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<< Other Photo Pages >> Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village - Museum in United States in The South

Submitted by Andy B on Sunday, 28 July 2013  Page Views: 14480

MuseumsSite Name: Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village Alternative Name: C.H. Nash Museum at the Prehistoric Chucalissa Archaeological Site
Country: United States
NOTE: This site is 13.699 km away from the location you searched for.

Region: The South Type: Museum
Nearest Town: Memphis  Nearest Village: Fuller State Park
Latitude: 35.062337N  Longitude: 90.129768W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
4 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
5 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
4 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
4

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stonetracker visited on 1st Feb 2024 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 4 Access: 4 Site is as described including the Nash Museum. Some additional notes: * The temple mound appears to be partially reconstructed, not unusual for mound builder sites. In particular, a tan clay facing has been applied to the front of the mound. It is thought that this is the way it appeared in late Mississippian times. * There is another smaller mound adjacent to the temple mound. As far as I can tell, this is the only other extant mound in the park. * There is a nice replica of a village house behind the temple mound. * There is also a replica of a segment of palisade enclosure, using wattle and daub construction. * Nature trails behind the temple mound traverse borrow pits and archeological excavation trenches of habitation sites.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Dodomad : C.H. Nash Museum employee Kiran Riar demonstrates how to throw a spear with an atlatl at Chucalissa. Image copyright: ilovememphis (Memphis CVB), hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API. (Vote or comment on this photo)
Museum in Shelby County, Tennessee. Before Europeans set foot upon Mississippi Valley Soil, American Indians had developed a vibrant and sophisticated culture in the Memphis area. Chucalissa Museum and Archaeological site allows visitors to explore the lifeways of these people.

Operated by the University of Memphis, Chucalissa serves as a gateway into understanding the science of archaeology and the interpretation of Native American history. Our museum exhibits interpret the prehistory of the Mid-South, and contemporary Southeastern Indian cultures.

Although projectile points dating back some 3000 years have been found at the site, most evidence indicates that the first town was founded around 1000 C.E. Although brief, this occupation, known as the Ensley Phase, paved the way for more stable communities in the following centuries. Little has survived of this first occupation, the site appears to have been a satellite of a larger community located near Downtown Memphis.

Around 1200 C.E. the village was again brought to life during what is referred to as the Mitchell Phase. Daily life and customs appear to have changed little, but this phase marked the initiation of the mound building phase with the construction of the first small mound. There is also evidence of contact with people to the south; yet again the village was short lived.

After being abandoned for some two hundred years, the site was again settled around 1400 C.E. During the Boxtown Phase of occupation, perhaps the most important evidence suggests a broad trading network extending from the Natchez area of Mississippi to Western Kentucky and Illinois. The most impressive evidence for these contacts is seen by the presence of potsherds.

Around 1500 C.E. the last, and most powerful settlement of the area occurred. The village constructed during this, the Walls Phase, is the one represented at the site today. During this phase, large mounds were constructed around the central plaza. Society and technology had evolved and produced a rather advanced chiefdom of both stratification and order - social and civil.

Find out more at the Official Museum Web site

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
1987 Indian Village Drive, T. O. Fuller State Park, Memphis, TN 38109
(901) 785-3160
Open most days. Small entry fee.
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Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : Interior showing thatched roof with vents (Vote or comment on this photo)

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : A reconstructed family dwelling (Vote or comment on this photo)

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : Some interpretation about houses at Chucalissa (Vote or comment on this photo)

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : Section of reconstructed palisade wall showing posts and wattle-and-daub walls. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : This is the only other extant mound at the site. It is to the left as you face the great mound. According to the interpretation, it was built before the great mound and likely was a rectangular platform mound before acquiring its more rounded shape due to erosion. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : Another view of the reconstructed large platform mound

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : Artist's conceptual model of site. Note that some of the housing was located well down the face of the bluff.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : Welcome sign

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by stonetracker : Good description of the history of occupation at Chucalissa, leading up to the final-mound building Walls phase

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by AKFisher : Symbols painted on a reconstructed temple wall on the platform mound at Chucalissa in Memphis in 1983. The temple was dismantled and the mound today has nothing on it. On the right you see the Hand Constellation, Orion, making its journey across the sky and through the underworld. Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (...

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by AKFisher : Chucalissa Mounds in Memphis, photo from late 1960s. This is how many mound sites displayed excavated burials and skeletal remains until 1990. Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016). 

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by AKFisher : Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016). Display at Chucalissa Mounds in Memphis explaining the importance of pottery.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by AKFisher : Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016). Archaeological reconstruction of the entire Chucalissa Mound site in Memphis, Tennessee from the mound encyclopedia. There is a large, square, sunken plaza area (still visible) in front of the main mound.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by AKFisher : Display sign at Chucalissa Mounds explaining how platform mounds were sometimes rebuilt and enlarged over generations. Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016).

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Andy B : Pottery bottle at Chucalissa Mound Museum in Memphis. The bottle is from the famous "Walls Site" just south of Memphis in Mississippi where virtually all of the Path of Souls death journey symbols were found on objects excavated from mounds there. Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016).

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by dodomad : Illustration displayed at Chucalissa Museum (Memphis) depicting the 3-part Native American Mound Builder cosmos and the Path of Souls death journey symbols. On the outer left you see the Hand Constellation (Orion) setting into the western horizon with the Milky Way. Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016).

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Flickr : Woodland and Archaic period axehead points at the Train Depot Museum, part of Delta Center, Helena Arkansas (75km from here) Image copyright: King Kong 911, hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Flickr : Native American Pottery at the Train Depot Museum, part of Delta Center, Helena Arkansas (75km from here) Image copyright: King Kong 911, hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Flickr : Potsherds from chucalissa indian village Image copyright: Argon[one] (Mike Baldwin), hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Flickr : The Platform Mound at Chucalissa is a "temple mound" at the center of a former Indian village just South of Memphis. Image copyright: ilovememphis (Memphis CVB), hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Flickr : 40SY1-3-2 Rhodes Incised Jar Side 1 Image copyright: katie jay (Katie), hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Flickr : 40SY1-6/1685 Nodena Red & White Bottle Side 2 Image copyright: katie jay (Katie), hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Flickr : 6SY1/553 Bell Plain Hunchback Human Bowl Side 1 Image copyright: katie jay (Katie), hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API.

Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village
Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village submitted by Flickr : Southeastern Indian Heritage Festival in memphis at Chucalissa village Image copyright: redcloudsky, hosted on Flickr and displayed under the terms of their API.

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"Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village" | Login/Create an Account | 7 News and Comments
  
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Re: Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village by stonetracker on Tuesday, 19 March 2024
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Reconstructed interior of a typical house site:

photos.app.goo.gl/GbRYzamwg8FUfCpb8

Note: My comment about one single mound was before I discovered there are in fact two mounds at the site.
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Re: Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village by stonetracker on Tuesday, 19 March 2024
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Palisade wall:

photos.app.goo.gl/csnEfLe9VA7J77W26
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Re: Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village by stonetracker on Tuesday, 19 March 2024
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Part 2 of site layout:

photos.app.goo.gl/CboqZ5RuNWMr1cq79
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Re: Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village by stonetracker on Tuesday, 19 March 2024
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First in a series of videos from my 02/2024 visit. This one on the plaza and site layout. Note that the "mound" I questioned in the video is actually the only extant one outside of the temple mound:

photos.app.goo.gl/8UL5qRXHqSjjzoEo8
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Chucalissa International Archaeology Day: October 17th 2015 by Andy B on Sunday, 20 September 2015
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Chucalissa International Archaeology Day: October 17, 10:00 am to 3:00 pm

For the price of regular admission:
Tour the museum and mound complex
Try your hand at throwing darts with an atlatl or playing chunkey
See live demonstrations of flint-knapping and spear-making
Children learn by doing in Archaeology Land
Watch a 1960 film of Choctaws making pottery, baskets, and blowguns
Stroll the nature trails

Family Days: Offered on dates below at 10:00 am & 1:00 pm

For the price of regular museum admission:
Take a tour of the museum
Throw darts with an atlatl
Conduct a scavenger hunt in our Main Hall
Tour our hands-on Archaeology Lab
Participate in a special fun program and create a keepsake craft to take home

Family program and craft activity change weekly. For a detailed description of programs and crafts, please see our online brochure.
http://www.memphis.edu/chucalissa/events/index.php

September 26 - Mystery Box/Pottery
October 3 - Stone Tools & Weapons/Snake Painting
October 10 - Music/Dreamcatcher
October 17 - International Archaeology Day
October 24 - Sports & Hunting/Coloring Book
October 31 - Trash Talks/Basket Weaving
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Re: Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village by davidmorgan on Tuesday, 25 June 2013
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Street View
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The Archaeology Channel features Mississippian Mound Site by Andy B on Tuesday, 20 October 2009
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St. Louis is not the only American city that sits atop the ruins of an earlier civilization. This week we take our audience down the Mississippi River to another such location in Welcome to Chucalissa, the latest video feature on our nonprofit streaming-media Web site, The Archaeology Channel http://www.archaeologychannel.org

Located in Memphis, Tennessee, the Chucalissa prehistoric site represents the widespread Mississippian Culture. Founded initially around A.D. 1000, Chucalissa village reached its peak around 1500 with the construction of large platform mounds around a central plaza. Part of a complex society and supported by farming and natural foods, the Native American people of this site traded throughout much of the Midwest and South. Since its rediscovery in 1940, the site has become an education center for the University of Memphis through the C. H. Nash Museum.

http://www.archaeologychannel.org/content/video/chucalissa.html
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