The complex originally included seven earthwork mounds, a public plaza and numerous individual village residences.

One of several major mound sites in the Florida Panhandle, the park is located in northern Tallahassee, on the south shore of Lake Jackson.

[2] After the abandonment of the Lake Jackson site the chiefdom seat was moved to Anhaica (rediscovered in 1987 by B. Calvin Jones and located within DeSoto Site Historic State Park), where in 1539 it was visited by the Hernando de Soto entrada, who knew the residents as the historic Muskogean-speaking Apalachee people.

[4] The mounds were the result of skilled planning, knowledge of soils and organization of numerous laborers over the period of many years.

The ceremonial plaza was a large flat area, constructed and leveled for this purpose, where ritual games and gatherings took place.

There were also communal agricultural fields in the surrounding countryside, where the people cultivated maize in the rich local soil, the major reason such a dense population and large site were possible.

[2] During the Lake Jackson I phase the site consisted of small village possibly with the beginnings of Mound 2 started.

During the Early Lake Jackson II phase the population and the habitation areas of the site expanded greatly.

During the Late Lake Jackson II phase, all 7 mounds had been started and most had seen numerous construction episodes.

In the Lake Jackson III phase, the central part of the site is occupied more intensively especially around Mound 2 and spreading north.

He found a series of fill layers of black muck, various soil types, and caps of red clay, but as the cut was not through the entire mound or located near any structures he could not learn much about its construction sequence or definitive purpose.

The first activity other than village occupation is a leveling of the location and pit dug and filled with 35 stone projectile points and burned organic material.

[2] The period burning, new fill layer, cap, and structure cycle was repeated twelve times in the 250-year lifespan of the mound.

[7][8] The time span in between renewals at many sites suggests the average lifespan of a ruler and their death and replacement by a successor.

Before it was dug away B. Calvin Jones, an archaeologist with the State of Florida Bureau of Historic Sites and Properties, conducted a salvage operation.

This entire procedure of wrapping the body is reminiscent of "bundling", a practice used for sacred objects which has a long history among Native North Americans.

[5] Mound 1 was partially excavated in the mid to late 1950s by Charles H. Fairbanks and Hale G. Smith for the Department of Anthropology at Florida State University.

All information from the excavation except for a single photo and a partial list of artifacts found are currently missing and presumed lost.

A series of postholes were discovered at the summit by John Griffin in 1947, but due to time constraints with the work season he could not proceed any further.

Both plazas would have had Butler's Mill Creek (a small stream that once bisected these areas, but whose course was altered in historic times) running through it.

The iconography of the items also slowly changes with time, growing more complex and numerous and thought by archaeologists to be evidence of influences from other elite polities and the development of a full-fledged local warrior class.

[13][better source needed] The Lake Jackson plate depicts a winged dancing figure holding a ceremonial mace in one hand and a severed head in the other.

These motifs are also found on sculptures and shell engravings from the Spiro site, such as the ogee headdress-wearing "Resting Warrior or Big Boy statue".

The figure also appears to be wearing a long-nosed god maskette (an object thought to be associated with ritual adoption[14] and also worn as ear-rings by the Resting Warrior[15]) and clothing which are all motifs associated with the falcon dancer/warrior/chunkey player including the columnella pendant, large shell beads, bellows apron (scalp motif), and the long-waist sash.

[10] This plate was one of 14 recovered from the mound, along with 11 copper axes, many copper headdress ornaments, a few polished-stone celts, marine-shell drinking cups of the type historically used for the black drink ritual, and pottery vessels and a few non-local materials such as mica, graphite pigment, red ocher and stone discoidals.

This monopoly on the shell trade by the Etowahans lasted until the fall of the chiefdom in about 1375, after which the elite status goods used in burials in Mound 3 come from other locations, mostly the northern Georgia and eastern Tennessee area.

[16] The Lake Jackson Mounds Archaeological State Park is recognized as part of the Native American Heritage Trail under the Florida Division of Historical Resources.

They are housed in a storage facility that meets the requirements for curating artifacts under the 36 CFR Part 79 under the Code of Federal Regulations for Section 106 compliance.

[18] Artifacts recovered from various excavations at the park include pottery sherds, shells, flint and other stone tool fragments, burial objects made of copper, mica, and other materials.