[1][2] Before that, archeological excavation was conducted by specialists from the University of South Carolina to establish history and recover thousands of artifacts.

After the Cherokee moved south and west later in the eighteenth century, deeper into Georgia and Alabama, they named other towns Keowee.

The alliance was partly the result of diplomacy by Sir Alexander Cuming, who had earlier visited Keowee (the Old Towne) on March 23, 1730 and solicited the Cherokee as allies.

[citation needed] Fearing an attack by the Muscogee (Creek), their traditional enemies, the Cherokee established a new town of Keowee in 1752, further removed from the Indian Path but more defensible.

[7][8] As tensions rose with France in the mid to late 1750s, the English built a fort east of the old Keowee town on the Savannah River.

[10] When American naturalist William Bartram visited the Keeowee New Towne site in South Carolina in May 1776, he noted no Cherokee lived there.

[12] Prior to creation of the lake, the sites of both the former towns of Keowee and of Fort Prince George were surveyed and archeological excavations conducted by the University of South Carolina.