Lupine Publishers- Anthropological and Archaeological Sciences Journal Impact Factor Abstract Mounds are human made accumulations of settlements debris of varying size and shapes, found in different parts of the world. In West Africa, they tend to be located in relatively flat lands, at low elevations, in wetlands, marshlands or flood plains. Some are large single mound sites. Others are made of groups of scattered or clustered mounds – mound-clusters -, spread over varying surface extent. The dynamics of such settlement systems is still poorly understood partly because of inadequate field methodology. Ethno-historical and ethnographic data from West Africa recent past are relied upon to suggest some of the key processes behind mounds clustering: ethnicity, craft affiliations, or a combination of both. The Mouhoun Bend Archaeological Project (MOBAP 1997- 2000) was designed to address this issue. The field methodology was articulated on testing all mounds parts of the mound
