qor thousands of years before ththe Southeast was inhabitedreached the Georgia coast as early as 15,these earliest Indians was quite unlikethis time they had no agriculture, pottespears and a few small tools whoseguesswork. Through the next several mwas uneven. Coastal Georgia has someAmerica, yet was one of the latest areagriculturecoming of the Europeansby Indians, who may haw000 years ago. The culture o)ur concept of Indian life. Ary, or bows and arrows, jusse is mostly archaeologicaillennia cultural developmen3f the earliest pottery in Nortlas to acquire maize or con Some of the earliest Indian sites in the Savannah area, dating fronas far back as 3,000 B.C. are the famed "shell middens". These ar~just huge piles of oyster shell discarded by the Indians, sort of prehistori,garbage dumps. Sometimes animal and fish bones and fragments opottery and stone tools are also found among the shells. The middeneanbe irregular heaps, or crescent or ring-shaped. The shell rings hav,provoked the greatest interest. Some are quite large, such as a ring o~Sapelo Island which is 300' across and 8' tall in places. The center othe ring is usually just bare sandy soil, leading early archaeologists t~speculate that the rings were ceremonial structures, possibly the oldesin the Americas. A less romantic explanation may be that they wervillage sites surrounded by a circular palisade, and oyster shells an,other refuse were piled up outside the palisade. Shell rings can be found in the Sashorelines of Wilmington Island (at leasleast three). In addition to the rings thein the Savannah area, including out in tlon the appearance of small desert islan~with palmettoes, cedars and other hardyin place by the shells. Not all of thesmnah area along the easter~wo) and Skidaway Island (~ are dozens of shell midden salt marshes. Here they taks lost in a sea of marsh gras.,plants growing in the soil hel small marsh islands, know