The Little Tennessee River enters Tennessee from a gap between the Great Smoky Mountains and the Unicoi Mountains and flows for just over before emptying into the Tennessee River. Tellico Lake, created by the completion of Tellico Dam in 1979, spans the lower of the river. Before inundation, the Mialoquo site was located at the river's Island Creek confluence, just under above the river's mouth. Rose Island spanned the river between and above the mouth of the river. Both sites were just south of a bend in the river known as Wears Bend and just north of the river's confluence with the Tellico River.