550 PREHISTORIC VILLAGES IN TENNESSEE [eTH. ANN. 41 
town. It is also probable that some of this earth in the wall came 
from the surface on the outer side of the wall, where there would be 
extremely little, if any, accumulation of pottery fragments. There- 
fore these few pottery fragments in the wall embankment render it 
likely that the walls were raised at a time not far from the central 
period of the town’s occupation. 
In some of the walled towns in middle Tennessee, notably the one 
on the Lindsey farm, 4 miles east of Lebanon, Tenn., there was a 
ditch along the inside of the entire length of the wall. No trace of 
such a ditch was found at the Gordon town. 
ORIGINAL APPEARANCE OF WALL 
Judging from the description of the many fortified towns found by 
De Soto and other early visitors in the southern United States, it is 
probable that this town was surrounded by a wall of wooden palisades 
firmly placed in the earthen embankment. This line of palisades was 
made of small tree trunks, from 3 to 10 inches in diameter, set prob- 
ably about 4 or 5 feet into the earthen embankment and rising about 
10 or 12 feet above it. These tree trunks were placed touching each 
other. The crack between them was protected by another tree 
trunk placed behind them, on the inside of the wall. As will be seen 
from the map (pl. 95), earthen bastions were placed about every 
55 feet. Upon these bastions semicircular towers, projecting beyond 
the line of the wall, were raised. These towers were about 17 feet 
in height. They were fitted with a platform, on the inside, about 8 
feet above the ground, which, with the surface of the earthen bastion, 
gave them two platforms for supporting warriors. From three to 
five warriors could stand on each platform. The towers projected 
beyond the line of the wall, and thus more effectively commanded 
its outer surface. 
These palisades were braced by long, slender poles extending along 
the inside of the wall, bound to the palisade trunks by wild vines or 
split cane stems. The outer surface of the wall and of the towers 
was plastered with a thick coating of mortar made of clay with inter- 
mingled tough wild grasses as a binder, and smoothed with a trowel, 
rendering the scaling more difficult. The walls and the towers were 
pierced with a large number of small loopholes, to allow the defenders 
to discharge arrows at the enemy. 
Watts or OTHER SouTHERN InpDIAN Towns 
The Gordon walls had an entrance like that of old Mauvila, 
destroyed by De Soto, but otherwise were somewhat similar to the 
Natchez forts, a description of which follows: 
I can not describe these forts better than by comparing them to a barrel hoop 
from which the withes have been cut. This circle is relaxed and the outside 
