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OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest                    Volume 99 : Issue 361

Today's Topics:
  #1 HAMILTON COUNTY PART 3               [AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M RE]

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X-Message: #1
Date: Fri,  4 Jun 1999 19:45:10, -0500
From: AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M REASONER)
Subject: HAMILTON COUNTY PART 3


HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF OHIO By Henry Howe, LL.D., 1898

                        HAMILTON COUNTY - PART 3

        LARGE EARTH ENCLOSURE. -From the base of the graded way heretofore
described extend two embankments forming the segments of an oblong oval,
enclosing an area of about 16 acres. These embankments extend in an
easterly direction, gradually approaching each other until an opening or
gateway 150 feet in width, remains. To protect this gateway a mound is
erected just within the opening, having a diameter at base of 125 feet and
a perpendicular height of seven feet. Within the above enclosure are
fourteen mounds and one large circular embankment, having a diameter of 300
feet and a gateway to the south sixty feet wide. Near the northern side of
this circular enclosure was a small mound covering a stone cist containing
a human skeleton.
        ALTAR MOUNDS. -On the southern side of the oval was a group of
eight mounds. Several of these mounds contained "Altars", or basings of
burnt clay, on two of which there were thousands of objects of interest,
which are described as follows by Prof. Putnam in his report: Two of these
altars, each about four feet square, were cut out and brought to the
museum. Among the objects from the altars are numerous ornaments and
carvings unlike anything we have had before.
        One altar contained about two bushels of ornaments made of stone,
copper, mica, shells, the canine teeth of bears and other animals, and
thousands of pearls (50,000 have been counted and sorted from the mass).
Nearly all of these objects are perforated in various ways for suspension.
Several of the copper ornaments are covered with native silver, which had
been hammered out into thin sheets and folded over the copper. Among these
are a bracelet and a bead, and several of the spool-shaped ear ornaments.
        GOLD IN MOUND. -One small copper pendant seems to have been covered
with a thin sheet of gold, a portion of which still adheres to the copper,
while other bits of it were found in the mass of material. This is the
first time that native gold has been found in the mounds, although hundreds
have been explored. The ornaments cut out of copper and mica are very
interesting, and embrace many forms. Among them is a grotesque human
profile cut out of a sheet of mica. Several ornaments of this material
resemble the heads of animals whose features are emphasized by a red color,
while others are the form of circles and bands. Many of the copper
ornaments are large and of peculiar shape; others are scrolls, scolloped
circles, oval pendants and other forms. There are about thirty of the
singular spool-shaped objects or ear-rings made of copper. Three large
sheets of mica, were on this altar, and several finely-chipped points of
obsidian chalcedony and chert were in the mass of materials.
        There were several pendants cut from a micaceous schist and of a
unique style of work. There are also portions of a circular piece of bone,
over the surface of which are incised figures, and flat pieces of shell
similarly carved. Several masses of native copper were on the altar.
        METEORIC IRON AND TERRA-COTTA FIGURINES. -But by far the most
important things found on this altar were the several masses of meteoric
iron and the ornaments made from this metal. One of these is half of a
spool-shaped object like those made of copper, with which it was
associated. Another ear ornament of copper is covered with a thin plating
of the iron, in the same manner as others were covered with silver. Three
of the masses of iron have been more or less hammered into bars, as if for
the purpose of making some ornament or implement, another is apparently in
the natural shape in which it was found. On another altar in another mound
of the group were several terra-cotta figurines of a character heretofore
unknown from the mounds.
        Unfortunately these objects as well as others found on the altars
have been more or less burnt, and many of them appear to have been
purposely broken before they were placed on the altars.
        Many pieces of these images have been untied, and it is my hope
that we shall succeed in nearly restoring some of them.
        Enough has already been made out to show the peculiar method of
wearing the hair; the singular head-dress and large button-like
ear-ornaments shown by those human figures are of particular interest. On
the same altar with the figurines were two remarkable dishes carved from
stone in the form of animals; with these was a serpent cut out of mica. On
the altar were several hundred quartz pebbles from the river, and nearly
300 astragali of deer and elk. As but two of these bones could be obtained
from a single animal, and as there were but one or two fragments of other
bones, there must have been some special and important reason for
collecting so large a number of these particular bones.
        A fine made bracelet made of copper and covered with silver and
several other ornaments of copper, a few pearls and shells and other
ornaments were also on this altar. Near the last group of earth-works are
two parallel ways or embankments 100 feet apart and extending one-half mile
in length north-westwardly across the lands of Mr. Gano Martin.
        SMALL EARTH ENCLOSURES. -Of the smaller earth enclosures, the one
in the Stites Grove, near Plainville, is in the best state of preservation.
It consists of a circular embankment, inner ditch, across which is a
causeway leading to an opening in the embankment to the southeast. Numerous
ancient burial places are found in the county, and the mortuary customs are
varied, indicating that the territory has been occupied by various tribes
at different periods. We find the stonecist burials, burials under flat
stones, burials in stone circles, burials in the drift gravel beds, burials
in pits in the horizontal and also in the sitting positions, original mound
burials intrusive mound burials and evidences of cremation.
        ANCIENT CEMETERY, NEAR MADISONVILLE, O. -The most extensive and
interesting of the ancient burial-places is the one known as the
pre-historic cemetery, near Madisonville, Ohio, which has become noted for
its singular ash-pits, as well as for the skeletons buried in or at the
bottom of the leaf-mould covering the pits. One thousand and sixty-five
skeletons, 700 ash-pits, upwards of 300 earthen vases, numerous implements
of bone, horn, shell, copper and stone have been found.
        THE ASH-PITS are discovered after twelve to twenty-four inches of
the leaf-mould has been removed and the hard pan or clay is reached, when
the pit is discovered by a circular discoloration or black spot. These
ash-pits as they have been well named, are circular excavations in the hard
pan of the plateau, from three to four feet in diameter and from four to
seven feet deep. The contents themselves are of peculiar interest, and the
purpose for which they were made is still a mystery. The average pit may be
said to be filled with ashes in more or less defined layers. Some of the
layers near the top seem to be mixed with the surrounding gravel to a
greater or less extent; but generally, after removing the contents of the
upper third of the pit, a mass of fine gray ashes is found, which is from a
few inches to over two feet in thickness.
        Sometimes this mass of ashes contains thin strata of charcoal, sand
or gravel. Throughout the mass of ashes and sand, from the the top of pit
to the bottom are bones of fishes, reptiles, birds and mammals. With the
bones are the shells of several species of unionidae. There are also found
in these pits large pieces of pottery, also a large number of implements
made of bones of deer, and elk antlers are in most cases adapted for
digging or agricultural purposes, and often, so large and so well made as
to prove that they are effective implements. Among other objects made of
bone are beeds, small whistles, or bird-calls, made from hollow bone of
birds, also flat and cylindrical pieces with "tally' notches and marks cut
upon them short round pieces of antler carefully cut and polished together,
with arrow points, drills, scrapers and other chipped instruments of stone.
A few polished celts and several rough hammer stones have been found in the
pits.

        -continued in part 4

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End of OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest V99 Issue #361
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