Huff Indian Village State Historic Site
A remarkably intact fifteenth-century Mandan village plan remains visible beside the Missouri River.
Artwork inspired by Cannupa Hanska Luger
Huff preserves more than one hundred lodge depressions, fortification features, and a central plaza from a large Mandan settlement occupied around 1450. Its relatively brief occupation helps archaeologists read a coherent village plan.
Bring an official plan or use the signs to locate plaza, houses, and defensive works; without that framework the shallow forms can disappear into grass. River position is essential to understanding fields, water, and travel.
There are no reconstructed houses and that is a strength. Do not create your own path, enter depressions, or remove even ordinary-looking fragments. Because the features are unrebuilt, an official plan turns shallow ground forms into a legible community layout.
- Date
- Occupied around 1450
- Setting
- Huff, North Dakota, United States
- Admission
- Free general admission
Quick guide
- Route question
- Occupied around 1450 ↔ More than 100 lodge depressions
- Final evidence
- Use the plan to read low earthworks
Quick guide
- Plan
- Trace lodge depressions, plaza, ditch, and bastions as parts of one Mandan settlement.
- Households
- Use lodge spacing and storage features to think about families, food, and work.
- Defense
- Ask how fortification related to trade, conflict, and the village’s relatively brief occupation.
- Respect
- Stay on the path and leave every artifact and depression undisturbed.
Good to know
Huff’s relatively brief occupation preserved an unusually coherent Mandan village plan, with more than one hundred lodge depressions organized around a central plaza.
Notice these
- Occupied around 1450
- More than 100 lodge depressions
- Use the plan to read low earthworks