Backusburg Mounds
Archaeologists first learned of the site in the 1920s, but only one scholarly investigation was conducted at the site during the twentieth century; it was performed largely by a team of students from the nearby Murray State University under the leadership of archaeologist Kenneth Carstens in 1981. Although Murray State only had one day's access to the site, the team was able to produce maps of the site that enabled its boundaries to be determined accurately, and the materials they collected from the surface enabled Carstens to study the site's cultural affiliation; it has since been determined to be a work of a Mississippian people. Four years later, the mound complex was listed on the National Register of Historic Places under its Smithsonian trinomial designation of 15-CW-64; it is Calloway County's only National Register-listed archaeological site and one of thirteen in the Jackson Purchase with this designation. Additional work was finally conducted at Backusburg in mid-2013, as another team of Murray State archaeology students was assigned to document the site more carefully for their field school. At the same, the property was in the middle of being bought by The Archaeological Conservancy, an organization whose raison d'être is purchasing archaeological sites in order to preserve them.
References
- ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
- ^ Funkhouser, W.D., and W.S. Webb. "Archaeological Survey of Kentucky". University of Kentucky Reports in Anthropology 7.5 (1950): 62–65.
- ^ New Acquisitions Archived 2013-10-29 at the Wayback Machine, The Archaeological Conservancy, n.d. Accessed 2013-10-24.
- ^ "MSU Research Featured in American Archaeology Magazine Archived 2013-10-29 at the Wayback Machine", Murray State University, 2013-06-13. Accessed 2013-10-24.
- ^ Michel, Mark. "Private Property-National Legacy", The SAA Archaeological Record 3.3 (May 2003): 4-5: 4.