Indians of Louisiana

According to anthropologists there have been people in Louisiana for at least 12,000 years. They probably migrated from the northern United States in search of game as more and more of the northern areas fell under sheets of advancing ice. Louisiana was much cooler and the plant-life very different from modern times.

These early men hunted bison, mastodon, camels, and horses with simple spears made by attaching a sharpened rock flake to the end of a spear. They were the true pioneers of this state. They came here without benefit of guides to show them the best hunting farm lands.

One of their villages has been discovered on Avery Island. Artifacts found among extinct animal bones indicate the area was inhabited when mastodons, bison, and camels, roamed Louisiana. The large animals gradually became extinct as the glaciers melted, the climate grew warmer, and the plant life changed. The native Louisianians were forced by necessity to hunt smaller animals and to supplement their diet with shellfish. The people of the Archaic Period moved from place to place leaving behind huge mounds of discarded shells which eventually increased the elevation of area and reduced flooding. During this period they developed such tools as spear—throwers, knives, scrapers, drills, and darts.