Natchez Trace Parkway
Emerald Mound, MS

Emerald Mound, one of the largest ceremonial mounds in the United States, is a massive, flat-topped earthen structure that rises 35 feet high and covers eight acres along the Natchez Trace Parkway. It was given to the National Park Service in 1950 and in 1989 was assigned the highest value bestowed upon American historic places: National Historic Landmark status.

On either end of Emerald's huge main platform, are secondary flat-topped mounds, which were probably the sites of a temple and the residence of a priest or ruler. Early drawings of Emerald suggest that three smaller mounds flanked the sides of the great earthwork. Built and occupied between 1250 and 1600 AD, this former Mississippian town as home to the ancestors of the Natchez people, whose remnants the French would encounter in the early 1700s. Emerald Mound, at its zenith, was most likely the setting for large religious and civic rituals.