While Caddo Indians flourished in northwestern Louisiana, those in the rest of the state by approximately A.D. 1000 had a slightly different way of life. Many of the latter were part of the Plaquemine Culture, who like the Caddo, were descendants of Troyville-Coles Creek Indians. In keeping with the patterns established by their ancestors, Plaquemine people built large ceremonial centers with two or more large mounds facing an open plaza. The flat-topped, pyramidal mounds were constructed in several stages, and eventually measured more than 100 feet on a side and 10 feet high. Sometimes they were topped by one or two smaller mounds. [Illustration: Medora Site] The Plaquemine Culture was so named because the Medora Site, typical of the period, is near Plaquemine, Louisiana, in West Baton Rouge Parish. The site had two mounds approximately 400 feet apart with a plaza in between. One was a flat-topped pyramid 125 feet on a side 13 feet high with a small domed mound three feet high and 25 feet in diameter on top. The other one was two feet high and 100 feet in diameter. Eighteen thousand pieces of broken pottery were found at Medora, along with a few stone tools. Plaquemine Indians often built the mounds on top of the ruins of a house or temple, and constructed similar buildings on top of the mound. In earlier times, buildings were usually circular, but later they were likely to be rectangular. They were constructed with wattle and daub, and sometimes with wall posts sunk into foot-deep wall trenches. At times, the Indians dug shallow, oval or rectangular graves in the mounds. These might be for primary burials of individuals, but more frequently they were for the reburial of remains originally interred elsewhere. Some graves contained only skulls, and one of these had 66 skulls. Burial offerings included pottery, pipes, stone points, and axes made of ground stone. One type of pottery occasionally placed in the graves is called “killed” pottery. This type has a hole in the base of the vessel that was cut while the pot was being made, usually before it was fired. The Plaquemine Indians also decorated their pots in other characteristic ways. They sometimes added small solid handles called lugs, and textured the surface by brushing clumps of grass over the vessel before it was fired. They often cut designs into the surface of the wet clay, and like their Caddo contemporaries, the Plaquemine Indians engraved designs on pots after they were fired. Plaquemine Indians also had undecorated pots which they used for ordinary daily tasks. [Illustration: (⅓ actual size)] Not surprisingly, the ordinary people lived much as the average Caddo Indians. They participated in festivals and ceremonies at the mound centers, but spent most of their time with families and neighbors collecting and producing food, or participating in village activities.