What these people did have in common was participation, to varying degrees, in a far-reaching system of trade and manufacture or use of certain artifacts. Recognition of these artifacts is how archaeologists differentiate between Poverty Point sites and sites of different cultures. Some of these characteristic artifacts include clay cooking balls, clay figurines, small stone tools called microflints, plummets, and finely-crafted stone beads and pendants ([Figure 2]). Several things distinguish Poverty Point artifacts. One is the decided preference for materials imported from other regions. The other is the emphasis on ground and polished stone artifacts, especially ornaments and other status insignias.
Radiocarbon and thermoluminescence dates show that Poverty Point culture developed over a long period of time. By 3000 B.C., many of the typical artifacts were already in use. A few items had appeared even earlier. During the next thousand years, new artifacts and new styles were added, and by 2000-1800 B.C., an early stage of Poverty Point culture had evolved in some areas. However, the period between 1500 and 700 B.C. was the most climactic, because that was the span dominated by the giant Poverty Point site.
Figure 1. How the Lower Mississippi Valley Might Have Looked in 1000 B.C. Shows Courses of Major Rivers and Locations of Poverty Point Territories.
AREAS OF SETTLEMENT SITES POVERTY POINT Jaketown Cowpen Slough Claiborne Ouachita River Arkansas River Joe’s Bayou West Fork Mississippi River East Fork Mississippi River Vermilion River Teche-Red River Louisiana boundaries and modern Mississippi River shown as dotted lines
Figure 2. Artifacts Characteristic of Poverty Point Culture. a-c, Plummets; d-f, Miniature Stone Carvings; g-j, Poverty Point Objects; k-l, Human Figurines; m-o, Projectile Points. Photographs courtesy of Brian Cockerham.
SETTLEMENT
A map showing the Lower Mississippi Valley in 1000 B.C., during the zenith of Poverty Point culture, reveals some very interesting things. Population was concentrated in certain areas and these areas were separated from each other, sometimes by scores of miles ([Figure 1]). While this pattern of geographic isolation may be due in part to river erosion and spotty archaeological investigation, it almost surely reflects preferences for certain kinds of land. There were at least 10 population clusters in the area. The largest concentration was in the Yazoo Basin of western Mississippi. Another surrounded the Poverty Point site itself in the Upper Tensas Basin-Macon Ridge region of northeastern Louisiana.
Lying between these various population clusters were stretches of uninhabited or lightly occupied land. In possibly one or two cases, intervening areas may have supported populations almost as concentrated as Poverty Point territories but, for various reasons, these peoples did not participate regularly or intensively in Poverty Point culture.