MOUND STATE MONUMENT

habitation site (from AD 1200 to 1500) of Indian farmers and pottery makers, near Moundville, western Alabama, U.S. It lies on a plain above the Black Warrior River, 17 miles (27 km) south of Tuscaloosa. Archaeological excavations, started in 1906 by Clarence B. Moore, led to the establishment (1933) of Mound State Park, which became a state monument in 1938. Developed by the Alabama Museum of Natural History, it became part of the museum in 1961. The monument (315 acres [127 hectares]) contains 40 square and rectangular flat-topped earth mounds that were used as foundations for dwellings rather than for burial. The largest, Mound B (58.5 feet high and about 2 acres at its base), was the foundation of a temple. A museum (1939) is built partly over exposed burial grounds.