Tequesta Native American village artifacts uncovered in downtown Miami

Tequesta Native American village artifacts uncovered in downtown Miami

By Andres Viglucci
The Miami Herald

Miami’s historic preservation board on Friday roundly rejected a developer’s plan to carve out and display a prehistoric remnant of a recently uncovered Tequesta village in downtown Miami, and instead set the stage for potentially designating the site a protected historic landmark.

The board’s decision, encapsulated in three separate votes after a seven-hour hearing, was a big win for preservationists and archaeologists who have been pressing the developer, MDM Group, to redesign a planned commercial and hotel project to accommodate the finds, regarded as some of the most significant traces of an indigenous settlement in the country.

But what exactly will happen on the site remains very much in the air.

The board also voted to ask the developer to come back with a revised plan that better protects and showcases the archaeology, which includes posthole patterns believed to have been the foundations of a 2,000-year-old Tequesta village, as well as remnants of a Seminole War-era U.S. Army fort and of Henry Flagler’s Royal Palm Hotel, which gave rise to the city’s founding.

See entire article:
http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/02/14/3935274/expert-tequesta-site-in-downtown.html

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Video: Prehistoric Village Found in Downtown Miami

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Video: The Birth of Miami

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