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Archive for cahokia

America’s Lost City

 

By Linda Tancs

Collinsville, Illinois, home of the world’s largest catsup bottle, is arguably the most unlikeliest of sites for a lost civilization.  But that’s where you’ll find Cahokia Mounds, the most sophisticated prehistoric native civilization north of Mexico, larger than London, England was in 1250.  Named for the Cahokia subtribe of the Illiniwek who moved into the area in the 1600s, the city of Cahokia was inhabited from about 700 to 1400.   The ancient citizenry built over 120 mounds, the largest of which is Monks Mound (rivaling Giza in Egypt), the largest prehistoric earthwork in the Americas.  A National Historic Landmark and one of only 21 World Heritage Sites within the United States, this ancient meeting place is just 15 minutes east of St. Louis, Missouri.