To a casual observer, the LSU Indian Mounds may seem out of place in the midst of the surrounding dull, gray concrete, but they were once as central to LSU’s campus as the grassy plain of the quad.
In fact, according to anthropology professor Rob Mann at St. Cloud State University, 1920 LSU campus plans incorporated the Indian Mounds as its landscape centerpiece.
At the time, the mounds were not protected by Louisiana laws, and had no established historical significance, but Mann believed LSU’s planners were far ahead of their time.
“They had the foresight that they wanted those mounds to be preserved, and I can’t tell you how important that is. Without that [foresight] those mounds probably would have just been leveled,” Mann said.
Core samples from 1982 and 2009 date the mounds at about 6,000 years old, during a time when the Mississippi River would have run quite a different course.
According to geology and geophysics professor Brooks Ellwood, the Mississippi River would have passed through the PMAC, curved around the mounds and formed a washout near the Greek Theatre. Native Americans standing atop northernmost mound A would have been able to see up and down the river.
The Indian Mounds overlooked the Mississippi River’s edge during the Middle Archaic period (6,000-2,000 BC), an era which archaeologists previously believed incapable of creating monumental architecture because there were no hereditary leaders.
Geography and anthropology professor Rebecca Saunders said Middle Archaic hunter-gatherer societies were believed to live in isolated bands of 30 to 50 members, but the mounds reveal these bands may have worked together.
“We now believe there was a lot more communication between the bands, and that the mounds, one of the primary functions, would be a central place where all these scattered bands came seasonally,” Saunders explained.
Mann said the mounds also reveal the capabilities of hunter-gatherers to work without leaders.
“What it indicates is that people who do not have a strong social hierarchy are capable of coming together and working without a leader. People can get things done on their own,” Mann said.
A 2012 excavation of northernmost Mound A revealed the mound was built by dumping individual baskets of dirt one on top of the other.
Hunter-gatherers are often stereotyped as living solely for survival, but Saunders said they were living in “nature’s larger.” According to Mann, Middle Archaic hunter-gatherers may have spent just 20-25 hours a week hunting for food.
A Native American’s protein diet would be 75-90 percent fish, provided for by the Mississippi River, Saunders said.
Mound A’s location along the river would have provided plentiful resources, and Ellwood concluded it was used as a lookout. He said evidence of hearths on Mound A using magnetic susceptibility tests support his conclusion.  
“He’s just looking at how receptive the soils are to magnetism, and so if you’re going to see something fired versus unfired the magnetism will be different,” Saunders explained.
Mann and Saunders’ 2012 excavation did not reveal evidence of fire. However, Ellwood believes there may still be hearths within the mound and hopes the mound will continue to be protected and respected by the LSU community so research may continue.
According to Mann, a former University faculty member, LSU students have a duty to protect and preserve the LSU mounds, just as the LSU planners chose to do almost a century ago.