Baton Rouge, Louisiana

=== Pre-history ===
Human habitation in the Baton Rouge area has been dated to [[Paleo-Indians|12000–6500 BC]], based on evidence found along the Mississippi, [[Comite River|Comite]], and [[Amite River|Amite]] rivers.<ref name="corps">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2uE0AQAAMAAJ&q=baton+rouge+paleo+indians&pg=PA341|title=Comite River Basin, Amite River and Tributaries Flood Protection, Baton Rouge/Livingston Parishes: Environmental Impact Statement, Volume 2|publisher=Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development|year=1991|pages=B–7–5}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Baton Rouge Historical Marker|url=http://www.stoppingpoints.com/louisiana/East-Baton-Rouge/Baton+Rouge/|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090802034500/http://www.stoppingpoints.com/louisiana/East-Baton-Rouge/Baton+Rouge/|archive-date=August 2, 2009|access-date=August 1, 2009|website=Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation and Tourism}}</ref> [[Mound Builders|Earthwork mounds]] were built by hunter-gatherer societies in the [[Archaic period in North America|Middle Archaic period]], from roughly the fourth millennium BC.<ref name="RSaunders">{{cite journal |last=Saunders |first=Rebecca |title=The Case for Archaic Period Mounds in Southeastern Louisiana |journal=Southeastern Archaeology |volume=13 |number=2 |pages=118–134 |date=Winter 1994 |jstor=40656501}}</ref> The speakers of the Proto-[[Muskogean]] language divided into its descendant languages by about 1000 BC; and a cultural boundary between either side of [[Mobile Bay]] and the [[Black Warrior River]] began to appear between about 1200 BC and 500 BC—a period called the Middle "Gulf Formational Stage". The Eastern Muskogean language began to diversify internally in the first half of the first millennium AD.<ref>{{cite web |last=Hopkins |first=Nicholas A. |url=http://www.famsi.org/research/hopkins/SouthEastUSLanguages.pdf |url-status=live |title=The Native Languages of the Southeastern United States |publisher=FAMSI |year=2007 |access-date=October 22, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924024153/http://www.famsi.org/research/hopkins/SouthEastUSLanguages.pdf |archive-date=September 24, 2015}}</ref>

The early Muskogean societies were the bearers of the [[Mississippian culture]], which formed around 800 AD and extended in a vast network across the Mississippi and Ohio valleys, with numerous [[chiefdom]]s in the Southeast, as well. By the time the [[Spanish Empire|Spanish]] made their first forays inland from the shores of the Gulf of Mexico in the early 16th century, by some evidence many political centers of the Mississippians were already in decline, or abandoned. At the time, this region appeared to have been occupied by a collection of moderately sized native chiefdoms, interspersed with autonomous villages and tribal groups.<ref name=north_ga>{{cite web
 | url = http://ngeorgia.com/history/early.html
 | title = Moundbuilders, North Georgia's early inhabitants
 | access-date = May 2, 2008
 | author = About North Georgia
 | date = 1994–2006
 | publisher = Golden Ink
 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080509164702/http://ngeorgia.com/history/early.html
 | archive-date = May 9, 2008
 | url-status = live
 }}</ref> Other evidence indicates these Mississippian settlements were thriving at the time of the first Spanish contact. Later Spanish expeditions encountered the remains of groups who had lost many people and been disrupted in the aftermath of infectious diseases, chronic among Europeans, unknowingly introduced by the first expedition.