Monks Mound is the largest Pre-Columbian earthwork in
America north of Mesoamerica. Located at the Cahokia Mounds UNESCO World
Heritage Site near Collinsville, Illinois, its size was calculated in 1988 as
about 100 feet (30 m) high, 955 feet (291 m) long including the access ramp at
the southern end, and 775 feet (236 m) wide.[1] This makes Monks Mound roughly
the same size at its base as the Great Pyramid of Giza (13.1 acres / 5.3
hectares). Its base circumference is larger than the Pyramid of the Sun at
Teotihuacan.
Construction of Monks Mound by the Mississippian culture
began about 900–950 CE, on a site which had already been occupied by buildings.
The original concept seems to have been a much smaller mound, now buried deep
within the northern end of the present structure. Sources
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