Natchez, Mississippi, is famous for the number of well-preserved antebellum mansions (part 10), its role as the starting point of the historic Natchez Trace Parkway (this post), its deep history as the oldest settlement on the Mississippi River (parts 8-10), and its contrast between the wealthy cotton growers and the slaves who had to grow and pick their cotton. These high points make the city a major center for Southern history and tourism, but since Natchez isn’t along any major highway, it doesn’t draw industries to the area.
Natchez Trace Parkway
This parkway takes us almost 500 miles from Natchez to Nashville through Jackson (the state capital) and Tupelo (where Elvis was born).
Usually I try to take you chronologically through what we’re learning and seeing, but this time we’re going to follow the road as it leads us—except for the following post that is so different from what we’re seeing in this post.
early life in this area of Mississippi
After the American Revolution, frontiersmen from the Ohio Valley carried their products down stream to Spanish-controlled New Orleans and Natchez. Returning home, the boatmen followed a series of Indian trails from Natchez to Nashville that evolved into the Natchez Trace.
I don’t think the southwest the sign is mentioning is the southwest we think of. Here’s what AI has to say:
“In 1798, the Mississippi Territory was created, marking a pivotal transformation for the Old Southwest from a Native American homeland contested by European powers into a key American frontier. This era began a rapid shift characterized by an influx of settlers, the rise of cotton production, and the expansion of slavery, turning the region into a cornerstone of the antebellum South.”
Here’s some more information I found through AI.
“Natchez was not purchased in 1798 but was transferred from Spanish control to the United States following the 1795 Treaty of San Lorenzo (Pinckney’s Treaty). On April 7, 1798, Congress established the Mississippi Territory, making Natchez its first capital. The U.S. officially took possession of the region on August 3, 1796, ending Spanish rule.”
“The treaty was an important diplomatic success for the United States. It resolved territorial disputes between the two countries and granted American ships the right to free navigation of the Mississippi River as well as duty-free transport through the port of New Orleans, then under Spanish control.”
Emerald Mound
Now we go back in time to 1300 A.D. to the Emerald Mound, which is the second largest temple mound in the U.S. Only a mound in Illinois is larger.
This 8-acre mound was made from a natural hill and was used from about 1300 to 1600 by the Mississippians, ancestors of the Natchez Indians.
Archaeological excavations have confirmed that the 1st and 2nd stages had at least 2 secondary mounds with buildings on their summits. During the final stage of construction, the secondary mounds at either end were enlarged, and at least 6 additional mounds were built along the perimeter of the platform.
The temple in the previous sign is on a 30-foot secondary mound that held a temple containing sacred Indian images.
Archeological evidence indicates that at least 2 small mounds stood along the north and south sides of the primary platform.
Have you been wondering how these mounds and temples were built? Me too. Here’s what the following sign tells us.
“Using early tools of wood, stone,and bone, the Indians loaded the dirt into baskets or skins that they carried on their backs or heads.”
As we’ve said, this platform mound was constructed in several stages. Starting with the natural hilltop, workers gradually transformed the hill into a flat-topped pyramid. They first leveled the hill, and then later added thousands of tons of earth from near the base.
This mound society was the product of a complex society organized to serve and take care of the welfare of its people. Life revolved around family relationships and well understood rules. As an elite family, the Suns, held special status as royalty, and the Great Sun was the highest rank of all.
Although aligned with a deity, the power of man holding the role of the Great Sun rose or fell with the people’s quality of life. Tribal prosperity rested on pooled resources and wise leadership. The elite only played a ceremonial role in their layered society, and they controlled surplus corn, which they shared when needed.
Only powerful leaders could have mustered and inspired the workforce needed for the years of labor that produced Emerald Mound.
In 1758, a French naturalist published his firsthand account of life among the Natchez Indians. This sketch in the previous sign shows the Great Sun, “the sovereign of the nation.” The Natchez people have continued cultural traditions from Emerald Mound’s time.
Want to know more about the Natchez Indians? Here’s what AI says:
“The Natchez (Nachee) were a Mississippian mound-building culture in17th-18th century southwest Mississippi, known for a rigid, matrilineal, and divine chiefdom led by a “Great Sun”. They were expert farmers growing corn, beans, and squash, living in a complex society with distinct social classes (Suns, Nobles, Honored People). After conflicts with the French in the 1720s–1730s, the tribe was dispersed, with survivors joining the Cherokee and Creek nations.”
This description sounds like the Cherokee people we learned about in our 2023 southwest swing trip when we visited a Cherokee village in the 1700s.
Here’s more about what the Emerald Mound looked like hundreds of years ago. The rectangular mound once held 8 smaller mounds, 3 along each side of a long plaza and 1 at each end. The Great Sun led from the top of the largest of the 8 mounds (following sign shows his house), which was more than 60 feet above where Barney was standing on the ground.
The mound was built along the ancient paths that became known as the Natchez Trace and was an important center for trade; ritual sporting contests; and social, political, and spiritual events.
In the following sign, tribal warriors are taking part in a traditional game on the plaza level of the mound that is 35 feet above where Barney is standing.
AI tells us about the games they played: “The Natchez Indians played games rooted in skill, physical endurance, and social bonding, with a strong focus on preparation for hunting and warfare. Key activities included stickball (a precursor to lacrosse [which our almost college-age grandson plays]), the “chunkey” hoop-and-pole game, archery, and various running, racing, and gambling games.”
“Stickball was played with two hickory sticks to carry and throw a ball, this game was sometimes used to settle disputes without full-scale war.”
connecting with other mounds
Trade, art, and ideas linked Emerald Mound, both physically and spiritually, with other mound sites throughout the eastern half of North America.
Trade in raw materials and fine ceremonial objects took place often. Artists bartered for items made from shells, copper, feathers, and clay. The symbolic images worn by the elite—winged serpents, panthers, and birds—showed up at sites hundreds of miles apart.
We found examples of widespread trade like this when we were at Mesa Verde National Park in southwest Colorado. This link in this paragraph starts you on our trip as we visited the cliff dwellers and their connections to their outside world.
Now back to the Natchez Trace
Before the road we drove on was built, the Old Natchez Trace was a wilderness road that originated from a series of trails used by the southeastern Indian tribes. This road was also politically, economically, socially, and militarily important to the U.S. in its early development.
Among those who traveled this road were the Natives, traders, soldiers, “Kaintucks,” post riders, settlers, slaves, circuit-riding preachers, outlaws, and adventurers.
The drawing in the following sign is of the Kaintucks taking their cargoes south along the Mississippi River to Natchez and New Orleans.
The name of the 444-mile long road we’re on today is the last of many names given to one of North America’s most historic transportation corridors. The trails were first created by animals. Later the Natives followed these paths, and the name became the Chickasaw Trail or the Path to the Choctaw Nation.
In the early 1800s, it became the Boatmen’s trail and the Mail Road. When trade and travel shifted to river steamboats, sections of the Trace became local roads, while others faded into the natural landscape.
In the 1930s, their interest in preserving the legacy of the Trace captured the attention of Congress. First a survey was approved of the path, and then in 1938, President Franklin Roosevelt signed the law creating the Natchez Trace Parkway.
Completed in 2005, the Parkway is the latest chapter in centuries old stories of trade, travel, and homeland. Now the National Park Service preserves this area.
back to some history
After the U.S. gained its independence, it faced a challenge. Many remote, frontier emigrants lived in the shadow of the French or Spanish empires in North America.
In the Old Southwest, the Jefferson Administration [1801-1809] threw a communication lifeline to Natchez, the political and economic capital of the Mississippi Territory. After treaties with the Chickasaw and Choctaw, the federal government sent regular post riders through tribal homelands back and forth between Nashville and the isolated Natchez District. These post riders traveled alone through dense forests and murky swamps, braving perilous river crossings.
By 1810, most travelers along the Natchez Trace were Kaintucks heading home by foot since their boats were useless for traveling upstream against the swift current of the Mississippi River.
They endured insects and snakes, rain and mud, as well as swamps, creeks, and rivers. They were already weary and homesick from their trip south by boat, so this trip north really wore them out.
“I have this day swam my horse five times, bridged one creek, forded several others beside the swamp we had to wade through. At night we had a shower of rain. Took up my usual lodging on the ground in company with several Indians.” These were tough men trying to make a life and support their families.
other stops along the way
Elizabeth Female Academy opened its doors in November 1818 in the community of Washington, just north of Natchez, just after Mississippi became a state in December 1817. It was the first institution of higher learning for women. After the capital moved from Washington to Natchez and then to Jackson, the Academy struggled financially and finally closed in 1845.
Here’s some more information about this state chartered college, perhaps the first college for women in the U.S., from a website that explores Southern history.
“Mississippi was a pioneer state in providing education for women and the curriculum of the Elizabeth Female Academy reveals that this was far from a token effort. The young ladies attending the school studied Latin, botany, history, natural and moral philosophy, chemistry, mythology, Christianity and more.” One of its well known graduates was Varina Howell Davis, the future First Lady of the Confederacy. [Remember her from previous posts 4 and 5 on this trip?]
The quality of the education provided for the young ladies is evidenced by one of its instructors—the famed naturalist John James Audubon. Famed for his research and paintings of American birds and wildlife, Audubon is known to have been in the Natchez area in early 1822 and began teaching at Elizabeth Female Academy in May of that year. While an instructor at the school, he worked on the art and observations that would become part of his acclaimed book, Birds of America.
another stopping point
The bluff behind the next sign and picture shows a deep deposit of windblown topsoil known as loess. It was formed during the Ice Age when glaciers covered the northern half of the U.S. During this time nearly continuous dust storms swept in from the western plains and covered this area with windblown dust to a depth of 30-90 feet and rested on sands and clay of an ancient sea. It originally covered a vast region, but in this area is now confined to a strip east of the Mississippi River from 3-30 miles wide extending from Baton Rouge into Tennessee.
sunken trace
Now that we know what caused the sunken trace, let’s learn more about it.
Remember the hardships that the Kaintucks faced while walking home, and all the other groups of people who used this path? We get to take a 5-minute walk to a sunken trail. People who walked these 500 miles had to put up with discomforts, and a broken leg or arm could spell death for a lone traveler.
After a day driving along the Natchez Trace Parkway, and a picnic along a stream, we’re ready to go home. But before we leave the park, we’ll look at the next post that is about an 1800s house that we saw on our drive. We almost drove past the turnoff, but talked ourselves out of ignoring what we’re about to see.
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