Some places where Native Americans of the Southeast once lived are still full of mystery.
Flying low over parts of South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, you can see giant, flat-topped mounds of earth. Some are as tall as a six-story building. No one knows for sure why they were built or how they were used. Scientists do know that temples or houses for chiefs stood on the tops of these mounds. The people who made them are called the Mound Builders.
By 1492, the Mound Builders’ way of life was disappearing, but their mounds remained. New towns sprang up close by. Some belonged to the Creek people, descendants of the Mound Builders. Like the Iroquois, Hopi, and Mandan, the Creeks were farmers and hunters.
