American Indians lived at the Pocahontas site during two periods: before Mound A was built and after. Before Mound A was built, a relatively large group of people appears to have lived there in a village community likely made up of families with common ancestral ties. That village was only a single community within a much larger cultural group whose members formed communities throughout the region, and important relationships among those widespread communities likely involved exchanges of trade goods as well as people moving between communities through marriage bonds. Although the Pocahontas site was one of hundreds of sites in the region, it likely held special status, as shown by its selection as the location for constructing a large platform mound. Platform mounds played important roles as centers for communal activities within American Indian societies. After Mound A was built, it undoubtedly served as a place for important cultural ceremonies that strengthened social ties within and among communities, and the site eventually appears to have been transformed into an exclusively ceremonial center occupied by only a small group of people where groups from throughout the region could meet to conduct ceremonial activities.
