Seventeenth-Century Fort Ancient Mortuary Practices

In 2023, after consultation with federally recognized tribes, it was determined that planned sewage treatment system improvements could not avoid impacting burials within the seventeenth-century Fort Ancient village of Augusta. Thus, the Kentucky Archaeological Survey investigated a cemetery and ritual space within this village. We will discuss the features we documented and the animal bones, plant remains, and other types of artifacts we recovered that reflect ritual activities. The patterns we identified are similar to those documented at contemporary late Fort Ancient Kentucky sites: Fox Farm, Hardin, Larkin, Petersburg, and the lower Shawnee Town.