The Graveline Mound (22JA503) is a sand platform mound in Jackson County, Mississippi, built on a low, late Pleistocene terrace on the Mississippi Sound. The Late Woodland mound (A.D. 590–780) is composed of local soils, and its presence today is a testament to the ancient builders’ knowledge of earthen construction materials and methods. Central to the study of the mound is an integrated geoarchaeological approach that uses stratigraphy and micromorphology to decipher material source and selection, construction techniques, and periodicity, in combination with more traditional artifacts, revealing the activities that created this ultimately monumental space. The mound was built in three rapid stages beginning with a low earthwork demarcating a ritual precinct used during late spring/early summer. Stage II quickly followed with a series of alternating zoned fills, sealing the space that was then subsequently covered by Stage III, a massive hard red surface that marked the location with a platform mound.
Seasonality of site occupation has been an important issue in the archaeology of precolumbian coastal populations in the U.S. Southeast. Sclerochronological oxygen isotope measurements to estimate season of capture were performed on marsh clam (Rangia cuneata) and oyster (Crassostrea virginica) shells from a Late Woodland platform mound in coastal Mississippi. This study is the first oxygen isotope analysis of archaeological Rangia cuneata. The results of the study, supported by vertebrate faunal and plant seasonal indicators and depositional circumstances, indicate that mound trash deposits were generated by short-term activities during the spring and summer months. Factors that could reduce the precision of the seasonal estimates are identified.
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