Bayou Grande Cheniere Mounds
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USA Layout of mounds at the Bayou Grande Cheniere Mounds | |
  Location within Louisiana today | |
| Location | Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, USA |
|---|---|
| Region | Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana |
| Coordinates | 29°29′46.68″N 89°47′33.324″W / 29.4963000°N 89.79259000°W |
| History | |
| Founded | 700 CE |
| Abandoned | 1200 CE |
| Cultures | Coastal Coles Creek culture |
| Site notes | |
| Excavation dates | 1926, 2003 |
| Responsible body: private | |
Bayou Grande Cheniere Mounds (16 PL 159) is an archaeological site in Plaquemines Parish near the southeast corner of Louisiana. Built by the Coastal Coles Creek culture, it was inhabited from 875 to 1200 CE, from the Early Coles Creek period to the Coles Creek/Plaquemine period.[1]
The site is located on a natural levee of Bayou Grande Chenière and has twelve mounds, eleven arranged around a central plaza and one 75 metres (246 ft) to the south, connected to the main group by a constructed landform. The site was connected by a manmade causeway to Bayou Grande Chenière.[2] The elliptical plaza measures 100 feet (30 m) on its north-south axis by 75 feet (23 m) east-west.[1] Mound 1, the largest, is a conical mound measuring 60 feet (18 m)[2] and located on the eastern edge of the plaza. The southern edge of the plaza is bounded by Mound 10 and the northern edge by Mound 3, both are platform mounds. The western edge of the plaza is a string of interconnected small mounds, Mounds 4 to 9.[1]
The site is unusual in its size and number of mounds. Typically Coastal Coles Creek settlements had three mounds arranged around a plaza. The site's plan and large scale are most like the large Coles Creek settlement in Avoyelles Parish, the Greenhouse site.[1]
