · Belle Glade (Calusa/Glades)
Glades woodland pond-mortuary and 1200 m causeway with charnel house, wood effigies in submerged pond.
🇺🇸 United States · Mound
Lilbourn Site
Late Mississippian (Lilbourn phase) · Mississippian (Bootheel)
Bastioned Late Mississippian town (1100–1350 CE) near New Madrid — 6-m mound with 3-ha palisaded village.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Hopeton Earthworks
Middle Woodland Hopewell 100 BCE–500 CE · Hopewell tradition
Hopewell 22 ha circle-square with 321 m Great Circle, UNESCO 2023 unit-of-measure type-site.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Spruce Hill Earthworks
Middle Woodland / Late Woodland debated · Hopewell tradition or Fort Ancient tradition
Hilltop stone-walled enclosure 42 ha above Paint Creek; Hopewell vs Fort Ancient debate.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Larkin Mound
Middle Woodland Weeden Island 200–600 CE · Weeden Island / Gulf Hopewell
Crystal River satellite burial mound with Hopewell copper and quartz, Gulf Hopewell southernmost evidence.
🇺🇸 United States · Ancient village
SunWatch Indian 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
Fajada Butte
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 · Tell
Keet Seel Cliff Dwelling
Ancestral Puebloan (c.600-1300 CE) · Anasazi/Puebloan (Basketmaker to Pueblo III)
Keet Seel Cliff Dwelling — buried ancestral tell/village at Arizona.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Emerald Mound
Plaquemine Mississippian Emerald phase 1250–1600 CE · Plaquemine (Natchez)
Second-largest mound in N America, 10.7 m terraced pyramid, 1250–1600 CE.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Rock Eagle Effigy Mound
Archaic–Woodland 1000 BCE–1000 CE · Woodland / Archaic
36.5-m quartz eagle effigy, 1000–500 BCE.