Home to a civilization of Native Americans of Mississippi that flourished from about 1000 to 1450 AD, the Winterville Mounds is the setting of ancient ritual traditions. The site was named after the nearby town of Winterville. The mounds were allocated by the tribal chiefs as the center of their society?s religious system and hallowed structures were placed there. The area was so sacred that only some high ranking officials of the community were allowed to live at the mound center. Based on the archeological evidence, Winterville natives established their dwellings on family farms situated in different settlement districts surrounding the Yazoo-Mississippi River Delta basin.

Based on the archeological findings from the Winterville Mounds, there were at least twenty-three mounds surrounding quite a few squares. However, many of these mounds, especially those situated outside the park boundaries, have been flattened due to agricultural activities and road developments. Thanks to the preservation efforts by the Mississippi Department of Archives and the Center for Archaeological Research of the University of Mississippi, a 55-foot high Temple Mound, along with eleven of the site?s largest mounds, has been protected.

Studies show that native Indians of the Winterville Mounds may have had a civilization comparable to that of the Natchez Indians. Their society was divided into upper and lower social ranks that were determined by heredity from their mothers. The high ranking tribal officials, especially the chiefs, succeed to their positions as members of the royal family.

The original building on the Temple Mound at Winterville was destroyed during a great fire that occurred in the late 1300s but its cause remains unknown. The natives continued to use the site afterwards but no more mounds were made or conserved. Eventually, the general population at Winterville declined and by 1450 AD, the site seems to have been deserted completely.

Many have visited the site of the Winterville Mounds during the late nineteenth to early twentieth centuries to collect relics there but only a few were found. To be able to find more artifacts in the site and to discover more about the civilization that thrived there, the National Park Service in cooperation with the Harvard University's Lower Mississippi Survey?s archaeologist Jeffrey P. Brain conducted the first modern archaeological studies at Winterville in the 1940s and extensive excavations were done in 1967.

Based from the studies done on the site of the Winterville Mounds, inhabitants there made pottery similar to that in the Eastern American area. Since the use of potters wheel has not yet been discovered, the natives performed pottery making by forming strips of clay then smoothening them out. Most of their pottery molds range from narrow plate like bowls to beakers and jars, some of which are decorated with animal carvings for handles. These ancient artworks are displayed in the museum built within the site.

To preserve the site of the Winterville Mounds, the Greenville Garden Club led a fund raising effort to purchase forty-two acres of the area and transferred the administration of the property to the City of Greenville. Then the acreage was transferred to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, and through the help of the Winterville Mounds Association, the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks (formerly the Mississippi Park Commission) managed Winterville as a state park from 1960 until 2000, while Winterville Mounds designation as a National Historic Landmark, took place in 1993.