The Dynamics of Mounds-Clusters in the Mouhoun Bend (Burkina Faso)

Volume 1 - Issue 1

Augustin FC Holl*

Received: October 16, 2019;   Published: October 29, 2019

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Abstract

Mounds are human made accumulations of settlements debris of varying size and shapes, found in different parts of the world. In West Africa, they tend to be located in relatively flat lands, at low elevations, in wetlands, marshlands or flood plains. Some are large single mound sites. Others are made of groups of scattered or clustered mounds – mound-clusters -, spread over varying surface extent. The dynamics of such settlement systems is still poorly understood partly because of inadequate field methodology. Ethno-historical and ethnographic data from West Africa recent past are relied upon to suggest some of the key processes behind mounds clustering: ethnicity, craft affiliations, or a combination of both. The Mouhoun Bend Archaeological Project (MOBAP 1997- 2000) was designed to address this issue. The field methodology was articulated on testing all mounds parts of the mound-clusters under investigation. Two mound-clustering strategies were identified:

a. Tight-clustering resulting in the formation of a large “single mound site”, and
b. Loose-clustering with scattered individual mounds of different size and shape.

Residential and craft requirements combined differentially in the 2000 years Mouhoun Bend settlement history, have generated the settlement patterns investigated in the study area. The ethnicity component of the identified dynamics – that is plausible – could not be tracked with the current methodology and is accordingly undecidable.

Abstract| Introduction| The Study Area| Conclusion| Acknowledgments| References|