The Nottoway River is a river in southern Virginia and northeastern North Carolina. It is part of the Chowan River system, which flows into Albemarle Sound in North Carolina. The Virginia portion of the river has an abrupt fall line. It has many waterfalls, one after the other. Past Cortland, Virginia it joins the Blackwater river before it flows into North Carolina. The Nottoway has large areas of Cypress groves that supports a logging industry. Archaeologists have been working at a site at Cactus Hill, Virginia (about 45 miles south of Richmond, Virginia) since 1995. The site was occupied by humans as early as 15,000 years ago. It is one of the two earliest known places where humans lived in the eastern United States.