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FOOT-PRINTS 
 
 VANISHED RACES 
 
 -IN THE — 
 
 MISSISSIPPI VALLEY 
 
 BEING AN ACCOUNT OF SOME OF THE MONUMENTS AND KELICS OF 
 
 PRE-HISTORIC RACES SCATTERED OVER ITS SURFACE, WITH 
 
 SUGGESTIONS AS TO THEIR ORIGIN AND USES. 
 
 By a. J. CON ANT, A. M., 
 
 Member of the St, Louis Academy of Science^ and of the American Association 
 for the Advancement of Science . 
 
 ST. LOUIS: 
 CHANCY R. BARNS 
 
 1879. 
 
Entered according; to Act of Congress, in the year 1879, 
 
 BY A. J. CONAST, 
 In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washinglon. 
 
 oRMC ^ 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The first organized effort for the study and preservation of the 
 antiquities of this continent was the formation of The American 
 Antiquarian Society, which was incorporated by Act of the Leg- 
 islature of Massachusetts in October, 1812. A goodly number of 
 distinguished scholars of that State were immediately enrolled as 
 members, as well as many other learned men residing in other 
 States, who were made corresponding members. In 1821 this 
 Society published its first volume of " Transactions." 
 
 Although nearly all the accounts of the expeditions of the earlier 
 explorers of the continent of N"orth America contained notes of 
 striking memorials, which were met with in their journeys, such 
 as mounds, embankments, fortifications and the like, still, all 
 such notices were too meagre and superficial to give them any 
 special scientific value. 
 
 Through the labors of the American Antiquarian Society, the 
 attention of the scientific world was first called to the countless, 
 and often imposing memorials of pre-historic America, and their 
 proper study began. 
 
 More than three-score years have now passed since the date 
 of the organization referred to, during which time volume after 
 volume has appeared upon the subject. Accounts of special sur- 
 veys, by private individuals and State geologists, have multiplied 
 every year. Scientific associations all over the land, as well as nu- 
 merous Archaeological Societies formed for this specific purpose, 
 have given the subject unremitting and serious attention. The 
 Smithsonian Institute has also expended large sums of money in 
 
IV PREFACE. 
 
 explbration and in publishing the accounts of the multiplied dis- 
 coveries of observers employed by that noble institution. !N'or 
 has the interest in the subject been confined to America. Some 
 of the wisest archaeologists of Europe have written learnedly 
 upon the works and migrations of the ancient inhabitants of 
 both continents of (America. 
 
 Notwithstanding all this labor and study, the great questions 
 continually repeated, which were suggested when our antiquities 
 were first noticed, still remain unanswered ; namely : Who were 
 the authors of these works ? What was their origin, and what 
 were the causes of their disappearance ? Were they the red men 
 found in possession of the continent at the time of its discovery ? 
 I am not aware that the opinion that the red men were the authors of 
 the most extensive works, though maintained by some scholars 
 of high repute, is held by any who have given them personal 
 and thorough examination. The earlier travellers who stumbled 
 upon them in the wilderness, or on the prairie, express their as- 
 tonishment at their magnitude and the skill displayed in their 
 erection. Captain Carver, in the account of his travels in the 
 years 1766-'7-'8, describes what hef was convinced was a mili- 
 tary work, which he accidentally discovered upon the bank of 
 Lake Pepin. This was long before it was known that America 
 had any antiquities. Concerning it he says that "its form was 
 somewhat circular, and its flanks reached the river. Though 
 much defaced by time, every angle was distinguishable, and 
 appeared as regular and fashioned with as much military skill 
 as if planned by Vauban himself." Again : "I was able to 
 draw certain conclusions of its great antiquity." " How a work 
 of this kind could exist in a country that has hitherto (according 
 to generally -received opinion) been the seat of war to untutored 
 Indians alone, whose whole stock of military knowledge has only, 
 till within two centuries, amounted to drawing the bow, and 
 
PEEFACE. V 
 
 whose only breastwork, even at present, is the thicket, I know 
 not." 
 
 His testimony is selected from that of a multitude of early 
 writers, because he could not have been prejudiced by the pre- 
 conceived opinions or notions of others, and also because he was 
 a man of military training, being a captain in the British army, 
 whose conclusions would not be mere guess-work. The judgment 
 of Brackenridge, Atwater, William Wirt and many other dis- 
 tinguished men, is in perfect agreement upon this point, 
 namely : that they could not have been built by the Indians, as 
 we know them, nor any people in like condition. 
 
 The first important question to be decided — if, indeed, it can 
 be — is the origin of the North American Indians. Was their 
 original home in Asia ? and did they, as many believe, make their 
 way to this continent across Behring's . Straits, or the Aleutian 
 Islands ? In the solution of this question, the student of Arch- 
 aeology bespeaks the aid of the Philologist. 
 
 Archaeology, Greology and Paleontology have been called 
 three sister sciences. Philology must be added to the sister- 
 hood, at- least as far as American pre-historic times are con- 
 cerned, as it may be that the lamp of this younger sister may 
 light the footsteps of the elder to the final results of ethnological 
 investigation. Should there be discovered some radical affinity 
 between a few of the forty stock languages of the red men of 
 North America and their physically-related brethren of ISTorth- 
 western Asia, the question, it would seem, would be settled. 
 
 No one who has not previously examined the antiquities of 
 the vanished races who once dwelt upon this continent, can have 
 any adequate idea of their magnitude and extent ; and he who has 
 seen them as they lie thickly scattered throughout the fertile 
 valleys of the Western States, is surprised at the evidence they 
 
VI PBEFACE 
 
 present of a prodigious population which once swarmed in this 
 wide domain. 
 
 The Cahokia group of mounds in the American Bottom, six 
 miles from St. Louis, may aid in illustrating the statement. 
 There are in this group, beside smaller ones, at least a dozen in 
 close propinquity ; any one of which, if standing alone, would be 
 a striking feature of the landscape. Just west of Monk's Mound, 
 the largest of the group, is one which is perhaps fifteen to twenty 
 feet in height. On the flat surface of the top stands a good-sized 
 farm-house, with necessary out-buildings and conveniences, and 
 plenty of room for a variety of fruit trees, and an ample vegeta- 
 ble garden. This is not the only one so occupied, and there are 
 near this one several others much larger and more conspicuous ; 
 while all of them look diminutive, and may be compared to ant- 
 hills beside that King of Mounds which stands near the northern 
 center of the group. Directly north of this great work are satis- 
 factory evidences of a large artificial lake, the dirt taken from 
 which was presumably used in building the mounds. The form 
 and size of the lake can best be made out just after the Cahokia 
 creek, which flows through it, has been swollen by heavy rains. 
 
 Having his home in the center of the great valley where these 
 works abound, and looking upon some of them almost every day 
 of his life, the writer has been impelled to note the facts which 
 came under his own observation, and to venture, concerning them, 
 a few conclusions. The conclusions may be valueless ; but if he 
 who causes two blades of grass to grow where but one grew 
 before, is a benefactor, truly, he who- contributes a new fact to 
 the sum of human knowledge, should be considered in the same 
 lieht : for the after times alone can reveal the value of the con- 
 tribution, and that which is least in all earthly kingdoms some- 
 times becomes the greatest. In the desire to do what he could 
 to advance the study of a science so deeply interesting to himself, 
 
PREFACE. VII 
 
 the writer commits these chapters to the public, making no claim 
 to originality beyond the accounts of his own explorations of the 
 mounds and caves therein contained.* 
 
 It should be noticed that this memoir has already appeared in 
 the voluminous work, entitled, "The Commonwealth of Mis- 
 souri," and as there has been, ever since the appearance of that 
 work, much inquiry from various quarters, particularly out- 
 side of Missouri, for the xlrchaeological portion, and by those who 
 had no special interest in the local history of our State, and there- 
 fore did not care to incur the expense of purchasing so costly a 
 work as the Commonwealth, it has seemed best, without further 
 delay, to reprint the work from the original plates, as it first 
 appeared in the history referred to. This statement will explain 
 the frequent allusions which will be noticed, to that work. 
 
 A. J. C. 
 
 * It may not be amiss to state, also, that an additional interest may attach to the sub- 
 ject-matter of tills work, because it is the result of explorations in an entirely new field, 
 concerning which nothing has before been published. The account of every new "find " 
 In-tlie Archaeological field alwaj^s elicits the attention of scientists all over the world. 
 This' is illustrated by the fact that a short paper upon the mounds in Southeast Mis- 
 souri, read by the author of this book at a meeting of the St. Louis Academy of Science, 
 and published in its transactions, has been translated and republished in France, Ger- 
 many, Austria and Denmark. 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Page. 
 
 Traces of Vanished Peoples.— Their "World-wide Diffusion. — Kussian Earth' 
 works. — ^Egyptian Monuments Ancient at the Date of Oldest Becords. — ^A 
 I'roy Still Older than the Ancient Troy of Homer 3 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Methods of the Archseologist. — The Shell-heaps of the Baltic. — The Buried For- 
 ests of Denmark. — Thfe Sisterhood of Science. — The Five Geological Periods. 
 — ^The Ages of Stone and Bronze. — Iron in Common Cse Three Thousand 
 Year's Ago 7 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 No "Age of Bronze" in America. — ^Traditions Regarding the Mounds. — Tus- 
 carora Chronology. — The Animal Mounds of the Upper Mississippi) Eegion. — 
 Ancient Fish Traps. — Burial, Sacrificial and Historical Mounds 12 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 The Archaeological Monuments of Missouri. — Their Rapid Destruction. — Sites of 
 Towns and Cities. — The Lahors of H. M. Brackeuridge. — The Big Mound at 
 St. Louis. — Col. O'Fallon's Eesidence Erected on an Ancient Mound. — ^Tlie 
 Mounds in Pore^ Park. — ^Evidences of a Vast Population. — New Madrid its 
 Center. — ^Description of Various Works 25 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 One People the Builders of these Mounds. — Cremation and Burial Mounds. — The 
 Big Mound at St. Louis. — ^Mistaken Views. — ^Minute Description of the Work. 
 — Stone Mounds. — Stone Sepulchres in St. Louis and Perry Counties 38 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 "The Cave-Dwellers." — ^Tales of Discoveries in Kentucky, etc. — The Caves of 
 the Ozark Mountains. — Proofs of Long Occupancy. — Skeletons and Other 
 Belies Found. — The Cave-Dwellers a Different Bace From the Mound- 
 Builders 47 
 
VIII. TABLE OF CONTENTS. '' 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Temple Mounds. — Growth of Ancient Religious Systems^ — Characteristics of this 
 Class of Monuments. — The Great Mound at Cahokia its best Representative 
 in North America. — Braekenridge's Description of it in 1811. — ^How it came to 
 be called " Monk's Mound." — The Ceremonies of the Sun- Worshippers. — 
 Other Temple Mounds. — The Indians not Descended Prom the Mound- 
 Builders 53 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Garden Mounds. — The Food of the Pre-Historic Races. — Fish Probably one of 
 their Main Resources. — The use of the Ditches within their City "Walls. — 
 ' Domestic Animals. — Agriculture. — Religious Systems. — Dissimilarity between 
 Northern and Southern Tribes of Indians. — Traces of Aztec Culture Among 
 the Latter. — ^Vast Numbers of the Garden Mounds. — Proofs of their Purpose. 
 — The Utah Mounds.— Interesting Discoveries. — ^A new Variety of Wheat 
 Grown from Kernels found Therein. — An Opening for Further Researches. . . 62 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Miscellaneous Works — Historical or National Festival Mounds. — Stone Struc- 
 tures. — Ruins on the Gasconade River. — Group near Louisiana, Mo. — Some 
 Indiana Relics, — Crenjatioij Chambers. — Proofs of Agricultural Knowledge. 
 — Great Canals Ante-dating the Erie — Ancient Counterparts of Modem 
 Achievements. — Our Southern " Bayous ";of Artificial Origin 70 
 
 CHAPTER X. • 
 
 Fottery.— Superiority of Pre-Historic America Wares over those of Europe. — 
 Imitations of Living Objects. — The Materials Used. — Reliquaries. — Skulls 
 Enclosed in Earthen Vessels. — Bowls with Ornamental Heads. — Probabilities 
 of Higher Art Among the Ancients 79 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Crania. — ^Diflferences Between the Skulls of the Mound-Builders and the Indians. 
 — Difficulties of the Subject, — ^Twp. Varieties of Crania in the same Mounds.— 
 Principles of Classification. — Influence of Local Customs. — Peruvian Skulls. — 
 Characteristics of Missouri Specimens, etc. — The Tools of Ancient Americans. 
 — Proofs of a Knowledge of Iron " 97 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Concluding Observations. — The Origin of the Pre-Historic Races of America. — 
 Theory of Spontaneous Generation. — The Law Governing their Migrations. — 
 Successive Movements of the Nahua Race. — The Aztecs the Last Colony of 
 that People. — Opinions of Baron Humboldt. — Our own Country Probably the 
 Original Home of the Aztec Civilization. — The Indian Races of Asiatic Origin. 
 — ^Facilities of Immigration via: Behring's Straits. — A Personal Word. — Dry 
 Bonnes Clothed. < 113 
 
Man in the A^e of the Mammoth and Great Bear. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Traces of Vanished Peoples. — Theiu World-Wide Diffusion. — Russian Earth- 
 works.— Egyptian Monuments Ancient at the Date of Oldest Records.— A 
 Troy Still Older than the Ancient Troy op Homer. 
 
 IN all lands, whenever in the ages past the climate has been such as 
 to render it possible for man to subsist, the earth is found thickly- 
 planted with the graves of vanished peoples. Countless generations 
 have come and gone, and left no record of their lives and work, save 
 what is to be found in the few surviving monuments they have erected, 
 or the rude implements and fragmentary remains of their industry, 
 which descended with them to the tomb. The great ocean of humanity, 
 with the energy of its ceaseless flow, has oft-times, no doubt, obliterated 
 the traces of former generations, save here and there a foot-print in the 
 solid rock, or an empty shell which has been left upon the shores of time. 
 We of to-day build, sow and reap, buy and sell, and thus repeat, over 
 and over again, the great drama of life, above the sepulchersof departed 
 millions, long since forgotten. How often the long eons have finished 
 their cycles and the new began — who can compute, or from whence 
 shall the data be drawn upon which such computation may be based? 
 The sacred records furnish no system of the chronology of the race, 
 nor standing- ground upon which a trustworthy one can be constructed. 
 The wisest who have essayed the task, from such sources, differ in 
 
* AJJCILEOLOGY. 
 
 their estiinates more than five f housaud years. The devout believer 
 ill Revelation, therefore, need feel no apprehensions for the foundations 
 of his faith if it shall be proven even that man has been an inhabitant 
 of the earth for a hundred thousand years or more. 
 
 All that can be gained from history, sacred and profane, supplemented 
 with the hieroglyphic annals of Egypt and the inscribed bricks and 
 cylinders of Assyria, carries us back only about forty-four centuries. 
 Suddenly we come then to the border-land of legendary myths and 
 extravagant traditions. The thick darkness which enshrouds all beyond^ 
 no one, a hundred years ago, thought possible to penetrate or dispel. 
 But within the last fifty years a new science has been added to the 
 varied departments of human knowledge and research — ^the science of 
 Archaeology, pure and proper, — and tbeusands to-day, including many 
 of the best minds in the most enlightened lands, are devoting to it their 
 serious and earnest labors. 
 
 The field of exploration is the wide world, whose continents are all 
 equally rich in the monuments of the forgotten past. From the widely- 
 separated quarters of this great field, the laborers gather from time to 
 time, bringing the results of their work. All these combined are 
 throwing their focal light upon the great questions of the origin and 
 antiquity of the various races of mankind — their peculiar customs and 
 mode of life — investing them with an interest never before awakened, 
 which increases more and more, as the promise brightens of their 
 satisfactory elucidation. The number of the monuments of which we 
 speak, upon our own continent, is legion upon legion. From Nova 
 Scotia to the southern coast of Florida — ^from Behring's Strait to Mexico 
 and Peru — from the Atlantic to the Pacific — are to be found the sites of 
 ancient cities, or the former seats of a dense population. Europe, as 
 every one knows, is full of them. Not only on the surface of the soil, 
 but far down in the gravels of the drift, are found the remains of man " 
 in companionship with the bones of huge mammals, who were buried 
 there, it would seem, long before the "British Channel was scooped 
 out." In Russia, from its western border to the Pacific, from its 
 southernmost limit far north into the inhospitable regions of Siberia, 
 earthworks are found giving evidences of long occupancy, and doubtless 
 a forced migration to the North. There, in the sepulchers of the dead, 
 they deposited the gold and silver ornaments and other treasures of the 
 departed, in which relics the more recent inhabitants have driven a 
 thriving trade. The great steppes of Asia abound with sepulchral 
 
TEACES OF VAJiTISHED PEOPLES. 5 
 
 mounds. Nor are the deserts of Africa without their witness to the 
 existence of former generations. Hei remorseless saiids are the tomb 
 of many an ancient city. 
 
 Egypt, the oldest nation which has preserved a written history, has 
 Also her pre-historic remains. Before the name of Athens was pro-' 
 hounced, or Greece was born — when Italy was peopled with savage tribes 
 as wild and barbarous as the red men of America, — Egypt was far 
 advanced in the higher branches of knowledge, the sciences and the 
 nobler arts. Her priests even then dwelt in the palaces of the kings', 
 and issued their mandates, with his, from the throne. Those palaces 
 were colleges of learning, while the priests were the professors, who 
 not only ministered in matters of religion and worship, but devoted 
 themselves to the higher education of the young as well. 
 
 To-day, as the explorer removes the stones from her ancient structures, 
 he finds here and there one, whose inner surface is carved with curious 
 devices and inscriptions, showing that it once had a place in older and 
 demolished edifices. She had then her libraries also, in which the 
 knowledge of her sages was preserved. Tombs of the librarians have 
 been discovered, dating back at least five hundred years before Homer 
 sang in the cities of Greece, and inscribed "To the chief of books." 
 
 Long since, the line of the Pharaohs became extinct, and no prince or 
 king — so the prophet said — shall ever sit on her throne again or sway 
 the scepter oyer the land of the Nile. How old she seems ! And yet old 
 Egypt was of yesterday, compared with the men of the drift, the 
 reindeer period, or the pre-glacial times of Scandinavia, Scotland, 
 France, England and the Pyrenees. 
 
 These everywhere ancient monuments of which we speak, men have 
 been wont to regard with unquestioning curiosity, or at most to pass by 
 with a conjecture only, as Homer did, who speaks of the ancient mounds, 
 .concerning which, in his day even, there was no history or tradition, and 
 who imagined they might be the tombs of ancient heroes. Job makes 
 more than one allusion to the monuments and '*solitary mansions of the 
 dead," which awakened the curiosity of the caravans and travelers of 
 Teman, as they passed along the great thoroughfares of commerce. 
 The wild songs of the most ancient bards are no longer poetic myths, 
 the creations of a fervid imagination ; but their inspiration was drawn 
 from events which actually transpired. "With truth their souls were fired." 
 The poets were the nations' historians as well. Troy, with her strange 
 istorj', is no longer a doubtful dty. Dr. Schlieman has found her ancient 
 
«? AKCELEOLOGY* 
 
 site and discovered enough, among her long-entombed memorials, to 
 authenticate her history ; and we may write once more "Ilium est", 
 for " Ilium fuit." 
 
 And what is most surprising of ali, far down beneath the level of the 
 ground once trod by the heroes whose names Homer has given to 
 immortality, the explorer has found the ruins of another city — and he 
 thinks still another below it— concerning which the poet seems to have 
 heard no tradition. Among those deposits of an age so remote, were 
 articles of stone and bronze and precious metals, skillfully wrought, giv-r 
 ing evidence of the existence of a people whose knowledge, attainments, 
 and social condition were far in advance of those of the more ancient 
 periods of stone and bronze — a civilization which could only have been 
 realized by the slow growth of centuries. 
 
 But not alone upon that glorious land, made immortal by the fiery 
 energy of Homer's matchless songs, has a resurrection morning dawned, 
 nor Egypt and Assyria with their hieroglyphic annals, hoary with age ; but 
 other lands, unknown in classic story, and the islands of the sea, are 
 giving up their long-forgotten dead. The explorers of to-day are 
 breaking down the hitherto impassable barriers of the remoter ages of 
 antiquity ; here and there we catch glimpses of the life and customs, and 
 hold converse with the tribes and peoples of pre-historic times. The 
 fast-accumulating records which have been gathered during the last 
 twenty-five years are continually enriching the libraries of every civilized 
 nation, and he who would master them all will soon find life too short to 
 do more than acquaint himself with the grand results of the multiplied 
 discoveries. The chief difficulty then, it will be perceived, in the 
 way of the present task, is one of condensation, or in other words, 
 how to select from such vast material only those facts and observations 
 which are necessary for the proper treatment of the subject we are 
 about to consider. 
 
 On account of the limits prescribed for the archaeological chapters of 
 this work compelling all possible economy of space, and also for the sake 
 of continuity, instead of burdening them ^vith frequent references, to the 
 authors consulted, I desire in the outset to make all due acknowledgment 
 of my indebtedness to those valued records of the labors of the noble 
 army of abler men who have preceded me in like investigations in this 
 <lepartment of knowledge. Chief among those which have been freely 
 consulted, are the writings of Garcillasso pp la Vega, PBor. 
 Hefinesqub, Daniel Wiljlson, LL.D., Alexander W. Bradford, 
 
TRACES Of VANISHEP PEOPLES. 1 
 
 J. "W; Foster; EdwabdL. ClabK, Wm. Pidgeon', Prof. G. C. Swal- 
 low, Sir John Lubbock, M. L. Figuieb, M. Marlot, John Evans, 
 Lewis C. Beck, H. M. Bbackenbidge, James Adaib, and others. 
 Also, an article upon the Archaeology of Missouri, contributed by 
 myself to the last volume of Transactions of the St. Louis Academy of 
 Science. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Hkthods ov the Arch^ologist.— The Shell-heaps of the Baltic— The Buried 
 FORESTS OF Denmark.— The Sisterhood op Science.— The Five Geological 
 Periods. — The Ages of Stone and Bronze. — Iron in common use three thousand 
 TEARS ago. 
 
 As before remarked, in almost every land upon the surface of the 
 globe, are to be found countless monuments and memorials of vanished 
 races ; sometimes structures of imposing magnitude, but oftener imple- 
 ments of war and the chase, of domestic use and personal adornment. 
 From such remains, more or less rude and defaced, it has been found 
 possible to reconstruct a pre-historic history of man's life in the most 
 remote ages of his existence ; and by their careful study we are able to 
 scrutinize his manner of life ; to look in upon his domestic scenes ; to 
 witness his ceaseless struggles for existence— ;-his mode of burial ; and 
 to learn something of his notions of anothej: life. Only one important 
 thing is forever lost — his language. For "we can never hear him speak." 
 Yet the history we may recover is as true and touching as any which 
 the poets sing. Nor need all this be thought incredible, for these 
 results are obtained by the simple processes of reasoning and induction 
 which we apply to the affairs of every-day life. When the traveler 
 upon our western plains stumbles by chance upon the ashes and debris 
 of a former habitation, if he finds there the fragments of a hoe and 
 sickle, he at. once infers that the former occupant was a tiller of the 
 soil; should his eye light upon a cast-off shoe of infantile propor- 
 tions, he naturally concludes that once it was the home of childhood. 
 In addition to this, should he discover charred bits of bread and other 
 articles of food, carbonized grain and fruits, along with culinary 
 articles, showing the action of fire, these facts would show what crops 
 
8 
 
 AKCH^OLOGT. 
 
 were grown, the kind of food upon which the family subsisted, and also 
 that the dwelling was destroyed by fire. The presence of the fragments 
 of a crucifix would point to the religious belief of the former occupant. 
 
 Such is the method of the archaeologist. When he examines the huge 
 heaps of shells along the shores of the numerous arms of the Baltic 
 sea, composed of individuals of large size, select and full-grown, pf 
 several species, commingled with rude implements of stoue and bone, 
 with also the bones of the codfish, and compares them with the 
 diminutive specimens he is able to procure from the same waters now, 
 it is an inference most reasonable, that when these heaps were piled up 
 around the miserable huts of the ancient fishermen, the waters of the 
 Baltic were not so fresh as now. The presence of the bones of the 
 codfish gives some evidence of skill in navigation, for they must be caught 
 in the open sea. When the peat-bogs of this same country are examined, 
 they present a record reaching far back of the historic period. These 
 depressions in the natural surface of the earth — sometimes to the depth 
 of thirty feet, disclose three distinct periods of arborescent vegetation. 
 At the bottom ai'e the stately trunks of the pine tree ; above these the 
 oak, which once grew upon the sides of the pits, and when their full 
 maturity was reached, fell inward. The oak was succeeded by the beech 
 anl birch which now flourish — and have flourished during all the period 
 of history — throughout the land. The pine and oak have never been 
 known during the historic period in the native forests of Denmark. 
 In these bogs, beneath the layers of pine, are found the rude implements 
 of the ancient inhabitants. Man lived, then, when the pine forests were 
 in their glory, and at that time also piled up the shell heaps along the 
 shore ; for in these are found in great abundance the bones of a bird 
 whose food is derived from the pine. 
 
 Again : when the student of Archaeology discovers — as is frequently 
 the case — ^the bones of extinct mammals, in situ, each bone lying by its 
 fellow in its relative position as when in life, he knows there can have 
 been no disturbance of the remains since the death of the animal. If he 
 finds also, in companionship with them, the relics of man's industry, he 
 believes that these mammals and man were contemporaneous. Should he 
 find, further, huge bones split longitudinally, and showing marks and 
 scratches of flint knives, which could only have been made while the bones 
 were soft, he naturally concludes that man hunted these animals for food 
 and split the bones to obtain the marrow. But the generalizations of the 
 archaeologist are not based upon the study of such relics alone. Geology, 
 
TRACES OF VANISHED PEOPLES. 
 
 9 
 
 Paleontology and Archseology go hand in hand, and have well been 
 called "three sister sciences." Each of these three related departments 
 of human knowledge is throwing its focal light with increasing luster 
 upon the great question of n^an's first appearance upon the earth. By 
 the light of their combined disclosures, the steps of our groping feet 
 are illumined as we travel slowly along the pathway which leads us 
 irresistibly to the night of the unknown ages, "and the mind recoils 
 dismayed when it undertakes the computation of the thousands of years 
 which have elapsed since the creation of man." 
 
 The five geological periods 
 into which the crust of the 
 earth. has been divided, are 
 commonly named in the rel- 
 ative order of their age : 
 the primitive rocks, the tran- 
 sition rocks, the secondary 
 rocks, the tertiary rocks, and 
 quaternary rocks, All of 
 these are antes^or to the pres- 
 ent geological period. The 
 long succession of animals 
 and plants peculiar to each, 
 is found generally to have 
 died out 
 
 its continuance 
 from the present order of 
 
 things, each period must a solitary Cav, Oweller. 
 
 have been of long duration ; for the animals and plants with which we 
 are familiar show scarcely any alteration since their first appearance, 
 though they have existed for thousands of years. Now it is considered 
 certain by the best informed, that man existed in Europe at the 
 commencement of the quaternary period. 
 
 We are not left in doubt as to the climatic conditions of that country in 
 those remote times, which must have been similar to the polar regions of 
 the North to-day. There was no Iceland, Scotland, or Scandinavia then. 
 The whole continent was shrouded in a winding sheet of snow. Her 
 now beautiful valleys were the bottom of the sea. Enormous ice-fields 
 stretched away from mountain to mountain, and only the highest 
 elevations of the Pyrenees and Apennines were visible above the vast 
 expanse of eternal snow and ice. Yet there, during that awful winter, for 
 
 during the time of 
 Judging 
 
w 
 
 . AKCILaiOLOGy. 
 
 whicjh there was no pronSise of a coming, spring, man aiid' cotemporaneotti 
 animals contrived to exist. But wliat a life! To us, it would seem 
 utteriy hopeless and dreaiy ; but for its maintenance he found abundant 
 employment for all his activities, in providing means for his daily 
 sustenance, and in his contests with the wild beasts around him for the 
 possession of the shelters of the caves and overhanging rocks. How, 
 long this period continued we cannot know ; but the centuries rolled 
 on, And slowly the glacial period comes to an end — the ice-fields melt 
 away, the glaciers retreat' to the north, and the submerged continent 
 arises from the ocean.: The sunshine and the genial air of a new spriug 
 morning dissipate the tears from the face of Nature, and she hastens ta 
 put on her robes of green. With this dawn of another life a newi 
 
 The Elephas Primigeneus. 
 
 genei^tion of animals now makes its appearance on the earth, and very 
 different too, from those which perished during the glacial period.. 
 Among them the huge mammoth ( Elephas pHmigenevs) with his 
 woolly covering and lion-like, shaggy mane ; the Siberian Ehinoceros 
 ( Rhiiwceros tichorinus^ with curious horns ) and clothing of fur, so soft 
 and warm ; several species of the Hippopotamus ; the Cave Bear, of 
 prodigious size, ( Ursizs .spelceus ) ; the Cave Lion ( Felis spelea ) ; various 
 kinds of Hyenas, the Bison, the Urus, {^Bos primigenus ) , and the 
 gigantic Irish Elk, with enormous wide-spreading antlers, and many 
 others which need not now be mentioned, 
 
TKACES .OF VANISHED PEOPLES. 1 X 
 
 These huge monsters rapidly multiply arid roam in countless multi- 
 tudes over the contioient, as do the buffaloes of our western wilds 
 to-day. Hundreds and thousands gather together in their favorite 
 resorts and from some cause unknown they perish. How man could 
 successfully contend with such formidable adversaries with the rude 
 implements he was able to construct by his infantile skill, is surprising; 
 but his necessities compelled him to he victorious. Nor was he then 
 destitute of aesthetic taste ; for at his leisure he carved in stone or bone 
 the outlines of the beasts he had slain in the chase. 
 
 At length the long summer ends, and another fearful winter begins. 
 Again the cold is intense ; the glaciers advance through the valleys 
 toward the south. The floods increase, the caves are submerged, and 
 man seeks a home again in the mountain ranges. The valleys are filled 
 with alluvium for hundreds of feet up the mountain sides. The centu- 
 ries roll on — how long, no one can tell, — and again another subsidence 
 of the floods, or uprising of the continent, takes place, and the glaciers 
 once more recede to the north. Slowly the mountain tops are lifted 
 toward the sky, and the earth is clad again in green. 
 
 Man now .returns to the former abodes of his ancestors. But what 
 a change has taken place 1 Many of the mighty mammals his forefathers 
 hunted on the plains are seen no more. A few solitary individuals 
 linger on, but soon he witnesses "the extinction and disappearance from 
 the face of the earth of an entire fauna of the larger animals." 
 
 From this period the Keiudeer epoch, — known also as the period of mi- 
 grated animals — ^begins. A new civilization dawns. Polished implements 
 of stone and bone take the place of rude chips and splinters of silex. 
 Pottery is manufactured and ornamented with curious dfevices ; and all 
 that man does displays the awakening exercise of his sense for beauty. 
 From this time the race proceeds with slow but steady advancement. 
 How long the Neolithic, or polished stone period lasted, we have no 
 means of ju<3girig, nor when men learned to smelt the more yielding 
 ores, and to make bronze by the alloy of copper with tin. But when 
 that great discovery was made by which he supplied himself with a 
 material so much better fitted by its superior hardness to copper for 
 cutting implements and other uses, he entered that pathway, which ends 
 only in all the glorious possibilities of the future. With this discovery, 
 the age of Bronze was ushered in. Speedily its use spread over the 
 greater part of- Europe. With the age of bronze the arts and sciences 
 may be said to have had their birth. Of the time of its continuance, 
 which seems to have been long, we know but little more than we do of 
 
12 AUCH^OLOGT. 
 
 the age of stone. But at length it seems to have been brought to a 
 sudden termination by that mightiest physical event in the history of 
 the development of mankind — the discovery of Iron. As to the time 
 when this great transition took place, history is silent ; for it was long 
 before history began. The poems of Homer and Hesiod prove that 
 iron was known and in use at least three thousand years ago. 
 
 CHAPTER HI. 
 
 No "Age of Bronze" in America.— Traditions Regarding the Mounds.— Tuscaror a 
 Chronology. — The Animal Mounds of the Upper Mississiffi Begion. — ^Ancient 
 Fish Traps.— Burial, Sacrificial and Historical Mounds. 
 
 The facts, and the conclusions they suggest, presented in the fore- 
 going chapter, are gathered mostly from the continent of Europe. 
 Each of the great geographical divisions of the globe seems to possess 
 an archseological record more or less peculiar to itself. Our own 
 continent has had no age of bronze. At the time of its discovery, 
 however, implements of copper, beaten out usually, but sometimes 
 smelted and cast in a mold, from the native ore, were to some extent 
 taking the place of those of stone and bone. And although the copper 
 regions of Lake Superior, for the distance of more than one hundred and 
 fifty miles along it southern shore, give evidence of loftg-continued 
 mining operations upon a stupendous scale, still we must believe'that this 
 metal was too costly to be to any great extent the propferty of the masses : 
 while, even in our own times the remnants of some savage tribes may be 
 found who still point their spears aiid arrows with stone. The presence 
 of the relics of such material therefore, it hardly need be Said, is of no 
 Value in questions of antiquity, only so far as they ate found in compau- 
 ionship with the remains of extinct animals, or their age is denaonstrated 
 by geological or some other irrefragable prodfs; 
 
 But now, leaving all other facts and considerations beai-jng upon the 
 general subject of archaeology, which might be interesting and' appropriate 
 in this connection, it is proper to projceed to the examination of the monu- 
 ments of our own land, among which those found in, Missouri are 
 peculiarly instructive, not only as forming no inconspicuous part of the 
 one great whole, and calculated to shed much 'light upon the quee^tiqu of 
 
TKADrnONS BEGAEDING THE MOUNDS. 13 
 
 the homogeneity of the vast population which once swarmed upon this 
 continent, but also — if not their origin — at least the direction of their 
 disappearance. 
 
 In view of the magnitude of the subject, the ethnological questions 
 involved, and the evident relation of these remains to all which are 
 found in both North and South America, it has seemed to me impossible 
 to examine them in the most profitable manner, if our examination shall 
 be circumscribed by the imaginary boundaries of the State. For the 
 reason mentioned, I have also presented, as briefly as possible, the 
 preceding statement of the results achieved by the labors of the 
 archaeologists of Europe. I will now proceed to speak of some of the 
 more important monuments of this country, with such description 
 as suits my present purpose. 
 
 The statement has been often repeated by writers upon this subject, 
 that the Indians have no traditions concerning the authors or the 
 design of these monuments. This is undoubtedly true as far as the 
 degenerate remnants of the tribes of the present day are concerned. 
 But when the country was first discovered, and long after, here and 
 there a solitary individual was found who claimed to be a prophet, and 
 to have descended from a long priestly line, and also from a race 
 superior to the Indians by whom their forefathers had been conquered 
 and enslaved. Concerning the traditions handed down from father to son, 
 they were very reticent, except under peculiar circumstances and with 
 those who gained their highest confidence and esteem. The sacred 
 treasures of their history, of which they were the preservers and 
 guardians, were not for the common masses of their own people ; much 
 less would they communicate them to strangers and foes. And when, 
 as it sometimes happened, their frigid reserve would be conquered, and a 
 narration of their legendary history elicited, it was considered more 
 wild and untrustworthy than the long lists of Manetho and Berosus, of 
 Egyptian and Assyrian dynasties, and not worth preserving. From 
 this cause many valuable facts have been irrecoverably lost. A few 
 only have escaped oblivion, of which the briefest possible mention can 
 now be made. 
 
 The traditions of the "Wyandot Indians, according to the account of 
 Mr. Wm. Walker, for some time liidian Agent for the Government, 
 published in 1823, are not devoid of interest. They were in substance 
 as follows : 
 
 Many centuries ago, the inhabitants of America, who were the authors 
 of the great works in the Mississippi Valley, were driven to the south 
 
i4 
 
 ARCHEOLOGY. 
 
 by an army of savage warriors from the North. Aifter many hundred 
 years, a messenger returned from the exiled tribes, with the alarming 
 news, that a terrible beast had landed on their shores, who was carrying 
 desolation wherever he went, with thunder and fire. Nothing could stay 
 his progess, and no doubt he would travel all over the land in his fury. ■ 
 ' It is conjectured that this beast of thunder and fire referred to the 
 Spanish invasion of Mexico. The Tuscaroras, according to the account 
 published by Mr. David Cusick in 1827 — quoted by Prof. Eafinesque — 
 tad a well-arranged system of chronology, dating back nearly three 
 thousand years. Thieir traditions locate their original home north of 
 the great lakes. lii process Of time, some of their people migrated to 
 the river Kanawag ( the , St. Lawrence ) . After many years, a foreign 
 people came by the sea and settled south of the lakes. Then follow 
 long accounts of wars, aiid fierce invasions by nations from the north, 
 led by confederate kings and a renowned hero named Yatatan. Many 
 years again elapse, and the king of the confederacy pays a visit to a mighty 
 potentate whose seat of empire is called the Golden City, situated south 
 •of the lakes; and so on, down to the year 1143, when the traditions 
 end. In these records appear accounts of wars with various tribes, 
 given with gteat particularity ; migrations southward and west to the 
 Mississippi, ( called Onanweoka ) ; the names of the ruling monarchs, 
 and the order of their succession. There appear to have been several 
 "dynasties of longer or shorter duration. Thus, the name Tarenyawagon 
 is borne by three successive monarchs, and Atotaro is continued to the 
 ninth. 
 
 Only a few items are here given, to indicate their character. No one 
 can examine these traditions without being coitvinced that they have 
 some great historic facts fortheir basis, however incredulous he may be 
 as to the correctness of their dates, or their pretentions to so high 
 antiquity. The limits prescribed for this essay admit Of but one more 
 notice of traditions in this connection. 
 
 A class of Works., frequently noticed by explorers, is found on the 
 tipper Mississippi, chiefly in Wisconsin ,^-a few in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois 
 and Iowa — known as animal mounds, on account of their striking 
 resemblance to the forms of various animals, such as the Buflalo, Bear, 
 Elk, and the like, and some to tbe human form. These works have 
 elicited much discussion and conjecture as to their origin and purpose, in 
 which no two writers agree. Some of them are of gigantic proportions, 
 and cannot be ascribed to the present race of Indians, for the same 
 reason which precludes the idea that they were the authors of the 
 stupendous works of the more southern States. 
 
THE -ANIMAL MOUNDS. 15 
 
 The traditions relating to these animal mounds are very minute, full 
 and interesting, and were first published in 1853, by Mr. Wm. Pidgeon, 
 ■who spent several years in the examination of the various monuments in 
 Virginia, the Valley of the Mississippi and South America as well. He 
 tells us that he began these researches from' motives of personal interest 
 merely, and continued them for several years, without any design of 
 publishing the results of his observations. 
 
 During his travels in the regions 
 of the Upper Mississippi, he met 
 a stranger among the red men, of 
 dignified and venerable appear- 
 ance, who had no fixed abiding 
 place, but wandered from tribe to 
 tribe, always welcomed and ven- 
 erated wherever he went; who 
 claimed to have descended from a "«• •-""*»<'»" "»""'»• 
 
 long line of tfncient prophets, he the last of the line and the last 
 of his race. He was then nearly ninety years of age. Thie Indians 
 ■called him "the Mocking Bird," because he could speak fluently 
 five different languages. By kindness, his confidence and friendshipwere 
 won, and his companionship secured during the journey of exploration. , 
 He seemed perfectly familiar with all the most important works, from the 
 Ohio to the extreme north and the far west, — could draw their outlines 
 from memory, and supply q,ny defect in the drawings of others ; and 
 could generally give a ready and lucid account of their authors and the 
 purposes for which thej' were constiiicted. Unlike many who have 
 -written upon the pre-historic people of America, the author seems to have 
 had no pet theory to maintain — as that they were the ten lost tribes of 
 Israel, and the like, — but to have been a thoroughly conscientious and 
 •careful observer, faithfully noting what he saw and heard. 
 
 From the seventy engravings — and accompanying descriptions — with 
 which the work of Mr. Pidgeon is illustrated, I select two or three, and 
 leave the reader to judge whether these traditions are reasonable and 
 trustworthy or not. 
 
 Many years ago, in th« bed of Paint Creek, in Ross County, Ohio, 
 several, deep cavities or wells were discovered, which gave rise to much 
 speculation as to their origin and purpose. I believe they have since 
 )ieen found in many other localities. Mr. Pidgeon states that he dis- 
 covered four similar ones in the bed of a small tributary of the St. Peters 
 river, varying in depth from eight to twelve feet, from five to six feet in 
 
16 AECHJEOLOGY. 
 
 diameter at the bottom and from three to five feet at the top. These 
 excavations were made in the soft slate rock which formed the bed of 
 the stream. 
 
 To the level top, or rim of the well, a thin flat rock was fitted, with a 
 round or square hole in the center, about twelve inches in diameter. 
 This opening could be closed at will, by a stone stopper perforated with 
 small holes. A short distance below the wells he found one of these 
 stoppers which fitted neatly the larger capstone of one of the wells. At 
 the time of their discovery the depth of the stream which flowed over 
 them was ten inches. Mocking-Bird informed him that these were fish 
 traps, and that many such could be found in other streams, were they not 
 so filled with mud and stones as to escape observation ; and also that 
 they were constructed and used anciently for the purpose of securing a 
 supply of fish for the winter. Large quantities of bait being deposited 
 in them in the fall, the fish would gather there in great numbers, when 
 the stopper would be placed over the mouth, which prevented their 
 escape, and then they could be taken out with a small net as desired. 
 While it is no doubt true that the mound-builders were an agricultural 
 people, it is quite reasonable to suppose, from the fact thiat their most 
 extensive works are found upon the shores of lakes and banks of rivers, 
 that fish formed no inconsiderable item of their bill of fare.' 
 
 As before stated, the historian of these traditions, after the death of 
 Mocking-Bird, proceeded to investigate by careful excavation those 
 earthworks of which he had previously made only a superficial survey, 
 especially those concerning which he had received traditions. The first 
 group thus explored which I notice is represented in Fig. 2. It is 
 described as being located at the junction of Straddle Creek and Plumb 
 river, in Carroll County, Illinois. It is composed of conical mounds, 
 rings and semi-circles, with diameters varying from twelve to twenty-five 
 feet. The rings are about two feet high, and seem to have been formed 
 by throwing up the earth from within, leaving the interior in the form 
 of a basiu. 
 
 The traditions concerning these works are in substance that they were 
 
 * Some writers have discredited the idea of the artificial origin of these wells or flsh- 
 traps, attributing their formation to the disintegration of the rooks in which they occnr, 
 owing to the unequal hardness of the strata of which they are composed, etc. But it 
 would seem that vastly more credulity is required to believe that the ordinary operation 
 of nature in various parts of the country would produce such cavities, from eight to 
 twelve feet in depth, with nice fitting covers, pref orated at the center, thauNthat they 
 are the workmanship of intelligent beings for some special purpose. 
 
BUEIAL MOUNDS. 17 
 
 constructed by a people who were accustomed to burn their dead, and 
 were only partially occupied. Each family formed a circle sacred to its 
 own use. When a member died, the body was placed in the family circle 
 and burned to ashes ; a thin covering of earth was then sprinkled over 
 the whole. This process was repeated as often as a death occurred, until 
 the inclosure was filled. The ring was then raised about two feet and 
 again was ready for further use. As each additional elevation would of 
 necessity be less in diameter than the preceding, in the end a conical 
 mound would be the result. The darkest spots in the engraving 
 represent those which are finished; the rings, those in various stages 
 of occupancy ; and the semi-circles those which were only begun. Similar 
 
 O 
 
 O o 
 
 o 
 
 ^ 
 
 Fig. 2. — Burial Mounds. 
 
 works have been found in the Ohio Valley, in the more northern States, 
 west of the Mississippi and in Michigan. Upon excavating the more 
 finished mounds of the group described, they were found filled with 
 ashes, mingled with charcoal : some of them to the depth of twenty 
 inches below the surrounding surface of the soil. In this group were 
 found two mounds much larger than the others, (one is represented 
 in the engraving), shaped like the body of a tortoise, known as battle 
 mounds, and said to contain the ashes of hundreds slain in battle. Both 
 these mounds were found to be filled with ashes and charcoal like the 
 others, thus confirming their traditional history. 
 
 About two hundred and fiftj' yards south of these mounds, another 
 group of finished works was found, where the bodies were deposited in 
 the more usual manner without burning. 
 2 
 
18 
 
 AKCH^OLOGT. 
 
 These two modes of burial, so widely diflferent and in the same locality, 
 mark either a sudden change of custom or the presence of two distinct 
 races at different periods of time. Tradition asserts that there was such 
 a sudden change of mode of burial in obedience to the command of the 
 prophets, for the reason that, while the people were burning the body of 
 a great and good king, suddenly the sun (their chief deity) refused to 
 shine, although there was not a cloud in the sky. This was taken as a 
 sign of disapprobation of the custom, which gradually ceased thereafter. 
 
 It has been generally supposed that those mounds, which showed the 
 frequent or long-continued action of fire, were used for sacrificial 
 purposes only. It seems however more likely that these cinerulent 
 structures were simply the depositories of the bodies of the dead, and 
 this the traditions affirm. 
 
 i 
 
 ^^ ^ ^ 
 
 ^ U^m 
 
 ® # # # # 
 
 ^ % ^ % ^ 
 
 • Fig. 3. — A Royal Cemetery. 
 
 The second group noticed in this connection is more complicated 
 (Fig. 3), and presents a greater variety of forms. It is found (or was 
 in 1840) on the north side of St. Peter's river, about sixty miles above 
 its junction with the Mississippi, in what was then the Territory of 
 Minnesota. 
 
 It is thus described : The central embankment, in the form of the 
 body of a tortoise, is forty feet in length, twenty-seven in breadth, and 
 twelve in perpendicular height. It is composed in pai*t of yellow clay, 
 
BURIAI, MOUNDS. 19 
 
 brought from some distant place. The two pointed mounds north and 
 south of this are formed of pure red earth, covered with alhivial soil. 
 Each is twenty-seven feet in length and six in height at the largest end, 
 gradually narrowing and sinking at the top until they terminate in a 
 point. The four corner mounds were each twelve feet high and twenty- 
 five in diameter at the base. The two long mounds on the east and 
 west sides of the group were sixty feet in length, twelve feet in diameter 
 at the base, and eight feet in height. The two mounds on the immediate 
 right and left of the central effigy, were twelve feet long, four feet 
 high, and six in breadth. . These were composed of sand, mixed with 
 small bits of mica to the depth of two feet, covered with white clay, 
 with a thin layer of surface soil on the top. The large mound in the 
 center, south of the effigy, was twelve feet high, twenty-seven in 
 diameter, and composed of a stratum or sand two feet in depth, covered 
 with a mixture of sandy soil and blue clay. The similar work on the 
 north of the tortoise was of like formation, four feet high and twenty- 
 two feet in diameter. Thirteen small mounds whose dimensions are 
 not given, complete the group. 
 
 Only a glance at this cluster of mounds, twenty-six in number, present- 
 ing such variety of forms and peculiar arrangement, and which must have 
 required so much time and labor for their construction, is needed to con- 
 vince the observer that they were intended to perpetuate some history, 
 and that each of the hieroglyphic symbols of which the group is composed 
 had its special significance, which was well understood by the builders 
 and their cotemporaries. 
 
 But what was that history, or what event is recorded here? The 
 works themselves give no answer. Tradition asserts, that this was the 
 royal cemetery of a ruler known as the Black Tortoise, and was designed 
 to commemorate the title and dignity of a great king or potentate. The 
 tortoise-shaped central mound (a) was his tomb. The four corner 
 mounds were called Mourning' Mounds. The two larger mounds (66) 
 directly north and south of the effigy were the burial places of chiefs. 
 The number interred in each is recorded in the number of small mounds 
 on each side of them — five in the northern and eight in the southern line. 
 The two long embankments (cc) at the extreme right and left of the 
 works, were known as points of honor, and are said never to occur 
 except in connection with those works which symbolize royalty. The 
 two pointed mounds (dd), and described as twenty-seven feet long, six 
 feet in width at the larger end, tapering down from the top and sides to 
 a vanishing point, are known as mounds of extinction, and tell us that he 
 
20 
 
 AKCH/5E0L0GY. 
 
 was the last of his line. These too are never found alone, but always in 
 connection with larger works. The mounds (ee) on either side of the 
 central effigy are the burial places of prophets. In these it will be 
 remembered small bits of mica were found mingled with the ashes. The 
 presence of this substance in a certain class of mounds, in localities so 
 remote from each other, from Minnesota to the Scioto Valley — some- 
 times in large circular plates, but oftener in countless smaller fragments, 
 has called forth much speculation as to its use by the ancient inhabitants. 
 It has been suggested that it may have been used for mirrors, or again 
 for ornament, or, on account of its preciousness, as a medium of com- 
 mercial transactions. But when it is remembered that it is never found 
 indiscriminately with other deposits in many mounds of the same group, 
 we may safely conclude that it was set apart for a special use. Tradition 
 says that it was sacred to the prophets, and was deposited in their tombs 
 alone ; — that they had the mysterious power of calling fire from heaven, 
 which was distributed to the minor prophets by whom the sacred fires 
 were kept perpetually burning; that the fire used at the annual feast 
 in their most holy places was thus received from the sun upon the 
 suiamit of the sacred altars. This bringing fire from heaven is found in 
 classic stories and in the traditions of many lands, as every school-boy 
 
 knows. So Zoroaster taught his 
 disciples, that the sacred fire 
 which he committed to their 
 care had been brought direct ' 
 from heaven. "It is possible 
 that the prophets of the ancient 
 Americans were able in some 
 manner to construct lenses from 
 plates of mica, of sufficient pow- 
 er to ignite the fuel upon the 
 sacrificial altars." ^ The Mexi- 
 cans in ancient times called ob- 
 sidian "the shining god," and 
 held it in high estimation. 
 
 Several works have been ob- 
 served of the form shown in Figure 4. The one here represented 
 is described as located on the lowlands of the Kickapoo Elver in 
 "Wisconsin. The central work, with radiating points, sixty feet in 
 
 ■Fidgeon. 
 
BUEIAI, MOUNDS. 
 
 21 
 
 diameter and three feet in height. This is inclosed by five crescent- 
 shaped works, having an elevation of two feet, and all presenting 
 a level surface at the top. It is traditionally represented to have been 
 occupied only during sacrificial festivities consequent upon the offering 
 of human sacrifices to the sun, which the central mound was said to 
 represent. Upon excavating, after removing the soil from the top, the 
 central portion, for a space ttvelve feet in diameter, is found thickly 
 studded with plates of mica set in white sand and blue clay ; and, says 
 the observer "had this surface soil been removed with care, and the 
 stratum beneath washed by a few heavy showers of rain, under the sun's 
 rays it would have presented no unapt symbolical representation of that 
 luminary." The sacred Pentagon, Fig. 5, is found in close proximity. ^ 
 
 As before stated, no class of 
 works has awaked more curiosity, 
 or elicited more unsatisfactory spe- 
 culations, than these animal efS- 
 gies ; and among these the most 
 singular and enigmatical are those 
 representing the larger animals, 
 and the human form on a gigantic 
 scale, and generally with such ac^ 
 curacy of delineation as to leave 
 no doubt as to what particular ani- 
 mal was intended to be represented 
 by the figure. Sometimes these 
 huge representations of beasts, 
 birds and men are grouped to- 
 gether in such strange and grotesque combinations as to forbid all 
 attempts to discover the design of the builders in their erection. A few 
 of the most common forms are shown in the accompanying engravings. 
 
 That the mastodon is intended by figure 1 is conceded by all — as 
 far as known — who haVe described it. I am not aware that it has ever 
 been found outside of Wisconsin. There it frequently occurs, either 
 
 Fig. 5. — Sacred Pentagon. 
 
 ' This is represented here because of its intimate relation to the one just described, 
 which is found associated with it. The outer circle is twelve hundred feet in diameter, 
 in the center is the sacrificial altar, upon which human sacrifices were said to have been 
 offered twice a year. In the spring the oldest man of the nation, willingly — so great 
 was the honor — presented himself as the victim. In the autumn a female was sacrificed. 
 If the day was cloudy, the offering was left upon the altar of sacrifice until the suti 
 looked down upon it, which was considered a sign that the sacrifice was accepted. The 
 people then repaired to the festival circle with rejoicing, where the feast was celebrated 
 
22 
 
 AECH^OLOGT. 
 
 alone or in companionship with other mounds. As men in all ages, in 
 their first attempts at pictorial art, have been accustomed to delineate 
 only those objects which were most striking and with which they were 
 most familiar, we may well believe that the ancient Americans were not 
 unacquainted with this king of beasts, and that they lived in those days 
 ■when those gigantic animals roamed over the plains in vast numbers, 
 whose skeletons have been so often found-in Missouri. 
 
 The combined figures of bird and beast as repres- 
 ented at Fig. 6 are also of frequent occurrence, parti- 
 culary in Wisconsin. The one here delineated is one 
 hundred and eighty feet in length, and forty-four in its 
 greatest breadth. The whole is composed of reddish clay, 
 but covered to the depth of twelve inches with a black 
 alluvium. It was designed to record the change in 
 title of a sovereign line of rulers. The head of the 
 beast being merged in the body of the bird concedes 
 to the conqueror the right of dominion. The two 
 truncated mounds, one on each side of the beast, record 
 the extent of his liumiliation. They are altar mounds, on 
 which were sacrificed his descendants both male and 
 
 Fig. 6. 
 
 Bird and Beast. 
 
 female. 
 
 The efiigy shown in Fig. 7 is unmistakably human. It memorializes a 
 hereditary chief of royal line, but who, according to the record, could 
 not yet have been a sovereign ruler, as no mound of honor indicating that 
 condition is found in connection with it. He was thus memorialized 
 because he fell in battle, and with him his son, whose memory is perpet- 
 uated in the truncated mound between his feet. 
 
 The amalgamation group ( Fig. 8 ) is more complicated and enig- 
 matical, and but for the traditions concerning it would doubtless always 
 remain so. The beast is one hundred and eighty feet in length ; the 
 liuman effigy perpendicular to it is one hundred and sixty. On either 
 side of the horizontal figure is a truncated work eighteen feet in diameter 
 and six feet in height. The summits of both are flat. The representations 
 of horns, which are very distinct, are of different dimensions. The 
 main stem of the front horn is eighteen feet in length. The one 
 which inclines backward is twelve, the longest antlers are six, and 
 the shortest three feet in length. At the foot of the human effigy 
 is attached an embankment running parallel with the horizontal figure, 
 eighty feet in length, twenty-seven in diameter and six in height. On a 
 line with this is a series of conical mounds, the largest of which is also 
 
SACKiriCIAL AND HISTOEICAL MOUNDS. 
 
 23 
 
 twenty-seven feet in diameter and six in 
 
 height. From this the others diminish on 
 
 either side and terminate in mounds eigh- 
 teen feet in diameter and three in height. 
 
 The group thus described is represented 
 
 to have been erected to commemorate an 
 
 important event in the history of two 
 
 friendly nations, which were once great 
 
 and powerful, but now reduced by long- 
 continued wars against a common foe ; and 
 
 being now no longer able to maintain a 
 
 separate national existence, they resolved 
 
 to unite their forces under one title and 
 
 sovereign. One was known as the Elk 
 
 nation, the other was the Buffalo. This 
 
 work was designed as a public record and 
 
 seal of their amalgamation. This fact is 
 
 plainly expressed by the union of the head 
 
 of the Buffalo with that of the human 
 
 effigy representing the sovereign of the 
 
 Elk nation, and also by the joining of the 
 
 hand of the otie with the foot of the other. 
 
 Horns appended to effigies represent warriors ; their length and 
 
 number the relative power of the two nations at the time of their union. 
 
 The Buffalo was therefore manifestly recorded as the weaker of the 
 
 two, as his antlers 
 are seen to be 
 smaller and in a de- 
 clining position. The 
 fact is also here re- 
 corded that, when 
 the union was fully 
 consummated the na- 
 tionality of the Buf- 
 falo became extinct. 
 This is shown by 
 the presence of the 
 mound of extinction 
 
 Fig. 7. — Human-Shaped Mound. 
 
 e & €) €> o 1^ 
 
 F\g. 8, — Amalgamation Group. 
 
 — ^before described — in connection with the Bufialo and terminating 
 at his hind feet. The two truncated mounds on either side of the 
 
24 AKCH^dLOGT. 
 
 animal effigy are sacrificial altars upon which appropriate sacrifices 
 were offered, not only at the time of the erection of the works, 
 but annually thereafter ; the fires of which were kept burning 
 until the smoke from both united in one column above the 
 mound. This annual sacrifice symbolized the renewal of the covenant 
 entered into when the compact was made. The seven truncated mounds 
 in a line with the embankment upon which the human figure stands, 
 (and known as a symbol of nationality) are matrimonial memorials, and 
 record the international marriages of seven chiefs which occurred during 
 the construction of the work, and which were also a further ratification 
 of the national union here perpetuated. Upon excavating the altars, 
 after the alluvial soil was removed, a stratum of burned earth mingled 
 with ashes and charcoal was disclosed, to the depth of fourteen inches. 
 This group was found upon the northern high land of the Wisconsin 
 Eiver, about fifty miles from its junction with the Mississippi. 
 
 In that part of the work where the heads of the two effigies unite, an 
 oak was standing at the time of its first examination. Upon a second 
 visit it was not there, but the stump showed by its concentric annual 
 rings of growtih that it was four hundred and twenty-four years old. 
 Works of this description, which occur so frequently in Wisconsin, have 
 also been observed in Northern Illinois. 
 
 Lance Head,. 
 
CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 The Archeological Monuments op Missouri.— Their Eapid Destruction.— Sites of 
 Towns and Cities. — The Labors op H. M. Brackenridge. — The Big Mound at St. 
 Lours.— Col. O'Fallon's Residence Erected on an Ancient Mound.— The Mounds 
 in Forest Park.— Evidences op a Vast Population.— New Madrid its Center.- 
 Description of Various Works. 
 
 The preceding remarks upon the general subject of Archaeology, with 
 the few notices of traditions concerning the ancient inhabitants of 
 America, are all that the limits of this article will permit, as well as all 
 which our present purpose demands. Nor has it seemed necessary to 
 describe those extensive and imposing works, which are found scattered 
 through the Central States, from the lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, and 
 especially in the Ohio Valley, consisting of walled towns, embankments 
 enclosing large areas of land, in squares, circles, octagons and the like, 
 associated with mounds of prodigious size ; for these have been so 
 often described and delineated that whatever comparison of them with 
 the monuments of Missouri may be thought desirable may he readily 
 accomplished by reference to the works of those authors, who have 
 published so many valuable descriptions of these antiquities, and which 
 are to be found in almost every public library. 
 
 That Missouri was once the home of a vast population composed of 
 tribes who had fixed habitations, dwelt in large towns, practiced agricul- 
 ture on an extended scale, with a good degree of method and skill ; who 
 had also a well-organized system of religious rites and wcjrship, and 
 whose aesthetic tastes were far in advance of the savage tribes who 
 roamed over her prairies and hill ranges when her great rivers were first 
 navigated by the white meu, is, I am confident, no difficult matter to prove. 
 Says Mr. H. M. Brackenridge, who was an extensive traveler, and a 
 man of excellent judgment, in speaking of the ancient works in the 
 Mississippi Valley : "It is worthy of observation, that all these vestiges 
 invariably occupy the most eligible situations for towns or settlements ; 
 and on the Ohio and Mississippi they are most numerous and consid- 
 erable. There is not a rising town, or a farm of an eligible situation, in 
 whose vicinity some of them may not be found. I have heard a 
 surveyor of the public lands observe, that wherever any of these 
 remains were met with, he was sure to find an extensive body of fertile 
 land." 
 
 Although, for more than three-quarters of a century since that time, 
 
26 
 
 AKCELEOLOGY. 
 
 the waves of an advancing civilization and the hand of agriculture have 
 passed over them and utterly destroyed vast numbers, including many 
 of the most remarkable ones, which arrested the attention of every 
 beholder, — still, any one at all familiar with those which now remain 
 would write the same things to-day. The name of the city of St. Louia 
 was once Mound City, called so on account of the number and size of 
 those ancient works which once stood upon hor present site. The larger 
 of them are all demolished, while the few which yet remain are so small 
 that they would hardly be noticed save by the eye of a practical observer. 
 The same may be said of nearly all which once crowned the terraces of 
 the Mississippi along her eastern border, and those of the Missouri and 
 her tributaries. 
 
 Notwithstanding all this widespread demolition and obliteration, there 
 is doubtless now no richer field for archaeological research in the great 
 basin of the Mississippi than is to be found in the State of Missouri. 
 As has been already stated, the most important works . are found 
 located in the vicinity of extensive areas of fertile lands, and upon the 
 most eligible sites for towns and cities. The same locations would 
 naturally be the first to be occupied by the pioneer settlements of our 
 own times, and these aboriginal remains would be the first to be oblite- 
 rated. It is not surprising, therefore, that the earlier notices of the 
 ancient monuments of this valley are so meagre and unsatisfactory, 
 especially when we remember the peculiar vicissitudes of a frontier life, 
 which necessitated unceasing toil and eternal vigilance : continually men- 
 aced, as the early settlements generally were, by a wily, savage foe. 
 
 It should also be remembered that until quite recently the prevailing 
 opinion concerning mounds and embankments was that they were the 
 work of the red men, and to this day they are known among the masses 
 as Indian mounds. 
 
 Notwithstanding the fact that multitudes have been destroyed, there 
 still remain so many vestiges of an ancient race — not only upon the 
 alluvial plains of our larger rivers, but also in the interior valle\'s, 
 watered by smaller streams and rivulets, and also upon the sterile slopes 
 and summits even of the Ozarks — ^that Missouri still presents a most 
 inviting field for the labors of the archaaologist. A proper examina- 
 tion and description of them all would involve no inconsiderable 
 expenditure of time and money, and require a volume for their 
 elucidation. It cannot therefore be expected that we can do more 
 in this article than to describe the different classes of those remains — 
 with their most pi'ominent characteristics — which are best known and 
 
AECH^OLOGICAIi MONUMENTS OF MISSOtTBI. 
 
 27 
 
 .which have been the most thoroughly explored. In carrying out this 
 design, it will perhaps best serve our purpose in the way of method 
 and convenience to consider them under the following general divisions : 
 ,1st, Sites of towns or cities. 2d, Burial mounds, caves and artificial 
 caverns. 3d, Sacrificial or temple mounds. 4th, Garden mounds. 
 5th, Miscellaneous works. 6th, Pottery; and 7th, Crania. 
 
 /. — Sites of Towns or Cities. — The early French explorers of the 
 Mississippi and Missouri rivers, and the territories through which they 
 flow, seem to have taken no notice of the ancient monuments along their 
 course ; or if they did, they doubtless ascribed their origin to the red 
 men, who were found occupying, in some instances works of similar 
 construction. 
 
 But when permanent settlements had been established along their 
 banks, with the consequent increase of travel, these works ere long 
 attracted the attention of the historian, and awakened an interest which 
 resulted in their more careful examination. The early writers, as they 
 became familiar with the habits and social condition of the Indians, and 
 in view of the magnitude of the structures they so frequently met with, 
 as well as the skill and herculean labors required for their erection , make 
 frequent mention of their doubts as to the ability of the Indians to erect 
 monuments of such prodigious proportions. And not until St. Louis 
 became an incorporated town, and the capital of that vast extent of 
 territory then known as Upper Louisiana, do we find any descriptive 
 accounts of the ancient works which at that time occupied the terraces 
 upon which this great city now stands. 
 
 Notwithstanding the meager and unsatisfactory character of the 
 accounts which have been preseiTed, still, we are thankful for the crumbs 
 of information the early observers have left us, and will endeavor to 
 make the most of them. 
 
 Mr. H. M. Brackenridge, 1 writing in the year 1811, says: "I have 
 
 1 The work of this author ( " Views of Louisiana " ) seems to have been the perennial 
 fountain from whence many subsequent writers upon American Archaeology, both in 
 this 'country and in Europe, have drawn much of their inspiration and many of the 
 facts and germinal suggestions which they have elaborated with extended speculations, 
 and frequently without any mention of their obligation to this writer for the facts and 
 suggestions which have been so freely made use of. Mr. Brackenridge, I believe, was\ 
 the first American author who alludes to the statements of Plato concerning a \ 
 people who had come from an island in the Atlantic, in great numbers, and overran . 
 Europe and Asia, and known as the Atlantides, which island was said to have been sunk^ 
 by an earthquake 9000 years before his time. He notes, also, a similar tradition among 
 the Bomans, and thinlcs it possible America may have been referred to. 
 
28 AKCH^OLOGY. 
 
 frequently examined the mounds at St. Louis. They are situated on the 
 second bank, just above the town, and disposed in a singular manner ; 
 there are nine in all, and form the three sides of a parallelogram, the 
 open side towards the country being protected, however, by three 
 smaller mounds, placed in a circular manner. The space inclosed is 
 about three hundred yards in length and two hundred in breadth. 
 About six hundred yards above these is a single mound, with a broad 
 stage on the river side ; it is thirty feet in height, and one hundred and 
 fifty in length ; the top is a mere ridge of five or six feet wide. Below the 
 first mounds there is a curious work called the Falling Garden. Advant- 
 age is taken of the second bank, nearly fifty feet in height at this place, 
 and three regular stages or steps are formed by earth brought from a 
 distance. This work is much admired — ^it suggests the idea of a place 
 of assembly for the purpose of counselling on public occasions." 
 
 Accompanying the foregoing description is a simple diagram which, 
 as it does not seem to be the result of any actual survey, and therefore 
 of no scientific value, need not be reproduced in this connection. 
 
 Dr. Beck, who noticed them twelve years afterwards, presents in his 
 work another diagram, which seems to have been the result of more 
 careful observation, although in this, however, one of the nine, and the 
 three smaller mounds described by Mr. Brackenridge as protecting the 
 side of the parallelogram opening towards the country, are wanting. 
 From all the information I can ga,ther, I believe the following plan will 
 present the true relation of the mounds here described : 
 
 
 Diagram of St. Louis Mounds. 
 
THE BIG MOUND AT ST. LOUIS. 29 
 
 One of the above group undoubtedly represents the old landmark 
 known as the Big Mound, ( a representation of which as it appeared at the 
 time of its removal, faces the first page of the present volume ) , which 
 once stood at the corner of Mound street and Broadway, but which was 
 entirely demolished in 1869. This I suppose to have been the terraced 
 mound, represented by Mr. Brackenridge to have been located six hun- 
 dred yards north of the main group. The Big Mound is known to have 
 been beautifully terraced, and nothing of the kind is mentioned in con- 
 nection with those constituting the parallelogram. Nor is the Falling 
 Garden spoken of as a mound, but only as a terraced bank. For these 
 and other reasons which need not be dwelt upon, after much reflection, 
 I am persuaded that the terraced mound, afterwards known as the Big 
 Mound, was the last to disappear before the encroachments of the 
 rapidly-growing city. Be this as it may, this most interesting work will 
 be particularly described under the more appropriate head of Sepulchral 
 Caverns, when I shall be able to speak' with more confidence, as I shall 
 give there the result of my own observations. There were formerly 
 many other mounds in the immediate vicinity of St. Louis, rivaling in 
 magnitude and interest those described by the authors just quoted, but 
 which escaped their notice In fact, the second terrace of the Mississippi, 
 upon almost every available commanding point of elevation, was finished 
 with them. Nineteen years ago, in a conversation with the late Col. John 
 O'Fallon, he informed me that his family residence on the Bellefontaine 
 road was erected upon one of those ancient mounds. It must have been 
 very large, although I do not recall the dimensions. He stated, further, 
 that as the summit was being leveled, preparatory to building, human 
 bones by the cart-load were disclosed, along with stone axes and arrow- 
 heads and the like, without number. He then led me to the forest west 
 of his dwelling, and called my attention to the small hillocks which 
 abounded there in prodigious numbers, which he conjectured were the 
 residence sites of former inhabitants, because of their regularity, and 
 from the fact that upon excavating them they disclosed ashes and 
 charcoal. 
 
 Still farther north, upon the highest points of the second terrace, I 
 have fraced the remains of others which must have been quite imposing 
 before they were subjected to the leveling influence of agriculture. 
 In Forest Park, a few miles west of the city, the^e is a small group of 
 mounds which the park commissioners, I am happy to know, have 
 resolved to preserve. It is a pity that none of the larger ones have been 
 spared, to stand hereafter as the memorials of a people whose origin is 
 
30 
 
 AECH^OLOGY. 
 
 hid in the night of oblivion. But let them remain, such as they are, and 
 when future generations shall throng the green groves and shady walks 
 of that beautiful garden of their great city, these shall recall the fainting 
 echoes of another race, whose homes once clustered, in days long gone,' 
 upon the banks of that great river where a statelier — can we say happier 
 — city stands to-day. 
 
 The works thus briefly noticed are only a few of the great group of 
 large circumference, of which that king of mounds, on the fertile plains 
 across the river, known as Monk's Mound, was the radiating center. 
 That high place was a temple mound^the holy mountain for this whole 
 region, doubtless, — and the smoke which ascended from the perpetual 
 fire of its sacred, altar could be seen for many miles on every side. 
 
 But while our business now is with the ancient people of Missouri, it 
 should be borne in mind that the imaginary lines which divide us into 
 States had no existence in those other times, when a mighty people 
 dwelt upon either side of the Mississippi, outnumbering far, perhaps, 
 the present occupants ; who were homogeneous in their commercial 
 pursuits, arts and worship. They traded with the nations who dwelt by 
 - the sea, and brought from thence the shells and pearls of the ocean, and 
 left them in their tombs, along with the precious wares of their own 
 handicraft, for our admiration and instruction. 
 
 But before we leave St. Louis, another work demands a notice, 
 which the following (Fig. 9), will illustrate. 
 
 This class of works 
 appears frequently in Iowa, 
 but was formerly found in 
 greatest numbers in Mis- 
 souri. The one figured 
 here was located on Root 
 River, about twenty miles 
 west of the Mississippi. 
 The central mound is repre- 
 sented as being thirty-six 
 feet in diameter, and 
 twelve feet in height. The 
 circle inclosing it was 
 nearly obliterated. The 
 Fig. 9.-Histon=.i Mound. j^^g. gmbankmeuts which 
 
 form the sides of the triangle were each one hundred and forty- 
 four feet in length, and respectively three, four and five feet in 
 
EVIDENCES OF A VAST POPtTLATIOlS". 31 
 
 height, aud twelve feet in diameter ; and what is singular, the sum 
 of the heights of the embankments equals the vertical height of the 
 central mound, and these two amounts multiplied together, give the 
 exact length of the embankments. Sometimes works of this description 
 are built in the form of a square, with four embankments ; but of 
 whatever form, it is stated that the same relation of the sum of the 
 heights of all the embankments to the height of the central mound 
 is always presented, and the product of these gives the length of the 
 embankments. 
 
 A group precisely similar to the one just described, and of large 
 dimensions, once stood near the village of St. Louis. Its precise 
 location cannot be learned, as it was demolished somewhere between the 
 years 1835-40. This class of mounds will be further noticed under the 
 head of Miscellaneous Works. 
 
 The evidences of a dense pre-historic population in Missouri are no- 
 where so abundant as in the southeastern counties of the State. These 
 consist of mounds of various dimensions and forms, sometimes isolated, but 
 oftener in groups of peculiar arrangement ; also embankments and walls of 
 earth inclosing large and small areas, in which may be traced the lines 
 of streets — if such they may be called — of a village or city, and 
 numberless sites of former residences. One of the largest mounds in 
 this region, is about four miles from New Madrid, and, as described in 
 1811, is twelve hundred feet in circumference, forty feet high and 
 surrounded by a ditch, five feet deep and ten feet in width. New 
 Madrid was unquestionably once the great metropolis of a vast popula- 
 tion, the remains of whose villages are everywhere met with, upon the 
 banks of the numerous bayous which abound in the several counties in 
 this portion of the State. For the reason before mentioned, one group 
 only can be particularly described. 
 
 The one selected is situated upon Bayou St. John, about eighteen 
 miles from the town of New Madrid. The bayou at this point is one 
 mile and a half in width ; its whole length may be stated in round numbers 
 to be about seventy-five miles. "While, in the^ notices of the earlier 
 travelers, it is described as a lake with a clear, sandy bottom, it is now 
 a sluggish swamp, filled to a great extent with cypress trees. 
 
 Upon the western bank of the bayou the works to be described 
 are located. They consist of inclosures, large and small conical and 
 truncated mounds in great numbers, and countless residence sites of 
 the ancient inhabitants. From the level of the bayou to the prairie 
 land above, the ascent is by a gradual slope to a vertical height of 
 
32 AECH^OLOGY. 
 
 fifteen feet. Upon this belt of sloping ground, now covered with a 
 heavy growth of timber, the works are most numerous ; while from its 
 edge, westward, the level prairie (that is, the alluvial plain of the 
 Mississii^pi) has been under cultivation for sixty or seventy years. 
 Here, including forty acres of the cultivated field and ten of the sloping 
 timber belt, is an area qf about fifty acres, enclosed by earthen walls 
 which may be distinctly traced for several hundred feet, but gradually 
 disappear on the western side, having been nearly obliterated by the 
 long cultivation of the field. Where it is best preserved in the timbered 
 land, its height was found to be from three to five feet, and fifteen feet 
 wide at the base. ^ In the centre of the western side of the enclosure 
 and close to the wall, is a mound of oblong shape, three hundred feet in 
 length at the base, and at its northern end one hundred feet wide, and 
 twenty feet high at the present time, as near as could be estimated by 
 careful stepping. The top of it slopes gradually to the south, and 
 although the plow has passed up and down its sides for sixty years, still 
 on its eastern side may be distinctly seen the evidences of a graded way 
 to its summit. Close to its northeastern side, where the mound is 
 widest, is a deep depression in the field, about ten feet in diameter. 
 Mr. Wm. M. Murphy, a farmer who has long resided in the neighbor- 
 hood, told me that when he first saw it he could not get in and out of it 
 without a ladder, and that it had since been nearly filled up by the 
 tillers of the soil with stumps, logs and earth. In the centre of the 
 enclosure stands a circular moijnd seventy-five feet in diameter, and 
 also twenty feet high, which upon examination disclosed nothing but 
 broken pottery. It belongs to that class usually termed residence 
 mounds. The view from its summit towards the west and south 
 commands a prospect several miles in extent ; on the north the view is 
 cut off by a heavy growth of timber, and on the east by the cypress 
 swamp. In a direct line with the two mounds thus described, partly 
 upon the edge of the cultivated field and partly upon the declivity which 
 descends toward the swamp, in the midst of a group of smaller works, 
 stands a large burial mound, twelve to fifteen feet in height, and 
 one hundred feet in diameter. Its original height could only be 
 conjectured, as it has long been occupied as a residence site by the 
 present inhabitants. The ruins of a log house are still standing upon 
 its summit. It has been the sepulchre of many hundreds, perhaps a 
 
 * It will readily be perceived that absolute accuracy of measurement would be impossible, 
 where the ground has been so much disturbed by cultivation. 
 
Small vessels of Pottery, Stone Pipe, Stone Implements and discoidal Stone from New Madrid, Mo. 
 
34 AIICIL3E0L0GY. 
 
 thousand individuals. The manner of interment, as far as my own 
 observations extended, was to place the corpse upon the back, with the 
 head towards the centre of the mound ; the vacant space between each 
 deposit being generally two or three feet. When the inner circle was 
 fiill, another would be formed outside of it. In two burial mounds in 
 this region, which were only from three to five feet in height, and fifty 
 or sixty feet in diameter, I found this process of burial continued far 
 beyond the circumference of the mound ; in which cases the graves had 
 been dug in the natural bed of the plain upon which the mound was 
 erected, and were generally from three to four feet in depth. The kind 
 of pottery found in these is precisely similar to that taken from the 
 centre of the mound, and was always in the same relative position to the 
 skeleton. Three vessels were usually found with each individual. Two 
 were water jugs, and placed on each side of the head; the other, a 
 receptacle for food, rested upon the side of the chest, and was kept 
 in place by the angle of the arms, which were folded across the breast. 
 These vessels will be more particularly described hereafter. 
 
 Within the enclosure before described, beginning near the margin of 
 the bayou, extending up the side of the declivity, around the burial 
 mound, and continuing quite a distance into the inclosure, are great 
 numbers of depressions, or shallow pits in the soil, from one to three 
 feet in depth and from fifteen to thirty in diameter ; sometimes in par- 
 allel rows, and usually about thirty feet from centre to centre. In many 
 of these, forest trees of large size are still growing, and others equally 
 large are lying upon the ground in various stages of decay. Upon 
 digging into them, almost every shovelful of earth disclosed pieces of 
 broken pottery ; many of these fragments indicated vessels of large size 
 which must have had a capacity of from ten to fifteen gallons. Upon 
 joining the fragments together, the mouths or openings were found to 
 vary from three to twelve inches in diameter. They were doubtless 
 stationary receptacles of food or water, as they were so thin that it 
 would hardly seem possible they could be moved, when filled, without 
 breaking. In many of these depressions were observed large rough 
 masses of burnt clay, of the color of common brick, full of irregular 
 and transverse holes, which seem to indicate, that, before it was burned, 
 the desired form of a chimney, or oven, had been rudely made out, by 
 intertwining sticks, twigs and grass, and the whole plastered inside and 
 out with moist clay, to the thickness of several inches, and then burned 
 until it became red and nearly as hard as the bricks now in use. At the 
 depth of about two feet, at the bottom of all which were examined, what 
 
THE KEW MADRID MOUNDS. 
 
 35 
 
 seemed to have been a fire-place was disclosed. The earth was also 
 burned, so as to present the color and hardness of the fragments of biick, 
 to the depth of several inches. Along with the broken pottery were 
 found, quite often, fragments of sandstone of various sizes, the larger 
 pieces with concave surfaces, and all showing that they had been used for 
 jjolishing or sharpening purposes, especially the smaller ones, which are 
 covered with small grooves one-eighth of an inch deep across the whole 
 length and width, and at various angles with each other, as though they 
 had long been used for sharpening some small metallic instrument or 
 
 graver's tool. 
 
 Water Juga and Food Vessel.. 
 
 Another interesting and suggestive feature of these works is worthy of 
 notice. Along the shore of the bayou, in front of the enclosure, small 
 tongues of land have been carried out into the water, from fifteen to 
 thirty feet in length by ten to fifteen in width, with open spaces between, 
 which, small as they are, forcibly remind one of the wharves of a sea- 
 port town. The cj'press trees grow very thickly in all the little bays 
 thus formed, and the irregidar, yet methodical, outline of the forest, 
 winding in and out, close to the shore of these tongues of land, is so 
 marked as to remove all doubt as to their artificial origin. Although the 
 channel of the Mississippi is now from fifteen to eighteen miles east of 
 this point, there is no question that this long bayou was one of its ancient 
 beds. It is well known that at New Madrid the river has receded at the 
 rate of one mile in seventy j'ears. With the supposition that its recession 
 has been uniform, at this rate nearly a thousand years must have passed 
 since the Mississii^pi deserted the banks upon which these works are 
 located. But this, could it be proven, would give us no positive testi- 
 mony concerning their age. When the river changed its course, a lake 
 
36 
 
 AECHJEOLOGY. 
 
 took its place. The change therefore must have been somewhat sudden, 
 for according to its prevailing habits, while it wears away the shore upon 
 one side it leaves a corresponding deposit of alluvium upon the other. 
 
 The numerous miniature wharves would suggest that the inhabitants 
 were fishermen and had plenty of boats of some sort, which being so, 
 these waters must have been navigable and not filled up as now with an 
 almost impenetrable cypress forest. 
 
 While it is true that the most im- 
 portant works are all situated upon the 
 high ground, fifteen feet above the water 
 level, some of the smaller ones are 
 located upon the intermediate declivity, 
 and near the shore of the bayou, as also 
 some of the residence sites. 
 
 If we assume their occupancy to have 
 been contemporaneous with the presence 
 of the river, they would be subject to 
 overflow by the annual floods, and the 
 Lafge Water Vessel. wharvcswould bc swept away. It seems 
 
 probable therefore that the time when they were occupied was long 
 subsequent to the change in the course of the river. The idea of the great 
 antiquity of these worlvs, entertained when I made the report of their 
 examination, to the St. Louis Academy of Science, I confess has since been 
 somewhat shaken, the reasons for which may appear as we proceed. I am 
 reminded however that, for the work of which these are the initial 
 chapters, a picturesque and, so to speak, a topographical description 
 of the ancient monuments of Missouri is desired, rather than a dry 
 detail of facts with extended generalizations. Considerations therefore 
 which might otherwise be appropriate in this connection will be reserved 
 for a more fitting opportunity. 
 
 One mile south of the remains under consideration, 
 and about three hundred feet from the margin of the 
 bayou, is a peculiar work, in the form of an oval or 
 egg-shaped excavation, one hundred and fifty feet long 
 in its largest diameter and seventy-five feet wide and 
 about six feet deep. It is surrounded by an embank- 
 ment about eight feet in height around its northern 
 curve : on the southern end the wall is not over five 
 feet, in which is a narrow opening, and extending from it is a curved, 
 elevated way to the swamp, in which the earth taken from the excavation 
 
 Small Drinking Vessel, 
 and Stopper. 
 
THE NEW MADKID MOTTSTOS. 37 
 
 seems to have been deposited, until a circular mound or wharf was raised 
 about twenty feet in diameter and five feet high in the centre. The same 
 opening and elevated way is seen at the northern end, extending to the 
 water. It is doubtless an unfinished work, but its purpose cannot be 
 conjectured. 
 
 About eight miles, in a southeasterly^ direction, from the works upon 
 Bayou St. John, upon what is known as West Lake, is another exten- 
 sive group almost identical with those described above, differing chiefly 
 in this, that they are covered throughout with a heavy growth of timber; 
 and the residence sites are found covering a much larger space, and in 
 prodigious numbers ; while in the center of the group is an open space 
 of several acres which seems to have been made perfectly level, contain- 
 ing no elevations or depressions whatever save what may have been 
 produced by the uprooting of timber. 
 
 The aboriginal remains thus briefly described are only small groups of 
 the multitudinous works with which this whole region abounds, and in 
 many instances are still covered with the primeval forests. 
 
 They seem to increase in number and size as we approach the town 
 of New Madrid, where they appear in structures of mixch greater magni- 
 tude, one of which has been already noticed. Their character at this 
 place would seem to indicate that here was the seat of government and 
 commercial metropolis of a dense population, which occupied a large extent 
 of territory, embracing not only New Madrid county, but also the 
 counties of Mississippi, Scott, Perry, Butler, Pemiscot, Scotland, 
 Madison, Bollinger and Cape Girardeau, all of which contain the same 
 class of works, and whose authors were the same people. Further 
 explorations, I have no doubt, will disclose their presence in other 
 counties adjoining. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 One People the Buildehs of these Mounds.— Cremation and Burial MouitdS.— 
 The Big Mound at St. Louis.— Mistaken Views.— Minute Description of the 
 Work.— Stone Mounds.— Stone Sepulchers in St. Louis and Perry Counties. 
 
 Notwitlistanding the variety of form presented iii the multitudinous 
 structures throughout the continent of North America, the comparison 
 of many of their most prominent characteristics makes it reasonably 
 certain that one people were the authors of them aU. WhUe many of 
 them in the order of their age belong to periods more or less remote, 
 reaching back many hundreds and perhaps thousands of years, many 
 others are comparatively recent. Taken as a whole, the thoughtful 
 observer will see, in this diversity of configuration and grouping, that 
 natural order of growth which might be looked for in the slow develop- 
 ment of a national life, whether generated among the people themselves 
 or helped forward by occasional and accidental impulses from without. 
 It seems highly probable that there were two slowly-moving streams of 
 -migration from the north ; the most important one on the east of the 
 Mississippi, the other through the territories lying west of the river. 
 This southward movement of a vast people seems to have been arrested 
 in the valley of the Ohio for a long period of time. Otherwise the fact 
 can hardly be accounted for that here occur the most stupendous monu- 
 ments of their industry and skill, and also the most strildng evidences 
 of the stability and repose of their national life. Here the mound- 
 builders reached the highest stage of civilization they ever attained this 
 side of Central America and Mexico. The movement upon the western 
 side of the river, while it had its source in the one great fountain-head 
 at the north, does not seem to have been so well defined in all its 
 characteristics, notwithstanding the fact that the population in Mis- 
 souri at one time was as great, and, we have reason to think, greater 
 than in Ohio. The cause may have been that they never enjoyed a 
 season of repose and exemption from war to such a degree as to render it 
 possible for them to devote the time and concentrate their energies upon 
 their internal afikirs to the extent which resulted in the more advanced 
 civilization of the eastern tribes. There seems to have been one prevail- 
 ing system of religion among them all, which was based upon the 
 worship of the heavenly bodies. This remark applies not only to 
 people of North America, but to the ancient inhabitants of the southern 
 
CREMATION AND BURIAL MOUNDS. 39 
 
 continent as well. The temple mounds in both, though built of different 
 materials, are the same in form and purpose. 
 
 While the oneness of their forms of worship of itself proves nothing 
 as to the unity of their origin, still, when taken in connection with the 
 fact of their constant intercourse, and the identity of so many rites and 
 customs among them all, it is believed no extended argument is needed, 
 as before stated, to prove that, whatever may be the relative age of the 
 groups of works found in different localities, they were all built by one 
 people. In view of the foregoing it ought not to be surprising if, as we 
 trace the history of their development as recorded in their remains, we 
 find here and there traces of a radical change in some of their customs. 
 The one we have now to consider is a most important and significant one, 
 which relates to the disposition of their dead. This has already been 
 noticed (see p. 17, fig. 2), as illustrated in the two cemeteries in Carroll 
 County, Illinois, with traditional reasons for the substitution of mound 
 burial for cremation. Many able writers upon American antiquities have 
 given much attention to the numerous class of works which have usually 
 been denominated sacrificial mounds. 
 
 These are described as presenting upon excavation a basin-shaped 
 cavity of varying dimensions : frequently paved with stones, and con- 
 taining ashes and charcoal, which are sometimes mingled with various 
 implements and ornaments, all showing the action of fire. To my own 
 mind the evidences are almost conclusive that these should be denom- 
 inated Cremation Mounds ; and that up to a certain period this was the 
 usual, and perhaps, universal, method of disposing of the remains ol 
 departed friends. The size of the mound would then indicate the rank 
 of him whose body was thus consumed therein. Upon no other hypothe- 
 sis can we account for the earth being heaped upon the so-called altars 
 while the fires were yet burning, leaving some portions of the wood 
 yet unconsumed. At length this practice ceased and mound burial took 
 its place. The latter custom seems to have been the one universally 
 practiced by the mound-builders of Missouri. 
 
 While cremation mounds occur in Iowa and Wisconsin, if any exist in 
 Missouri they are yet to be discovered. But here even the mode oi 
 burial was not uniform throughout the State, nor always in the same 
 locality even. One class, in the bayou St. John group, has already been 
 described. It is to be remembered that in these no implements what- 
 ever were found with the interments — nothing save the earthen vessels 
 for food and drink. Occasionally a flint spear and arrowhead would be 
 disclosed, but in such relations that I have no doubt their presence was 
 
*0 AECH^OLOGY. 
 
 accidental. These mounds I believe to have been the ordinary burial 
 places of the people. In others, as was the case with the one upon 
 which the O'Fallon mansion stands, great numbers of stone axes, arrow- 
 points, and the like abound. 
 
 In the one case, only those domestic utensils were deposited which 
 minister to the comfort of their domestic life ; in the other, those which 
 served them in war and manly activities. Nor does this seem strange, 
 when we remember the belief, so common among mankind in certain 
 stages of civilization, that those pursuits to which the individual was 
 devoted in this life are continued in the life beyond the grave ; conse- 
 quently, if he had been a great hunter or mighty in war, it would be 
 most natural to deposit with him, in the tomb, his arms. But if the 
 nation were at peace, and unused to the arts of war, his friends would 
 think only of a necessary supply of food and drink; hence vessels of 
 pottery would be the sole accompaniments of his journey. 
 ' Should the idea here advanced be substantiated by future investigation, 
 that cremation was once the prevailing custom and that at some period it 
 was discontinued and mound-burial adopted in its place, then it would 
 seem altogether probable that Southeast Missouri was peopled at some 
 time subsequent to that event, and therefore the works so abundant there 
 are more recent than those of the Ohio Valley. 
 
 Another class of sepulchral mounds, whose occurrence is somewhat 
 rare, has been observed more particularly in the Western Central States. 
 Generally they are of large dimensions and contain a chamber or vault, 
 which is sometimes rudely finished with stone. The floor is usually 
 on a level with the natural surface of the soil, upon which the dead were 
 placed, in a reclining posture. The most conspicuous example of this 
 class is the one known as the Big Mound, which once stood at the corner 
 of Mound street and Broadway in St. Louis, but which, as before stated, 
 was removed in 1869. A representation of it, as it appeared, is given 
 in our frontispiece. 
 
 Of all sepulchral mounds thus far examined, this was the king. If 
 its magnitude, or rather the size of the vault within it has aiiy signifi- 
 cance, it would seem to have been the tomb of the most holy prophets, 
 or of the royal race. The statements concerning its dimensions are 
 widely difierent. According to one observer, it was four hundred feet 
 in length, two hundred feet wide at the base and over fifty feet high. 
 According to Mr. Brackenridge, it was one hundred and fifty feet in 
 length and thirty in height. The latter figures are probably not far from 
 the truth. 
 
THE BIG MOUND AT ST. LOUIS. 41 
 
 These discrepancies are not difficult of explanation when it is remem- 
 bered that in its ooustriiction, advantage was taken of the highest point 
 of the terrace, and when the streets were cut through it, on its northern 
 and southern ends, the grade was nearly twenty feet lower than the top 
 of the terrace upon which it was erected. A casual observer, therefore, 
 would be likely to take the whole as artificial, whereas more than one- 
 half, as it then appeared, was of fluviatile origin. The dividing lino 
 between the natural ground and the mound proper is shown in the 
 engraving. It is about midway between the level of the street and the 
 top of the mound. 
 
 The demolition of this ancient landmark was an event which awakened 
 much interest among the citizens, who gathered in crowds, from day 
 to day during the many weeks occupied by its removal. Numerous 
 and conflicting accounts were published at the time concerning it, with 
 any amount of speculation and hasty conclusions. Some of them have 
 been perpetuated in one recent work, at least, upon the pre-historic 
 races of America ; on which account I think it proper to say that the 
 statements which follow are based upon personal and careful examination 
 of the work during the process of its removal, until its destruction 
 was accomplished. 
 
 This mound, as is well known, was used by the Indians as a burial 
 place, and only about sixty years since, it was visited by a small baud, 
 who disinterred and carried away the bones of their chief who had been 
 buried there. But their interments here, as was their unvarying 
 custom, were near the surface. I have observed the same in other 
 localities, sometimes not more than eighteen inches from the top of the 
 mound, — as was the case with some I examined in Washington County, 
 on the banks of the Missouri. On account of this it is not difficult to 
 distinguish the Indian burials from those of the Mound-builders. Had 
 this fact been better understood, we would have been spared many erro- 
 neous statements, as well as hasty generalizations upon articles taken 
 from the mounds, which were attributed to their builders, but which, 
 in fact, were deposited by the Indians; and many of them even, subse- 
 quent to their first acquaintance with our own race. A striking example 
 of this occurred during the removal of the "Big Mound." Near the 
 northern end, and about three feet from the surface, two skeletons were 
 discovered very near each other, one evidently that of a male, the other 
 a female. With the larger of the two were found the spiral spines of 
 two conch shells, much decayed, nine ivory beads of an average size, as 
 near as I can recollect, one inch in length and nearly one-half in 
 
42 AECBLEOLOGT. 
 
 diameter, aa ivory spool with short shaft but very wide flanges, which 
 were much brolcen around the edges, and two curious articles of copper, 
 about three inches iu length and about half as wide, resembling some- 
 what in shape the common smoothing iron of the laundry. The under 
 side, which was concave, showed the marks of the mould in which they 
 were cast. The upper side, which was muqh corroded, showed traces 
 of an elaborate finish in the way of engraving. From the center of the 
 finished upper side an arm projected at a right angle, about five-eighths 
 of an inch iu continuous width and two-eighths in thickness at its junc- 
 ture, which tapered to a thin edge. 
 
 Embedded in the verdigris with which they were encrusted were plainly 
 visible the marks of a twisted string just like ordinary wrapping twine, 
 which had been clumsily tied about them, and upon which the beads had 
 been strung. All the above articles were about the head and neck of the 
 skeleton, and had evidently been interred with the possessor just as he 
 wore them in life. 
 
 I have been thus particular in the account of this "big Indian" and his 
 treasures — for such he undoubtedly was — ^because these articles of copper, 
 and the ivory spool, which must have been turned in a lathe, (and I 
 must include also the pieces of cloth found with them, which however I 
 did not see) have been taken as the exponents of the state of the arts 
 among the Mound-builders, and have been made the subject of the most 
 extravagant statements. Although I was not present when these articles 
 were taken out, they were placed in my hands a short time afterward, 
 by the person who unearthed them, who also kindly gave me portions of 
 the skull, the larger bones of the legs, and a lock of hair! from the head 
 of both the sachem and his squaw, which are still in my possession. 
 
 But the most interesting ffeature of this trulj' great structure is the , 
 sepulchral chamber which it once contained. By what means the 
 ponderous mass of earth which formed its roof was sustained, the mound 
 itself furnished no clue, for it had long ago fallen in and crushed almost 
 to atoms the already decayed bones of the skeletons lying upon the 
 floor. The original length of the chamber could only be conjectured, as 
 portions of the mound had been removed when the street was cut 
 through upon the southern end, as seen in the engraving. It could be 
 traced, however, for seventy-two feet. For this distance the sides were 
 perfectly smooth and straight, and sloped outwardly a few degrees from 
 the perpendicular, and the marks of the tool by which the walls were 
 plastered could be plainly seen. One circumstance, which was very 
 puzzling for a while, was the curious appearance of the surface of the 
 
THE BIG MOUND AT ST. LOUIS. 43 
 
 walls. They were covered with a complete network of black lines, 
 interlacing and crossing each other with all sorts of beautiful and fanciful 
 complications, resembling more than anything else the delicate tracery of 
 a frosted window pane. Upon careful examination, these proved to be 
 the remains of rootlets from the trees which once grew upon the surface 
 above ; which, finding easy ingress along the face of the wall, had thus 
 covered its surface, but were now completely carbonized. 
 
 The manner of its construction seems to have been thus : The surface 
 of the ground was first made perfectly level and hard ; then the walls 
 were raised with an outward i4iclination, which were also made perfectly 
 compact and solid, and plastered over with moist clay. Over these a 
 roof was formed of heavy timbers, and above all the mound was raised 
 of the desired dimensions.^ The bodies had all been placed in a direct 
 line, upon the floor of the vault, a few feet apart, and equidistant from 
 each other, with their feet towards the west. These were disclosed, 
 several at a time, as the laborers detached long, vertical sections of 
 earth by the simultaneous use of crowbars inserted at the top. Mingled 
 with the black deposit which enveloped the bones, were beads and shells 
 in prodigious numbers, though in no instance were both deposited with 
 the same individual. 
 
 The beads, so called, are the same as are found in the mounds of Ohio, 
 and evidently cut, as Dr. Foster thinks, from the Busycon, from the 
 Gulf of Mexico. They are small discs perforated in the center by drill- 
 ing. From the many specimens in my possession in various stages of 
 their manufacture, the conclusion is warranted that the hole was first 
 drilled and the edges rounded afterwards. Many of these seem to have 
 been cut from the common mussel-shells which are abundant in this region. 
 The small sea shells {Marginella apicina), were only found with a few 
 skeletons, possibly five or six at the southern end of the vault, and with each 
 one from four to six quarts, all of which were pierced with small holes 
 near the head, by which they were imdoubtedly stnmg together. With 
 the majority, however, only the perforated buttons were found, but in 
 such numbers that the body from the thighs to the head must have been 
 covered with them. 
 
 Being very desirous of securing, if possible, a perfect skull, or at 
 least the fragments from which one might be reconstructed, and as all 
 
 ' Although not a vestige of wood was discovered when it was removed, in a worls 
 across the river, more recently destroyed, which contained a similar vault, were found 
 Sticks of red cedar, much decayed, but in such positions as showed that they had been 
 the supports of the superincumbent earth. 
 
'« 
 
 44 
 
 ARCHEOLOGY. 
 
 which were thrown out by the excavators were in small pieces which 
 crumbled at the touch, I began a careful excavation with a common 
 kitchen knife near the feet of a skeleton, following the spinal column to 
 the head. My work was soon interrupted however by the crowd of 
 eager boys from the neighboring schools, who scrambled for the beads 
 which were thrown out with every handful of earth, with such energy 
 that I was lifted from my feet and borne away. By the aid of a burly 
 policeman, however, I was able to finish my excavation, but without 
 being able to secure what was so much desired. The bones were so much 
 decayed, when the roof fell in, that all the larger bones were crushed, 
 and only small fragments of the skull could be obtained, and of course 
 no cavity corresponding to its shape remained from which a plaster cast 
 might have been taken. 
 
 The last visit to the mound was most interesting of all. The 
 night before, the workmen had made a vertical cut directly across 
 the northern end of the small portion of the work which yet remained. 
 
 
 
 >• i^*.-!; 
 
 Cross-Section of the Big Mound at St. Louis. 
 
 What was there revealed is well represented in the engraving. The 
 sloping walls were of compact yellow clay, the intermediate space filled 
 with blue clay in a much looser condition, in perfect agreement with the 
 idea of its having fallen in from above by the decay of its sujDport. Hei'e 
 too, at the northern end, I conjectured, was the entrance to the sepul- 
 
STONE MOUNDS. 45 
 
 cher, for the reason that here the walls were about eight feet in height, 
 from six feet to eight feet apart, whereas the first measurements at the 
 top, when the walls were discovered, showed a diameter of eighteen feet. 
 
 Here, then, was an artificial sepulchral tomb, whose dimensions we 
 may safely state to have been from eight to twelve feet wide, seventy- 
 five feet long, and from eight to ten feet in height, in which from twenty 
 to thirty burials had taken place. If any other deposit had been made 
 with the dead, save the before-mentioned beads and shells, the tomb must 
 have been desecrated by some savage who had no regard for its sacred 
 character, for not a vestige of anything else was disclosed at the time of 
 its demolition. 
 
 Another evidence of a large aboriginal population is furnished by the 
 stone mounds which are very numerous in certain localities, particularly in 
 those counties through which flow the Osage and the Gasconade rivers. 
 Not being so conspicuous as the others already noticed, they would not 
 be likely to attract the attention of ordinary travelers, and may therefore 
 be found covering a much larger area than is at present known. These 
 are simple heaps of stones, of such size as could be conveniently carried 
 from the ravines where they are found to the highest elevations — the spots 
 usually chosen for their erection. I have seen them in groups on a con- 
 tinuous line running back from the very brow of a precipitous escarpment 
 two hundred and fifty feet above the Gasconade, which swept majestically 
 below. In fact, those commanding elevations, no matter how diflicult of 
 access, from whence the view of the surrounding landscape was most 
 extended and lovely, seem to have been the oiles most preferred. The 
 Ozark Hills, clothed with the primeval forests, are full of them. They 
 are generally considered more recent than the earthen tumuli. In all 
 that I have opened nothing was discovered which shed any light ,upon 
 their history, save a few human teeth and the smallest bits of the larger 
 bones, which proved them to be burial mounds. It is stated by Adair 
 that some of the nomadic tribes of Indians thus disposed of their dead, 
 and as they passed and re-passed those graves, from year to year each man 
 of the tribe was accustomed to add another stone to the heap which had 
 been raised above them. In agroup of seven, I observed one which showed 
 some skill in masonry ; one of the walls was built up with a smooth face 
 about three feet in height, in which the joints were beautifully broken, 
 although there was uo evidence of mortar having been used. 
 
 In this connection should be noticed still another class ; the most note- 
 worthy examples of which, were discovered about the year 1818, in the 
 town of Fenton, about fifteen miles from St. Louis. These were stone 
 
46 AKCEUEOLOGY. 
 
 graves or cists, each inclosing a single skeleton, or the dust of one — as all 
 were in a crumbling condition there. Not one of the many examined 
 exceeded fifty inches in length. They were built of six flat stones, single 
 slabs forming the bottom, top, sides, and ends. 
 
 According to Dr. Beck, of Gazetteer fame, much discussion was elicited 
 at the time and many communications appeared in the newspapers. The 
 chief point upon which it all centered was the shortness of the graves. 
 As was the case in Tennessee, a few years since, it was considered as 
 proving the former existence of a race of pigmies. But the fact that in 
 some of them the leg bones were observed lying parallel with and along- 
 side of the bones of the thigh, accounted for the shortness of the graves ; 
 and this, taken along with the well-known custom practiced by some 
 tribes, of suspending their dead in the branches of trees until the bones 
 were denuded of flesh and afterwards depositing them in their common 
 burying place, was regarded as a sufficient answer to all the pigmy spec- 
 ulations. 
 
 About one hundred yards from the ancient burying ground at Fenton 
 were once a number of mounds, and remains of an extensive fortification, 
 which also attracted the attention of the curious in those early days. 
 And if files of the old Missouri Gazette of sixty years ago could be 
 found, no doubt many interesting facts would be recovered which are 
 now forgotten. Similar stone graves are found in Perry County, seventy- 
 five miles from St. Louis. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 "The Cavk-Dwbllebs."— Tales op Discoveries in Kentucky, etc. — The Caves of 
 THE Ozark Mountains.— Proofs of Long Occupancy. — Skeletons and other 
 Relics Found. — The Cave-Dwellbes a Different Eace from the Mound- 
 Builders. 
 
 To the general student of Ethnology and Archaeology, no one depart- 
 ment of antiquarian research has yielded grander or more satisfactory 
 results than those which have rewarded the explorers of the caves and 
 rock-shelters of some of the mountain chains of the old world. Concern- 
 ing the relative age of the earthen structures of the vast alluvial plains 
 of America there may be much difference of opinion. But in his 
 occupancy of the caves of Europe, primeval man has so inscribed the 
 records of his early life and presence, during those geologic changes 
 which he witnessed, in the succession of the glacial and diluvial epochs, 
 that they are sometimes as sharply delineated and legible as are those 
 of the various orders of animal life in the stratified rocks By these 
 faithful chronographs of the childhood of the race, we are carried back 
 irresistibly to a period so remote, that the cave-dwellers from Mount 
 Hor, who jgined the confederate kings, and were so signally overthrown 
 by Abram in the plains of Sodom, were but of yesterday. 
 
 In America, this field is compdratively unexplored, or perhaps we had 
 better say, is undiscovered. Indeed, it may be that we have nothing 
 here which shall be found to correspond to or compare with the drift 
 period and bone-caves of Europe. It is true we find, in the early tales 
 of border life in Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee, accounts which 
 must contain some elements of truth, of caverns filled with human bones ; 
 others whose walls are pictured and sculptured with strange devices, of 
 animals, known and unknown ; and representations of the heavenly 
 bodies ; and others still, coutaining mummied corpses, embalmed and 
 wonderfully preserved, clad in robes of feather-work like those of Peru- 
 vian fabric which so filled the Spanish conquerors with admiration. But 
 alas ! these were long since destroyed. Then, they had little or no 
 scientific value, consequently there was no motive for their serious 
 examination, or preservation. 
 
 Still, however, we may indulge the not unreasonable hope that others 
 may yet be discovered, whose disclosures shall be equally precious. In 
 this hope we are the more encouraged by the fact that the few which 
 have been noticed and described, furnish indubitable proof that they 
 
48 
 
 ARCHEOLOGY. 
 
 were once the favorite resorts, for burial purposes, of some pre-historic 
 race. When the stones shall be rolled away from the doors of the sep- 
 ulchi-al caverns in the limestone hills of Missouri, the long-forgotten 
 dead may again come forth re-vivitied, rehabilitated, and the Ozark 
 Mountains may yet disclose materials for a chapter in the life of her 
 primitive people, which shall equal in interest the records of the mounds. 
 The Ozarks, thanks to their sterile slopes, have preserved their sacred 
 
 Among the Oiarks. 
 
 treasures well. They are honeycombed with caves, some of unknown 
 extent. Their openings may be seen in the precipitous blutfs along the 
 Gasconade Kiver, in great numbers, on either side, or the majestic arches 
 of their openings span the divides where the smaller hill ranges meet. 
 Do these numerous caves and channels evidence an ancient system of 
 drainage, in operation long before the Gasconade had asserted its "right 
 of way " and scoojjed for itself a course through the rocks by its cease- 
 less flow? ^ 
 
 In these caves the ancient dead were buried and the funeral feasts 
 were celebrated. The deep deposit of rich nitrogenous earth in the 
 
 1 See Sir Charles Lyell's remarks upon the Valley of the Meuse, "Antiquity of Man," 
 p. 73. 
 
THE, CAVE DWELLEKS. 49 
 
 larger chambers, and the bones of various animals, birds, and mussel 
 shells — the refuse of the funeral feasts, — the alternate layers of ashes and 
 charcoal mingled with earthy matter, containing human bones in diiferent 
 degrees of preservation, tell of oft-repeated visits and recurrence of the 
 funeral rites. 
 
 What little we have learned from the few thus far explored makes us 
 only the more eager to examine still further the records they contain. 
 A description of one must serve our present purpose. The one selected 
 is in Pulaski County, and is one of the many famous saltpetre caves so 
 often mentioned in the early anuals of the State, with which the country 
 of the Gasconade abomids. The opening is in the face of a perpen- 
 dicular limestone bluff which extends along the river for many miles. 
 While the scenery of this whole region is very beautiful, the view from 
 the mouth of some of the caves is enchanting. Standing in the shadow 
 of one of their lofty arches, the eye is charmed with the peculiar beauty 
 of the landscape spread out before it. The Gasconade flowhig far below, 
 the stately trees which fringe its banks and mark the course of its long 
 graceful curves, until it loses itself in the dim outlines of the Ozarks, 
 which swell and roll away until their opalescent hues melt into the mel- 
 low light of the autumn sky,— all conspire to awaken the liveliest 
 feelings of respect and admiration for a people whose aesthetic taste was 
 so refined and tender as to lead them to select a place so charming for 
 the long repose of their loved ones. But poetry and science have but 
 little in common : one must end where the other begins. So turning my 
 back upon the beautiful scene, and repressing all compunctions for the 
 sacrilege we are about to commit, the impatient workmen are directed 
 to begin the labor of cutting a trench one hundred and seventy-five feet 
 long, through the deposit at the bottom of the cave. At the end of this 
 distance the perpetual gloom begins. Here the torches are brought into 
 requisition, by whose dim light, as the laborers proceed with their work, 
 the sectional notes and measurements are taken. 
 
 The whole surface of the deposit seems to have been much disturbed, 
 to the depth of from eighteen inches to two feet. It is composed of 
 earth and ashes, mingled profusely with broken pottery, fragments 
 of human bones and fiint-chips. Below this, the deposit is hard and 
 compact. Selecting a point about midway from either end of the trench, 
 we proceed to make more critical examinaticm. Continuing the excav- 
 ation to the depth of six feet, the natural deposit at the bottom is 
 reached, composed of a tough reddish clay, which contained nothing 
 but decaj'ed mussel shells. All above this showed the continual 
 
50 ABCH^OLOGY. 
 
 occupancy of the cave during its deposition. A vertical section at the 
 point above named, disclosed the following strata : 
 
 Alluvium, mingled with ashes, bits of pottery, etc 18 laches. 
 
 Stratum of different colored ashes 2 " 
 
 Clay and dark Alluvium iyi " 
 
 Ashes ]i " 
 
 Alluvium 3 " 
 
 ' Mixture of Ashes and Clay 3 " 
 
 Pure Ashes }i " 
 
 Alluvium ZYz " 
 
 Pure Ashes, mingled with Charcoal 4 " 
 
 Alluvium, " " " 7 " 
 
 Ashes 3 " 
 
 Alluvium, mingled with Charcoal 20 " 
 
 At the depth of about two feet, the first skeleton was reached, lying 
 upon its back, with head towards the east. All the small bones were 
 thoroughly decayed. About six feet north of this, another skeleton was 
 disclosed, evidently buried in a sitting posture. This was so much 
 decomposed that only a few of the thicker portions of the skull could 
 be secured. Near this was also found the skeleton of a very aged 
 female, the skull in a better state of preservation. In companionship 
 with these was a flint spear-head of the rudest pattern, as were all the 
 implements of stone — which were not numerous — which the deposit 
 contained. With the exception of the rude spear-head, their presence 
 seemed to have been accidental, and this also may have been so. 
 Among the most interesting relics, were articles of bone, such as awls, 
 scrapers, and the like, and occasionally one made from the inner surface 
 of a shell, with a sharp edge. 
 
 What was most surprising was the prodigious number of mussel 
 shells which were continuous through the whole deposit, decreasing in 
 size and more decayed as we descended, until their whole substance was 
 a chalky paste. These are still abundant in the river below. Inter- 
 mingled with the alluvium and ashes, as far as the excavation extended, 
 were skulls and bones of fishes, deer, bear, mud-turtle and wild 
 turkey. The skulls were always broken, no doubt to obtain the brains, 
 which have always been esteemed a great delicacy among the civilized 
 and savage as well. While, for purposes of ethnological study, a more 
 detailed description of the crania contained in this cave would be 
 instructive, and other particulars here suggested might be properly 
 enlarged upon, still, enough has been stated to indicate the desirable- 
 ness of a more thorough exploration of this comparatively new class 
 
THE CAVE DWELLERS. 
 
 51 
 
 of antiquities. But keeping in mind that we have more to do in these 
 chapters with the traces of the aboriginal inhabitants of Missouri than 
 with lengthy generalizations upon the facts they disclose, we can only 
 hint at one or two conclusions. 
 
 Bone Implements. 
 
 Here was the burial place of a people who were not insensible to 
 those beauties with which nature around, them was glorified, and who 
 sought those places with the most lovely surroundings in which to deposit 
 the remains of their friends. Here were laid to rest from time to time 
 the old and young, the aged matron, and the child, the fragments of 
 whose thin, paper-like skulls suggested many thoughts of maternal love 
 and tears of sorrow. The vast numbers of shells, and bones of beasts 
 and birds, *bear witness to the oft-repeated funeral feasts beside the new- 
 made graves of the departed, and point to a belief in a life continued in 
 another world. Who they were, or when they lived, it is not our 
 province now to try to answer. The Indians, it is well known, regarded 
 these gloomy caverns with superstitious fear, for in them they believed 
 
52 AECH^OLOGT. 
 
 the great Manitou dwelt. In view of this fact, so well attested by early 
 writers, the idea that they were the occupants becomes a matter of grave 
 doubt. The skulls thus far examined, are also wanting in those peculiar 
 and generally very marked characteristics which are so evident in the 
 crania of the mounds. With this allusion to a question so interesting, 
 we must leave its discussion to a future occasion, when we may reason- 
 ably hope to be able to continue it in the light of more extended 
 information. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Temple Mounds.— Growth of Ancient Eeligiotjs Systems. — Charactbkistics of this 
 Class of Monuments. — The Great Mound at Cahoeia, its best representativb 
 IN North America.— Bbackbnridgb's Description of it in 1811.— How it came to 
 be called "monks' mound." — the ceremonies of the sun-worshlppers.— other 
 Temple Mounds. — The Indians not descended from the Mound-Builders. 
 
 Although the propriety of some of the mound-classifications of the 
 earlier writers has sometimes been questioned, no doubts are entertained 
 as to the purpose of those which have been denominated Temple Mounds. 
 In treating of this class, we enter at once upon a field almost as vast as 
 the two continents of America. For, whatever may have been the 
 material used in their construction, whether stone, or earth alone, or 
 both combined, they present such uniform characteristics, so identical in 
 evident purpose and design, that they link together by one prevailing 
 system of religious worship, of which they are the striking exponents, 
 unnumbered tribes and peoples, scattered up and down the two continents 
 from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Eeason as we may, the more they are 
 studied, and considered in their relation to other groups and classes with 
 which they are found associated, we can hardly escape the conviction 
 that they point to one common origin. 
 
 Before yielding a hasty assent to a general conclusion, a proper caution 
 would suggest the possibility of accounting for this uniformity of struc- 
 ture by other and natural considerations. It is well known that barbaric 
 tribes in all lands and times have manufactured their first implements of 
 war and the chase from stone and bone, and have learned, by means of 
 some hint which Nature, perhaps, afforded, to fashion rude vessels of clay 
 for domestic use. It is also true that their petitions and adorations have 
 been addressed to the same class of imaginary beings, or objects and 
 active forces whose effects they were accustomed to behold around them ; 
 among which the heavenly bodies appear to have occupied a conspicuous 
 pla.ce, particularly during some stages of their progress from barbarism 
 to a higher life. 
 
 Possessed of the same faculties, appetites and passions, inheriting the 
 same necessities, meeting always the same difficulties in their struggles 
 for existence, it is not surprising that rude nations have ever followed the 
 same paths in all the activities of their wild, infantile life. Indeed, it 
 would be surprising if they had not. From these and similar considera- 
 tions it may be thought that the identity of form, structure and relation^ 
 
54 AECILEOLOGT. 
 
 and also apparent oneness of purpose which characterize the Temple 
 Mounds, demonstrate only the operation of a universal law, in the 
 progress of a people from a state of barbarism through the slow stages 
 of its developement towards a higher civilization. The sun and moon 
 have been worshiped in ages and countries widely separated, and by 
 nations between which there could never have occurred any possible 
 communication . 
 
 Man never has attained by intuition or philosophy that knowledge of 
 the unity and perfections of the Supreme Being which Revelation presents : 
 and wanting that knowledge, he naturally worships those visible objects 
 which are most conspicuous and which most inspire his reverence, 
 especially those which, he conceives, exert the greatest influence upon 
 his life and destiny. But when each nation starts out for itself in the 
 path of a progressive civilization, the prevailing forms of worship, being 
 subjected to the same influences which mould the national polity, must 
 necessarily, under the new impulse, become also materially changed, or 
 as has sometimes happened, displaced altogether, by a system entirely 
 new. From this point, the forms of Nature-worship would cease to be 
 identical, and each resultant system become thereafter more and more 
 divergent ; and long periods of time must necessarily be required for the 
 working out of a complicated and well arranged system of popular 
 religion which should be able to enforce the ready obedience and subjec- 
 tion of a vast people to its mandates, and enlist the energies of the 
 nation in the erection of their most imposing structures, for no other 
 purpose than the observance of their religious rites and ceremonies. Such 
 structures, among the memorials of an ancient people, are very inter- 
 esting and instructive, from the fact that religion has ever exerted such 
 controlling influence in the establishment and perpetuity or decline of 
 countless nations, whose history has been preserved. 
 
 They are the records, therefore, of more than the religious faith and 
 practice of a particular people ; but, because of the leavening influence 
 of religious ideas when crystallized into systematic forms, they become the 
 interpreters of many things which otherwise would never be understood. 
 
 It will readily be seen, therefore, in the light of the foregoing, that 
 the Temple Mounds of America are invested with an interest and 
 importance outside of their purely religious character ; and which is 
 greatly enhanced by the fact that wherever they are found, along with 
 them invariably occur the most striking evidences of the former presence 
 of a numerous population, whose civil and social condition was separated 
 by a wide gulf from that of the red race who occupied their ancient seats 
 
TEMPLE MOUNDS. 55 
 
 when America was discovered ; and whose government was so well 
 established and enduring, as to render it possible for vast numbers to 
 be employed for a series of years in their erection. 
 
 Temple Mounds, according to Squier and Davis, "are distinguished 
 by their great regularity of form and general large dimensions. They 
 consist chiefly of pyramidal structures, truncated, and generally have 
 graded avenues to their tops. In some instances they are terraced or 
 have successive stages. But whatever their form, whether round, oval, 
 octimgular, square or oblong, they have invariably flat or level tops." ^ 
 
 "The summits of these structures were probably crowned with 
 temples, but having been constructed of perishable materials, all traces 
 of their existence have disappeared. The truncated pyramidal form, 
 which often rises to no great height, was obviously the foundation for 
 such structures. In the works at Aztalan, Wisconsin, we trace the out- 
 lines of this form of mounds at the angles of the bastions, and this may 
 be said to be their northern limit. They are not recognized on the 
 southern slope of Lake Erie, and are seen at only three points in Southern 
 Ohio, viz : Marietta, Newark and Chillicothe. 
 
 "The stupendous mound at Cahokia in Illinois, with its graded way, 
 its terrace and level summit, was the best representative of this class. '^ 
 In Kentucky they are not rare ; the great mound near Florence is of this 
 character, and that near Claiborne — fifty feet in height — has a level 
 summit with a gradual slope on the east, and a succession of ten terraces 
 on the west. In this class, too, must be included the great mound at 
 Seltzertown, Mississippi, and most of those in the Gulf States. 
 
 'Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley, p. 173. Smithsonian Contributions to 
 Knowledge. 
 
 '' When he wrote this, Dr. Foster was under the impression that this great work was 
 destroyed. "While he was mistaken, it is understood to be for sale, and may soon be 
 reckoned among the things that wei-e, provided some railway shall be constructed near 
 enough to render its huge mass — containing several million cubic yards of earth — 
 desirable to elevate its grade. What a graceful thing it would be for the State, or 
 National Government to purchase it and decree its perpetual preservation ! Men of 
 science all over the world and in all future time would be so thankful for such an act. 
 Thus the Government of Denmark has done with her antiquities. Whether either of 
 our great political parties could be persuaded to assume such a tremendous responsibility 
 is very doubtful. Our legislators are so conscientious and so intent upon " retrenchment 
 and reform," that the expenditure of a few hundred dollars for the preservation of the 
 stupendous work which must have occupied the ceaseless labor of thousands of men 
 through a life-time to erect, would be a precedent too dangerous to think of — such an 
 act might shake the foundations of the Eepublio. No partizan would dare favor such a 
 proposition, lest it should be followed by his speedy consignment to a political grave 
 from which there could be no resurrection. 
 
56 AEcaa;oLOGY. 
 
 " In Mexico and Central America, we see the culmination of this form 
 in the Teocallis, which were faced with flights of steps and surmounted 
 by temples of stone." ^ 
 
 The identification of some of the mounds in their enumeration as 
 Temple Mounds, by the authors above named, I cannot but regard as 
 lacking confirmation. Indeed the evidences derived from my own obser- 
 vations are conclusive that some of them belong to quite another class. 
 Those of the " truncated pyramidal form which often rise to no great 
 height," were doubtless crowned with the residences of the chiefs and 
 rulers. These are often found in groups. I have counted seven or eight 
 very near each other, a few feet in height, with flat or level tops : the 
 central one generally larger than those around it, which tradition affirms 
 was occupied by the dwelling of the chief. The others of the group were 
 erected from time to time for residence sites for his sons, as they came to 
 man's estate and had families of their own. In all which I have excavated, 
 nothing was disclosed but fragments of pottery. 
 
 The only structures which can with certainty be identified as Temple 
 Mounds are those whose perfect model is seen in the Teocallis of Mexico 
 and South America. 
 
 In whatever group they are found, they are the most imposing. 
 Generally oblong, with one or more stages, and ascended by graded 
 avenues. Such was one of the large mounds at St. Louis, and I am 
 disposed to believe that the beautiful Falling Garden was an unfinished 
 work of this class, whose three stages, about fifteen feet each in height, 
 were finished, but the elevated work which was to crown the whole was 
 wanting. 
 
 The great Cahokia Mound is the best representative of this class to be 
 found in North America. This was examined by Mr. Brackenridge ia 
 1811-12. His interesting description of it, along with the numerous 
 works of smaller dimensions with which the American Bottom is filled,— 
 or was in his day — may well be quoted entire in this connection : 
 
 "To form a more correct idea of these, it will be necessary to give the 
 reader some view of the tract of country^ in which they are situated. 
 The American Bottom is a tract of rich alluvial land, extending on the 
 Mississippi, from Kaskaskia to the Cahokia River, about eighty miles in 
 length and five in breadth ; several handsome streams meander through it ; 
 the soil is of the richest kind, and but little subject to the efiects of the 
 Mississippi floods. A number of lakes are interspersed through it, with 
 
 ' Foster's Pre-Historic Baces, etc., p. 186. 
 
THE GEE AT MOUND AT CAHOKIA. 57 
 
 fine high banks ; these abound in fish, and in autumn are visited by 
 millions of wild fowl. 
 
 " There is perhaps no spot in the western country, capable of being 
 more highly cultivated, or of giving support to a more numerous 
 population, than this viiUey. If any vestige of ancient population were 
 to be found, this would be the place to search for it ; accordingly this 
 tract, as also the bank of the river on the western side, exhibits proofs 
 of an immense population. If the city of Philadelphia and its environs 
 were deserted, there would not be more numerous traces of human 
 existence. 
 
 " The great number of mounds, and the astonishing quantity of human 
 bones . everywhere dug up, or found on the surface of the ground with 
 a thousand other appearances, announce that this valley was at one 
 period filled with habitations and villages. The whole face of the bluff, or 
 hill which bounds it on the east, appears to have been a continued burying 
 ground. But the most remarkable appearances are two groups of mounds 
 or pyramids, the one about ten miles above Cahokia, and the other 
 nearly the same distance below it, which in all exceed one hundred and fifty 
 of various sizes. The western side also contains a considerable number. 
 
 "A more minute description of those above Cahokia, which I visited in 
 the fall of 1811, will give a tolerable idea of them all. I crossed the 
 Mississippi at St. Louis, and after passing through the wood which 
 borders the river, about a half a mile in width, entered on an extensive 
 plain. 
 
 " In fifteen minutes I found myself in the midst of a group of mounds, 
 mostly of a circular shape and at a distance, resembling enormous haystacks 
 scattered through a meadow : one of the largest, which I ascended, was 
 about two hundred paces in circumference at the bottom; the form nearly 
 square, though it had evidently undergone considerable alteration from 
 the washing of rains ; the top was level, with an area sufficient to contain 
 several hundred men. The prospect from this mound was very beautiful ; 
 looking towards the bluffs, which are dimly seen at the distance of six 
 or eight miles, the bottom at this place being very wide, I had a level 
 plain before me, bound by islets of wood, and a few solitary trees : to 
 the right the prairie is bounded by the horizon ; to the left, the course 
 of the Cahokia may be distinguished by the margin of wood upon its 
 banks, and crossing the valley diagonally S. S. W. Around me, I 
 counted forty-five mounds or pyramids, besides a great number of small 
 artificial elevations : these mounds form something more than a semi- 
 circle, about a mile in extent, the open space on the river. 
 
58 AKCILS;OLOGY. 
 
 " Pursuing my walk along the bank of the Cahokia, I passed eight 
 others in the distance of three miles, before I arrived at the largest 
 assemblage. When I reached the foot of the principal mound, I was 
 struck with a degree of astonishment not unlike that which is experienced 
 in contemplating the Egyptian Pyramids. What a stupendous pile of 
 earth I To heup up such a mass must have required years, and the labor 
 of thousands. It stands immediately on the bank of the Cahokia, and 
 on the side next it, is covered with lofty trees. Were it not for the 
 regularity and design which it manifests, the circumstances of its being 
 on alluvial ground, and the other mounds scattered around it, we would 
 scarcely believe it the work of human hands. 
 
 "The shape is that of a parallelogram standing from north to south ; on 
 the south side there is a broad apron or step, about halfway down, and 
 from this another projection into the plain, about fifteen feet wide, which 
 was probably intended as an ascent to the mound. By stepping around 
 the base I computed the circumference to be at least eight hundred 
 yards, and the height of the mound about ninety feet. The step or 
 apron has been used as a kitchen-garden by the monks of La Trappe, 
 settled near this, and the top is sowed with wheat. Nearly west there 
 is another of a smaller size, and forty others scattered through the 
 plain. Two are also seen on the bluff at the distance of three miles. 
 Several of these mounds are almost conical. As the sward had been 
 bvirnt, the earth was perfectly naked, and I could trace with ease any 
 unevenuess of surface, so as to discover whether it was artificial or 
 accidental. 
 
 " I everywhere observed a great number of small elevations of eaith to 
 the height of a few feet, at regular distances from each other, and which 
 appeared to observe some order; near them I also observed pieces of 
 flint and fragments of earthen vessels. I concluded that a populous 
 town had once existed here, similar to those of Mexico described by the 
 first conquerors. The mounds were sites of temples or monuments to 
 great men. 
 
 " It is evident this could never have been the work of thinly-scattered 
 tribes. If the human species had at any time been permitted in this 
 country to have increased freely, and there is every probability of the 
 fact, i^ must, as in Mexico, have become astonishingly numerous. The 
 same space of ground would have sufliced to maintain fifty times the 
 number of the present inhabitants, with ease, their agriculture having no 
 other object than mere sustenance. Among a numerous population, the 
 power of the chief must necessarily be more absolute, and where there 
 
CEKEMONIES OF THE SUK-WOESHIPPEES. 59 
 
 are no laws, degenerates into despotism. This was the case in Mexico, 
 and in the nations of South America. A great number of individuals 
 were at the disposal of the chief, who treated them little better than 
 slaves. The smaller the society, the greater the consequence of each 
 individual. Hence, there would not be wanting a sufficient number of 
 hands to erect mounds or pyramids." 
 
 The largest mound of the Cahokia group, thus described by Bracken-r 
 ridge, is now known as Monks' Mound, on account of its having been 
 occupied in early days by a colony of monks of the order of La Trappe. 
 This prodigious temple site, as before remarked, is the best represent- 
 ative of its class in the United States, not only on account of its vast 
 size, but also because it is tKe most finished model of all similar works 
 which can with any degree of certainty be determined as temple mounds. 
 The- Teocallis of Mexico and the regions further south, though finished 
 with stone, are of the same form, with graded ascents, or flights of steps, 
 leading to the broad stage, or level top, at one end of which rose 
 another elevation, upon which stood the most holy temple and sacred 
 altars. 
 
 Upon these burned the perpetual fire, to be extinguished only at the 
 close of the year, and rekindled by the sun himself, as his rising beams 
 were concentrated by the high priests, when the new year began. This 
 event was always observed with the greatest solemnity. 
 
 When the sacred flame expired upon the altars, with the dying year, 
 the whole land was filled with gloom, and the fire upon every domestic 
 hearth must be extinguished also. Then the people sat down in awful 
 suspense to watch for the morning. Possibly their father, the sun, 
 might be angry with his children, and veil his glory behind the clouds at 
 the coming dawn. Then as they thought of their sins and bewailed 
 their transgressions, their fears were expressed in loud lamentations. But 
 as the expected dawn — the momentous time — approaches, all eyes are 
 turned towards the holy mount where the now fireless altars stand. At 
 length the eastern sky begins to glow with a golden light which tells 
 them that their god is near, and, while they watch, he rolls in splendor 
 from behind the eastern hills, and darts his fiery beams upon the sacred 
 place where holy men are waiting to ignite anew the sacrificial fires. 
 Nor do they wait in vain, for soon the curling smoke and the signal 
 flames are seen by the breathless multitude which fill the plains below, 
 and then one long, glad shout is heard, and songs of joy salute the 
 bright new year. Swift-footed messengers receive the new-lit fire from 
 
60 AKCH^OLOGY. 
 
 the hands of the priests, quickly it is distributed to the waiting throng 
 and carrifed exultingly to their several homes, when all begin the joyful 
 celebration of the feast of the Sun. 
 
 The peaceful tribes who once dwelt in this region of the Mississippi 
 Valley, upon either shore, found no quarries of stone of easy cleavage, 
 or which could be wrought with their simple tools for the erection of 
 their edifices. Doubtless wood was the only mateiial at their command, 
 or possibly sun-dried brick. The dust of their temples is gone with that 
 of their builders ; their altars are crumbled — ^the sacred fire is extin- 
 guished, which the sun shall nevermore rekindle. But the proud monu- 
 ment of their national solemnities still rears aloft its majestic form in the 
 midst of a vast alluvial plain of exhaustless fertility — a grand memorial 
 of days more ancient than the last migration of the Aztec race to the 
 plains of Anahuac, who found there the very same structures, which 
 they appropriated and by which they perpetuated the worship of the 
 land of thoir fathers as well as that of the people whom they subjugated. 
 It is not unreasonable to suppose that when, from its elevated summit, 
 the smoke of the yearly sacrifice ascended in one vast column heaven- 
 ward, from the great work above described, that it was the signal for 
 simultaneoiis sacrifices from lesser altars throughout the whole length of 
 the great plain, in the centre of which it stands, and that the people 
 upon the Missouri shore responded with answering fires from those 
 high places which once stood upon the western bank of the river, but are 
 now destroyed. 
 
 Here, we may well believe was the holy city, to which the tribes made 
 annual pilgrimages to celebrate the national feasts and sacrifices. But 
 not here alone ; for this vast homogeneous race, one in arts and worship, 
 had the same high and holy places, though of less imposing magnitude, 
 in the valley of the Ohio, in Alabama, and Mississippi. 
 
 In south-east Missouri, at New Madrid, is a similar work, surrounded 
 by a ditch ten feet in width and five in depth. It is twelve hundred feet 
 in circumference and forty feet in height. Among the ruins of almost 
 every ancient town lying back from the river, upon bayous and smaller 
 streams, may be found the oblong Temple-mound, which is always the 
 highest work of the group, and commands a view of the whole. 
 
 There are some who profess to believe that the Indians are the degen- 
 erate sons of the authors of these extensive and complicated works. But 
 when it is remembered that their languages, which are divided into many 
 groups, present very few affinities which are common to all, and the 
 dialects into which these groups are further divided are, many of them, 
 
THE MOUOT)-BUILDEES. 61 
 
 SO distantly related as to show that the various tribes must have been 
 separated from the parent stock in times very remote ; and when we 
 take into the account also, the wonderful unity of the race of the mounds, 
 as displayed in their works and worship, and the vast extent of territory 
 they occupied, it will be seen that such a supposition involves an antiquity 
 of the red race, which its most ardent defenders will find difScult to 
 harmonize with the recognized facts. 
 
 To my own mind the evidence is clear that the two peoples were as 
 distinct as the Greeks and Romans. That the exodus of the mound- 
 builders occupied long periods of time, is altogether probable, and com- 
 prised several distinct migrations, to the south and southwest, which were 
 brought about by the continued encroachments of the more warlike and 
 savage hordes from the north and northwest. Here and there, no doubt, 
 small bands were enslaved or absorbed by their conquerors, who adopted 
 some of the customs of the subjugated race, particularly those pertaining 
 to their worship, the traces of which are often well defined, — ^the practice 
 of which was continued by a few Indian tribes as late as the beginning of 
 the present century. 
 
 If the views here presented are correct, it will be apparent that the 
 Temple-mounds are invested with an interest peculiar to themselves, in 
 as much as they give us an insight to the social and political condition of 
 the ancient inhabitants of the State of Missouri and the Mississippi 
 Valley, which can be gained from no other class of works. It will also 
 be perceived that we have barely entered upon a most interesting field of 
 research, which will well repay a carefiil and thorough examination. 
 
CHAPTER VIU. 
 
 Garden Mounds.— The Food of the Pre-historic Races.— Fish Probablt one op their 
 Main Eesohrces.— The Use of the Ditches within their City Walls.- Domestic 
 Animals.— Agriculture.-Eeligious Systems.- Dissimilarity between Northern 
 AND Southern Tribes of Indians. — Tracks op Aztec Culture among the Latter. — 
 Vast Numbers op the Garden Mounds.— Proofs of their Purpose,— The Utah 
 Mounds.— Interesting Discoveries. — A new Variety op Wheat grown from Ker- 
 nels found Therein.— An Opening for Further Researches. 
 
 The foregoing evidences of an ancient people swarming in prodigious 
 numbers throughout the vast territory in which these works abound, and 
 who had their permanent dwellings in towns and cities which were well 
 arranged and constructed with no mean skill, suggest the most interest- 
 ing question, How did they subsist? The importance of this question is 
 realized when we remember that it lies at the foundation of their whole 
 social fabric ; and in fact, once determined, the answer becomes one of 
 the chief exponents of their physical condition, intellectual capacity and, 
 in a good degree, of their moral status as well. Many of the staple arti- 
 cles of food upon which all civilized nations depend for subsistence are 
 only to be procured by intelligent labor, guided by a plan and forethought 
 which are the result of a more or less extended observation of nature's 
 laws. 
 
 Here were large cities ; then here also must have been trade and com- 
 merce of some sort. Merchandise may not have been bartered for gold 
 and silver, but more likely — as was the case with the Peruvians — the 
 products of the field, the fold, or the chase, were exchanged for those 
 of the workshop and domestic handicraft. Again : their means of sup- 
 port must have been so certain and reliable, and withal so abundant, that 
 large numbers of the people could be employed continuously upon those 
 monuments of their industry which they have left behind for our admira- 
 tion. The probability that fish formed no inconsiderable item of their 
 food supply has already been suggested. The name of our great river, 
 which it is thought has come down to us from their time— ^emesi-sipu, 
 which means River of Fish — if it be true, bears witness to this. The 
 prodigious shell heaps along the southern coast, from Florida to the 
 mouth of the Mississippi, may also be noticed as evidence of the fact 
 that they were not unskillful fishermen. These accumulations of 
 the refuse of their kitchens have often proved peculiarly interesting 
 and instructive, inasmuch as they abound in numerous relics which, 
 
TOWKS OF PKE-HISTOBIO AMEEICANS. 63 
 
 under other circumstances would have been destroyed. The shell heaps 
 of the Baltic coast are complete zoological museums of the fauna 
 of the period when they were formed, containing, as they do, the 
 bones of many animals long since extinct in those regions, and pre- 
 senting also the bones of the few domestic animals which were the com- 
 panions of man in that remote period. 
 
 The most important sites of the towns of the pre-historic Americans 
 are found upon the shores of lakes or banks of rivers, and generally — 
 though not always — contiguous to, or upon extensive areas of fertile 
 land. We are not compelled to suppose, however, that they were always 
 influenced by agricultural considerations in the location of their permanent 
 homes, for the ruins of some towns have been observed upon the sandy 
 beaches of lakes, and where, too, there was no fertile land near, which 
 was suitable for agricultural purposes. It is, therefore, natural to sup- 
 pose that the inhabitants of towns so situated were fishermen. 
 
 The wide, deep ditches on the inside walls of some of their enclosures 
 have called forth much speculation as to their purpose. It has generally 
 been assumed that the walls which enclosed their towns were erected 
 for defensive purposes. But the puzzle has been about the location 
 of the ditch along the base of the wall within the enclosures. According 
 to all our notions of warfare, the ditch — to serve any defensive purpose 
 — should have been outside the walls. Moreover, many of the walled 
 towns were so situated in valleys, which were overlooked by the near 
 hills which surrounded them, as to be totally incapable of defense in any 
 kind of known warfare. The theory, therefore, that this inside ditch 
 was one of their means of defense, seems hardly satisfactory. I have 
 somewhere met with the statement that there was a tradition to 
 the eifect that the ditches were receptacles for water, or rather, 
 artificial channels for water conducted from the natural streams near 
 which the towns were located, thereby furnishing the inhabitants with a 
 constant and flowing supply. Without stopping to discuss the question, 
 it may be remarked that the idea seems altogether probable, and their 
 construction for such a purpose a very natural thing to do, while the 
 control of the stream, by gates and locks,wouId require no greater en- 
 gineering skill than they have displayed in their more durable works. 
 They would also have been specially adapted to the culture of fish, or 
 they may have been the receptacles for their winter's supply. Speculative 
 as the above may appear, it is certainly as rational as the notion that 
 the inside ditch contributed in any way to their defense against the 
 attacks of their foes. 
 
6* AECHl^OLOGY. 
 
 What sort of domestic animals, if any, were reared by the ancient 
 inhabitants of Missouri, we have no knowledge ; but there can be very 
 little doubt that game was abundant and that they were successful in the 
 chase. There is satisfactory evidence that the huge Mastodon was their 
 cotemporary whose bones are so abundant in our alluvial plains ; and also 
 that he was conquered and slain by their seemingly feeble weapons. I 
 have myself exhumed from the ruins of one of those towns fragments of 
 the vertebral column of the buffalo. 
 
 However all this may have been, concerning their agricultural skill, 
 we are not left to conjecture ; and we may confidently assert that their 
 main dependence for subsistence was upon the labors of the husbandman. 
 They worshipped the sun, and invoked his benign influence upon the 
 occurrence of the grfeat annual festival when their crops were sown in the 
 spring ; and when these were gathered, in the autumn they offered up 
 the first fruits to him as lord of the harvest. 
 
 That this was their custom we may with confidence assume ; nor is it, 
 indeed, mere assumption. The largest of these structures — the Temple 
 Mounds — are found to be precisely similar in form and character to those 
 of Mexico ; and the Spanish historians have given the fullest accounts of 
 the manner in which their religious exercises were performed upon their 
 summits, or in the temples which crowned the Teocallis. And as the be- 
 lief prevails that the builders of these were of the same race as the Mound- 
 builders, and probably their descendants, it becomes almost certain that 
 structures of the same form in both countries were erected for the same 
 uses and ceremonies. If it be true, as we believe, that when the great 
 majority of the race of the Mound-builders had been destroyed, or driven 
 from their habitations in the Mississippi Valley, some of whom are 
 known to have migrated to the southwest — some remnants of the tribes re- 
 mained, and were absorbedby their conquering successors, then we might 
 expect to find some of the customs of their fathers still practiced by those 
 who were left behind ; and more particularly, those pertaining to their 
 religious rites and manner of providing for their subsistence. The 
 student of the history of the red men cannot fail to notice the fact that 
 a few of the southern tribes possessed traits and customs peculiar to 
 themselves, and in which they differed widely from those of the north 
 and east. The former had a complicated and well-arranged system of 
 religious worship, with the perpetual fire of the altars ; also a line of 
 priests or prophets, who enjoined seasons of rigorous fasting, and con- 
 ducted the exercises upon the occasions of their festivities. The former 
 can scarcely be said to have had any religious system or belief. Mr. 
 
ANCIENT METHODS OF AGEICULTUEE. 65 
 
 Adair has given a detailed account of the religious rites and ceremonies 
 which were once practiced by a few southern tribes among whom he re- 
 sided for many years ; and so impressed was he with their imposing and 
 multifarious ceremonials that he believed they must have derived their 
 system from the Jews. 
 
 The dissimilarity between the tribes of the south and those of other lo- 
 calities was equally striking in their manner of house-building, sports 
 and games. The former had fixed habitations, in towns with streets and 
 public squares, and a love of home, with various other characteristics 
 which belong to a higher civilization than the nomadic tribes of red men 
 ever possessed. 
 
 But perhaps in no one thing was the dissimilarity more strongly ex- 
 pressed than in the methods of agriculture. The author quoted above 
 speaks of having seen deserted cornfields seven miles in extent, and we 
 know that they raised quite a variety of crops, and in abundance, chief 
 among which was maize. Among the now numerous and roving tribes we 
 discover only a methodless and scanty agriculture. 
 
 The ancient garden beds supposed to belong to the Mound-builders, 
 which in some instances are several hundred acres in extent, have fre- 
 quently been noticed in several of the Western States. These are said 
 to have been laid out in straight parallel rows or drills across the fields ; 
 but as none have been found in Missouri, as far as I am informed, they 
 need not be dwelt upon in this connection. 
 
 There are evidences of tilling the soil, of quite a novel character, which 
 Still exist in prodigious numbers, not only in Missouri but also in other 
 regions west of the Mississippi. I have heard of very few east of that 
 river. These works consist of low circular elevations, generally two or 
 three feet above the level of the natural surface of the soil, with diame- 
 ters varying from ten to sixty feet; all are round, or nearly so, sloping 
 off gently around the edges. All that I have seen among the Ozark hills 
 are composed of black alluvial soil, and disclosed, when excavated, no 
 implement or relic of any sort. Their presence may always be detected 
 in cultivated fields when covered with growing crops, by the more luxuri- 
 ant growth and deeper green of the vegetation. They abound in all the 
 little valleys among the flinty hills of the Ozarks, from Pulaski County, 
 Missouri, to the Gulf of Mexico, and westward to the Colorado in 
 Texas, and as far north as Iowa. Their size in the hilly regions seems 
 to have been determined by the amount of rich vegetable mold which 
 could be scraped together in a given spot. Residence sites they could 
 not have been, or they would have contained some relic of stone or bone, 
 5 
 
66 
 
 AECH^OLOGY. 
 
 or fragment of pottery, or at least the ashes of the family fire. To 
 enable the reader to form some idea of their prodigious numbers, I can 
 do no better than give the remarks of Prof. Forshey, as quoted by Dr. 
 Foster, in his "Pre-historic Eaces of the United States," which I take it, 
 refer to the same class. 
 
 Says Prof. Forshey : "In my geological reconnoisance of Louisiana, 
 in 1841-2, I made a pretty thorough report upon them. I afterwards 
 gave a verbal description of their extent and character before the New 
 Orleans Academy of Sciences. These mounds' lack every evidence of 
 artificial construction, based on other human vestiges. They are nearly 
 all round, none angular, and have an elevation hemispheroidal, of one foot 
 to five feet, and a diameter from thirty feet to one hundred and forty 
 feet. They are numbered by millions. In many places in the pine forests, 
 they are to be seen nearly tangent to each other as far as the eye can 
 reach, thousands being visible from an elevation of a few feet. On the 
 gulf marsh margin, from the Vermillion to the Colorado, they appear 
 barely visible, often flowing into one another, and only elevated a few 
 inches above the common level. A few miles interior they rise to two 
 and even four feet in height. The largest I ever saw were perhaps 
 one hundred and forty feet in diameter and five feet high. These 
 were in Western Louisiana ; some had abrupt sides, though they 
 are nearly all of gentle slopes." He further states that he "encount- 
 ered hundreds of these mounds between Galveston and Houston, and 
 between the Red river and Ouicita; that they were so numerous as to 
 forbid the supposition of their having been the foundations of human 
 habitations ; that the burrowing animals common to the region piled 
 up no such heaps ; and finally, that the winds, while capable of 
 accumulating loose materials, never distribute them in the manner 
 above mentioned." In conclusion he adds : " In utter desperation I cease 
 to trouble myself about their origin and call them inexplicable mounds. "^ 
 
 Fom all that can be learned about them, I see no reason to doubt that 
 they were erected for agricultural purposes, and have therefore pre- 
 sumed to name them Garden Moimds. 
 
 It would seem perfectly natural, in a sterile country, and where the in- 
 habitants had few materials for artificial fertilization, to gather into 
 
 > The Professor adds, that " there is ample testimony that the pine trees of the present 
 forests ante-date these mounds." What the testimony is he does not say. If they are the 
 work of the Indians, then we must believe them to have been vastly more numerous than 
 any other facts hitherto known would lead us to suppose. 
 
GAEDEN MOinsroS. 6T 
 
 heaps the thin vegetable mold uppu the surface, thus increasing its 
 richness and capacity for retaining moisture. But the question may be 
 as lied, why should the same practice be necessary in the. prairies and 
 bottom lands, the richness of which is proverbial and inexhaustible. 
 For the answer, we are not left to conjecture. 
 
 In the rich lowlands of the west, the chief difficulty is too much mois- 
 ture, especially in seasons of unusual rain-fall. This, the corn-raisers in 
 the American bottom know from repeated expierience. Hence, acres of 
 corn are often utterly ruined in such seasons, when planted upon low and 
 level fields which have not ample artificial or natural drainage : when, 
 had the earth been raised a few inches even in drills or mounds, such as 
 have been described, a good crop would have been secured. An intelli- 
 gent Iowa planter informed me that he had often seen this demonstrated 
 in corn-fields which were filled with these mounds. The low ground be- 
 tween them, if the 5-eason were unusually rainy, would yield no returns, 
 while upon the mounds themselves the crop would be excellent. From 
 these considerations, there can be but little doubt that the garden mounds 
 were raised for the better cultivation of maize, which was doubtless the 
 staple article of ancient husbandry. But we are not to suppose, however, 
 that this was the only kind of grain known to the pre-historic Americans j 
 for evidence is not wanting that, in some sections at least, they cultivated 
 wheat, and deposited it, along with those articles which were deemed 
 most precious, in the tombs of their loved ones. Thus — ^thanks to their 
 afiectibnate care in the disposition of the dead, — it has been preserved 
 for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years ; and, like the few small 
 grains in the hand of the Egyptian mummy, when brought forth to the 
 sunlight and moisture, has germinated and ripened, and furnished 
 us with a variety unknown before. 
 
 From an interesting account of certain mounds in Utah, communicated 
 by Mr. Amasa Potter to the Eureka Sentinel, of Nevada, as copied by 
 27*6 Western Review of Science and Industry, I make the following 
 extracts : 
 
 " The mounds are situated on what is known as the Payson Farm, 
 and are six in number, covering about twenty acres of ground. They 
 are from ten to eighteen feet in height, and from 500 to 1,000 feet 
 in circumference." "The explorations divulged no hidden treasure so far, 
 but have proved to us that there once undoubtedly existed here a more 
 enlightened race of human beings than that of the Indian who inhabited 
 this country, and whose records have been traced back hundreds of 
 years." " While engaged in excavating one of the larger mounds, we 
 
*8 AECH^OLOGT 
 
 discovered the feet of a large skeleton, and carefully removing the hard- 
 ened earth in which it was embedded, we succeeded in unearthing a large 
 skeleton without injury. The human framework measured six feet, six 
 inches in length, and from appearances it was undoubtedly that of a male. 
 Ill the right hand was a large iron or steel weapon, which had been buried 
 with the body, but which crumbled to pieces on handling. Near the 
 skeleton we also found pieces of cedar wood, cut in various fantastic 
 shapes, and in a state of perfect preservation ; the carving showing that 
 the people of this unknown race were acquainted with the use of edged 
 tools. We also found a large stone pipe, the stem of which was inserted 
 between the teeth of the skeleton. The bowl of the pipe weighs five 
 ounces, and is made of sandstone ; and the aperture for tobacco had the 
 appearance of having been drilled out." "We found another skeleton 
 near that of the above mentioned, which was not quite as large, and must 
 be that of a woman. There was a neatly carved tombstone near the 
 head of this skeleton. Close by, the floor was covered with a hard 
 cement, to all appearances a part of the solid rock, which, after patient 
 labor and exhaustive work, we succeeded in penetrating, and found it 
 was but the corner of a box, similarly constructed, in which we found 
 about three pints of wheat kernels, ipost of which was dissolved when 
 brought in contact with the air. A few of the kernels found in the 
 center of the heap looked bright, and retained their freshness on being 
 exposed. These were carefully preserved, and last spring planted and 
 grew nicely. We raised four and a half pounds of heads from these 
 grains. The wheat is unlike any other raised in this country, and pro- 
 duces a large yield. It is the club variety ; the heads are very long and 
 hold very large grains." " We find houses in all the mounds, the rooms 
 of which are as perfect as the day they were built. All the apartments 
 are nicely plastered, some in white, others in red color. Crockery ware, 
 cooking utensils, vases — many of a pattern similar to the present age — 
 are also found. Upon one large stone jug or vase can be traced a per- 
 fect delineation of the mountains near here for. a distance of twenty 
 miles. We have found several millstones used for grinding corn, and 
 plenty of charred corn-cobs, with kernels not unlike what we know as 
 yellow dent corn. We judge from our observations that those ancient 
 dwellers of our country followed agriculture for a livelihood, and had 
 many, of the arts and sciences known to us, as we found molds made of 
 clay for casting different implements, needles made of deer-horns, and 
 lasts made of stone, and which were in good shape. We also found 
 many trinkets, such as white stone beads and marbles as good as made 
 
THE UTAH MOUNDS. 69 
 
 now ; also small squares of polished stones resembling dominoes, but for 
 what use intended we cannot determine." / 
 
 The above account we see no reason to discredit, and can only wish 
 that the examinations had been more thorough and the account more 
 explicit as to dimensions of rooms and other details. From what is 
 stated, however, we conclude that tbe authors of these works could not 
 have belonged to the present Indian race, but were undoubtedly of the 
 mound-building people of the Mississippi Valley. It is, at least, a most 
 interesting • discovery, and they may belong to a series of structures 
 which shall yet reveal the history of their migrations. That there were 
 two if not three, distinct and widely separated southward movements, 
 in point of time, of the pre-historic race, has already been suggested; and 
 the Utah mounds may belong to that class which upon further investigaT 
 tion shall furnish the clue to one of the routes pursued, and lead to its 
 demonstration. Should the conjecture as to tlieir authorship be verified, 
 a new chapter of unusual interest in the history of the Mpund-builders 
 will be opened for our perusal ; and we may reasonably hope for much 
 valuable information concerning the character and extent of their agri- 
 culture, their esthetic taste, and their knowledge of the industrial arts ; 
 and we may find that, in most respects, their social condition was in no 
 wise inferior to that of Mexico and Peru. The wood-carving, plastered 
 and tinted walls, painted vases, and the presence of that most precious 
 of all cereals, wheat, are new and striking evidences of a higher social 
 state than we have hitherto thought possible, whose luxury and refine- 
 ment were but the presage of a nobler civilization which found its 
 realization and full development in Central and South America, or by 
 some dire calamity was overwhelmed and destroyed. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 Miscellaneous Works.— flfexoKiCAL or National Festival Mounds.— Stonb Struo 
 
 TURES.— KUINS on THE GASCONADE ElVER.— GROUP NEAR LOUISIANA, MO.— SOMB INDIANA 
 
 Eblics.— Crbmation Chambers.— Proofs of Architectural Knowledge.- Great 
 Canals Ante-dating thb Erie.— Ancient Counterparts of Modern Achievements. 
 —Our Southern " Bayous " of Artificial Origin. 
 
 The works to be described under the head of Historical, or National 
 Festival Mounds have already been noticed. A representation of one 
 of this class is given on page 30. (Fig. 9.) It consists of three 
 embankments placed in a triangular form, enclosing a central mound 
 which is also enclosed by a circle of small elevation. The ends of 
 the embankments do not meet, however, but narrow openings are 
 left at the lines of intersection, and in these openings are found small 
 truncated mounds. Sometimes, we are told,, the group is composed! 
 of two parallel walls, but oftener of three, in triangular position 
 as just described ; while some have been seen which had four embank- 
 ments arranged in the form of a square ; all, however, containing th© 
 central mound with its enclosing circle. 
 
 These groups have generally been thought to be defensive works. As 
 far as known, none have been seen south of Missouri, but it is said they 
 frequently occur in the States of Iowa, Wisconsin, Indiana, and some in 
 Illinois. In the latter two States the usual form is square, while in Iowa 
 and Missouri the triangular arrangement is most frequent. As the walls 
 are generally of no great height, they are among the first to be leveled 
 by the plough. But, of whatever form or size, there seems always to 
 have been obsei-ved in their construction a fixed rule in the relative size 
 of the several parts, whose uniformity invests them with an interest 
 peculiar to themselves. The group figured on page 30, though found in^ 
 Iowa, was selected for description because this form is said to have been 
 of most frequent occurrence in Missouri. 
 
 It will be remembered that the embankments which form the sides of 
 the triangle were each one hundred and forty-four feet in length, and 
 respectively three, four and five feet in height, and twelve feet in diame- 
 ter. The sum of the heights of the embankments is twelve feet, which 
 is the exact height of the central mound. These multiplied together 
 equal the length of the embankments — one hundred and forty-four feet. 
 In all which have been described, the same relation of the several parts 
 is observed. The embankments are always of equal length, but never 
 
HISTOEICAL OK NATIONAL FESTIVAL MOUNDS. 71 
 
 of the same height, while the sum of the heights — ^whether the group is 
 composed of three or four — always equals the height of the central 
 mound, and the product of both gives the length of the embankments. 
 The tradition concerning them is, that they were erected to perpetuate 
 the union of two or more tribes ; the number forming the compact is 
 recorded by the number of embankments, and their relative power by 
 the height of each. The circle in the center of the enclosure was known 
 as the festival circle, and the small mounds in the angles, or openings, 
 were matrimonial mounds. To these works the confederated tribes 
 made annual visits, to celebrate the event of their union with singing, 
 dancing and feasting, and a great variety of festive games, which were 
 performed within the enclosure. The national union thus celebrated was 
 further cemented on these occasions by intermarriages among the mem- 
 bers of the different tribes, which took place at the matrimonial mounds. 
 The central mound was known as the union mound, and on festival occa- 
 sions was occupied conjointly by the chiefs and prophets of each nation, 
 who presided during the celebration. Concerning the relative age of 
 this class of works nothing is known, and though the tradition above 
 given may be regarded as having no weight or importance, it is quite 
 clear that all conjecture concerning them is equally valueless. 
 
 The early writers upon the antiquities of Missouri make frequent men- 
 tion of the ruins of buildings which were constructed of unhewn stone, 
 and whose walls were said to have been built up with creditable skill and 
 strength, though without durable mortar, if indeed any were used. 
 
 Of this kind of structure, the examples are very rare east of the Mis- 
 sissippi. Whether any are now to be found in any good degree of preser- 
 vation is quite doubtful. I will present, therefore, such facts concerning 
 them as can be gleaned from the most trustworthy accounts of early 
 writers. The first to be noticed are thus described by Mr. Lewis C. 
 Beck, who, after speaking of the pine timber which abounded fifty or 
 sixty years ago along the Gasconade river, and the saw mills erected 
 upon its banks by which the lumber was prepared for the St. Louis 
 market, goes on to state that "near the saw mills, and at a short dis- 
 tance from the road leading from them to St. Louis, are the ruins of an 
 ancient town. It appears to have been regularly laid out, and the dimen- 
 sions of the squares, streets, and some of the houses can yet be discov- 
 ered. Stone walls are found in different parts of the area, which are 
 frequently covered by large heaps of earth. Again, a stone work exists, 
 as I am informed by Gen. Ashley, about ten miles below the mills. It 
 
72 AECH^OLOGY. 
 
 is on the west side of the Gasconade, and is about 25 or 30 feet square ; 
 and, although at present in a dilapidated condition, appears to have been 
 built with an uncommon degree of regularity. It is situated on a high 
 bald cliff, which commands a fine and extensive view of the country on 
 all sides. From this stone work is a small foot-path running a devious 
 course down the cliff to the entrance of a cave, in which was found a 
 quantity' of ashes. The mouth of the cave commands an easterly view. 
 
 " It would be useless at this time to hazard an opinion with regard to 
 the uses of this work, or the beings who erected it. In connection with 
 those of a similar kind which exist on the Mississippi, it forms an inter- 
 esting subject for speculation. They evidently form a distinct class of 
 ancient works, of which I have, as yet, seen no description." 
 
 Another group, described by the same author, was located about two 
 miles southwest of the town of Louisiana. " They are built of stone, with 
 great regularity, and their site is high and commanding, from which I am 
 led to infer that they were intended for places of defence. Works of a 
 similar kind are found on Buffalo creek, and on the Osage river. They 
 certainly form a class of antiquities entirely distinct from the walled 
 towns, fortifications, barrows, or mounds. The regularity of their form 
 and structure favors the conclusion that they were the work of a more 
 civilized race than those who erected the former — a race familiar with 
 the rules of architecture, and perhaps with a perfect system of warfare." 
 The description of those works located near Louisiana is accompanied 
 by a ground-plan or diagram made by the Rev. S. Giddings, a former 
 clergyman of St. Louis, of which Fig. 1 is an exact copy. 
 
 DESCRIPTION OP ACCOMPAilTING DIAGRAM. 
 
 a, b, 0, d, outer wall, 18 inches in thickness; length, 56 feet; breadth, 22 feet. The 
 walls are built of rough, unhewn stone, and appear to have been constructed with 
 remarkable regularity. 
 
 £ is a chamber three feet in width, which was no doubt arched the whole way, as 
 some part of the arch still remains. It is made in the manner represented at 3, and is 
 seldom more than five feet above the surface of the ground : but as it is filled with 
 rubbish it is impossible to say what was its original height. 
 
 Ji* is a chamber four feet wide, and in some places the remains of a similar arch still 
 remain. 
 
 © is a chamber 12 feet in width, at the extremity of which are the remains of a furnace. 
 
 jff is a large room with two entrances, I and K. It is covered with a thick growth of 
 trees. The walls are at present from two to five feet in height. One of the trees in the 
 work is two feet in diameter. 2 is a smaller work about 80 rods due east from the former. 
 
 A and C are two chambers without any apparent communication with S. 
 
 £ is a room nearly circular, with an entrance. 
 
 In the apartment &, human bones have been found. 
 
1. a 
 
 Fig. I. — Ancient Works near Louisiana, Mo. 
 
74 
 
 AKCH^OLOGY. 
 
 The stone edifices thus described seem to hare been peculiar to Mis- 
 souri alone, as I find no notices of existing similar works in any other 
 locality, unless those described by Mr. Brown in his Western Gazetteer 
 were such. Those were found near the town of Harrisonville, Franklin 
 Co., in the State of Indiana. They were located on the neighboring 
 hills, northeast of the town. The ruins of quite a number were observed, 
 all of which, it is stated, were built of rough, unhewn stone. The walls 
 were levelled nearly to the foundations, and covered with soil, brush and 
 full-grown trees. Mr. Brown informs us that " after clearing away the 
 earth, roots and rubbish from one of them, he found it to have been 
 anciently occupied as a dwelling. It was about twelve feet square. At 
 one end of the building was a regular hearth, on which were yet the 
 ashes and coals of the last fire its owners had ever enjoyed, for around 
 the hearth were the decayed skeletons of eight persons, of different ages, 
 from a small child to the head of a family. Their feet were all pointing 
 towards the hearth, which fact suggests the probability that they were 
 murdered while asleep." The bottom lands in this region are said to 
 have abounded in mounds similar to those described elsewhere, and con- 
 taining human bones, implements of stone, and a superior article of glazed 
 pottery. A skull taken from one of them was found pierced with a flint 
 arrow which was still sticking in the wound, and was about six inches 
 long. The stone dwellings described by Mr. Brown were evidently of 
 inferior construction to those of Missouri. The authors of the latter 
 showed no mean skill in architecture ; while the rough and ruder walls 
 of the Indiana structures, their diminutive size, along with the fact of 
 the whole family lying together on the floor, would indicate a social con- 
 dition but little removed from barbarism. Whether their builders 
 belonged to the race of the mounds in the valleys near, is not certain, 
 and the means of deciding the question are doubtless destroyed. 
 
 Upon a recent visit to the site of the works near Lousiana, Mo., 
 described by Mr. Beck, I found only a confused heap of stones, the walls 
 thrown down and the stones scattered in every direction. The view from 
 the summit of the hill where the building once stood Avas very extensive 
 and lovely. Mr. Levi Pettibone, now ninety-seven years of age, and 
 Mr. Edwin Draper, — ^both gentlemen having resided in the neigborhood 
 of the work for nearly half a century — confirmed the account given by 
 Mr. Beck, in every important particular.' 
 
 1 Mr. Stillman, the obliging and gentlemanly proprietor of the Laclede Hotel at Lou- 
 isiana, also gave me much valuable information. He stated that formerly there existed 
 
STONE STRUCTUEES. 75" 
 
 111 the Fiebruary number of the Western Revievi of the present year, 
 appears quite a lengthy article, by Judge E. P. West, containing an 
 account of the examination of several mounds near the Missouri river 
 which contained "buried chambers, or vaults, built of stone, compactly 
 and regularly laid." The stones, which are undressed on the inside, are 
 laid horizontally, and apparently have been selected with great care, the 
 walls presenting, when the earth is removed, a smooth inner face. The 
 chambers were generally of uniform size, being about eight and one half 
 feet square and four feet in height. Each had an opening, or doorway, 
 towards the south, two and a half feet in width. The walls were about 
 eighteen inches in width at the top, and five feet at the base. Some are 
 described as containing " a large quantity of burnt human and animal 
 bones, burnt clay, wood ashes and charred wood, all intermingled and 
 extending entirely over the floor, at one point to the depth of eight 
 inches." Judge West seems to favor the opinion that they were used for 
 dwellings, before the dead were interred in them. This was possibly the 
 case ; but the commingled mass of burnt bones, charred wood, and) 
 burnt clay to the depth of several inches, would point to funeral rites by 
 cremation. A house eight and a half feet square and four feet high 
 would be a very confined habitation for a family of ordinary size. It 
 seems more in consonance with the facts as stated to suppose them to 
 have been furnaces for consuming the dead b}' burning. The Judge 
 computes their age to be about two thousand years. Other and similar 
 structures have been described to me, and the localities of their sites 
 named, by respectable persons who claimed to have opened them^ of 
 much larger dimensions than any above described, and which are stated 
 to have contained large quantities of human bones and implements of 
 stone. One, I was told, contained a vault at least one hundred and fifty 
 feet in length, fifty feet wide and above twelve feet in height. Another, 
 
 upon his land, at a distance of about half a mile from the work described, a stone heap 
 of quite large dimensions, similar in its appearance to those noticed in a previous chap- 
 ter and conjectured to have been of Indian origin. Having occasion to use the stones 
 for the walls of a cistern, he caused them to be removed. At the bottom of the pile he 
 found a level floor, composed of flat stones of various sizes, but joined together, as he 
 expressed it, as closely and evenly as any mason could do it to-day. From these, and 
 similar facts, I am led to believe that possibly many of those which appear outwardly to 
 be simply piles of stones loosely thrown together, and which are to be counted by 
 thousands upon the hills in various parts of the State, may be the remains of the un- 
 cemented walls of ancient habitations. And this conviction receives additional strength 
 from the fact that recent explorations of many earthen mounds have disclosed a vault, 
 walled and arched with stone, — some of large dimensions,— with contents similar to 
 those of Utah. 
 
76 AKCttiEOLOGT. 
 
 much smaller, was beautifully arched with stone. At the time the nar- 
 rator saw it, it was cleared of the decayed skeletons and was used as a 
 dairy-house. The two just mentioned were in Missouri, and distant 
 from each other one hundred and fifty miles. Again the question recurs 
 Who built them ; and whence their architectural skill and knowledge? 
 
 Says Dr. Foster : " A broad chasm is to be spanned before we can 
 link the Mound Builders to the North American Indians." There are 
 some who attempt to do this, but the difficulties which beset the task are 
 insurmountable to those who have examined, with any degree of thorough- 
 ness, the evidences of the vastly superior civilization of the people who 
 erected the stone structures found in Missouri, to that of the North 
 American Indians, during any known period of their history ; and to 
 such, the belief that they were the authors of the multitudinous monu- 
 ments of the Missouri and Mississippi valleys, becomes altogether 
 improbable. But if all this is inconclusive of the proposition we main- 
 tain, what shall be said of the ancient canals, some of which still remain, 
 the indubitable evidences of an extended inland communication between 
 lakes, rivers and bayous, and also of an industry, enterprise and skill 
 which would be creditabe to the scientific engineers of our own times ? 
 In many of the great achievments of this age of ours we are only recov- 
 , ering the knowledge and wisdom of the long-forgotten past. 
 
 When Gov. Clinton, of New York, first proposed the construction of 
 the Erie Canal, the idea was greeted with scorn and derision ; and as the 
 work progressed it was characterized as " Clinton's Ditch," the opposers 
 of the scheme little dreaming that it was to become the great channel for 
 the commerce of the nation ; connecting, as it does, the great chain of 
 lakes in the far Northwest with thie Atlantic Ocean. And not until a 
 thousand freighted boats began to pour the rich treasures of the prairies 
 into the lap of the East, was the far-seeing wisdom of its projector fully 
 vindicated. Then men began to point to it with boasting congratulation, 
 as an evidence of the rapid and surprising progress which we of the 
 nineteenth century were achieving. But alas for human pride I we are 
 but slowly learning again what other nations, who lived in the morning 
 of the historic period, knew, and the world had long ago forgotten. 
 
 Again, when the French began the Suez Canal, " all the world won- 
 dered " at the grandeur of the enterprise. But they soon found that 
 they were only clearing out the sands of three or four thousand years' 
 accumulation from the old pathway of the commerce of the Pharaohs, 
 who had built the canal when Egypt was the storehouse of the nations. 
 These came through the canal to her door, in great ships laden with the 
 
SOUTHERN "BAYOUS" OF ABTIFICIAL OEIGrN-. 77 
 
 riches of the Orient, which they exchanged for corn, and then sailed 
 back from the Nile, and through the Red Sea to their homes again. 
 But at length the scepter departed from the throne of the Pharaohs ; the 
 temple colleges, to which the philosophers of Greece resorted for instruc- 
 tion six hundred years before Christ, were closed, and crumbled in decay 
 — the desert sands swept over their ruins ; the canal was filled and 
 forgotten through all the long dark ages. At length commerce revives, 
 and men begin to dig canals again, with vain-glorious pride. 
 
 It is with nations as with individuals who are taken with some deadly 
 disease, from which they barely escape with their lives. Though their 
 strength returns, their memory is utterly oblivious to all they have ever 
 learned from books, and so they must begin with the alphabet once more. 
 Nations have their deadly maladies from which few recover, and for those 
 which do, how long and unpromising js the tutilage of their second child- 
 hood. History is repeated here. The pre-historic people of Missouri 
 were not only great in populous towns, in their agriculture, in their huge 
 piles of earth and embankments and buildings of stone, but they, too, 
 were canal-builders. With surprising skill they developed a system of 
 internal navigation, so connecting the lakes and bayous of the southern 
 interior of the State, that the products of the soil found a ready outlet 
 to the great river. The remains of these artificial water-courses have 
 been frequently alluded to by travelers who have seen them, but never 
 thoroughly explored. Dr. G. C. Swallow, while at the head of the 
 Geological Survey, called attention to them, and described one which was 
 "fifty feet wide and twelve feet deep." For the fullest description of 
 this class of works, I am indebted to Geo. W. Carleton, Esq., of 
 Gayoso ; who, in response to a note of enquiry, — in addition to many 
 interesting facts concerning a great number of ancient structures in 
 Pemiscot County, — kindly furnished the following account, which I give 
 in his own words : 
 
 "Besides our Mounds, we can boast of ancient canals. Col. John H. 
 Walker informed me that before the earthquakes, these canals — ^we call 
 them bayous now — showed very plainly their airtificial origin. Since the 
 country has become settled, the land cleared up, the embankments along 
 those water courses have been considerably leveled down. One of these 
 canals is just east of the town of Gayoso. It now connects the flats of 
 Bier Lake with the Mississippi river. Before the bank crumbled ofi", 
 taking in Pemiscot bayou, it connected this bayou with the waters of Big 
 Lake. Another stream, that Col. Walker contended was artificial, is 
 what we now call Cypress Bend Bayou. He said that it was cut so as to 
 
"78 A11CIL3E0L0GY. 
 
 ■connect the waters of Cushion Lake with a bayou running into Big Lake. 
 Cushion Lake lies in the northern part of Pemiscot county. The canal 
 'was cut from the flats of the lake on the south side, about three miles 
 into Big Lake bayou. By this chain of canals, lakes and bayous, these 
 . :ancieut mound-builders and c;anal-diggers could have an inland naviga- 
 tion from the Mississippi river at Gayoso, into and through Big Lake 
 bayou and the canal into Cushion Lake, through Cushion Lake and a 
 bayou into Collins Lake or the open bay, thence north through a lake 
 and bayou some eight miles, where another canal tapped this water course 
 and run east into the Mississippi river again, some five miles below the 
 town of IS'ew Madrid. Col. Walker, in referring to these water-courses, 
 spoke of them only as canals. They show even now a huge bank of 
 earth, such as would be made by an excavation, on the side opposite to 
 the river, so that in case of overflow the water from the river would not 
 wash the excavated dirt back into the canal." ^ 
 
 Although in the foregoing account the present depth and width are not 
 ^iven, from it and from the reports of others, there can be no doubt that 
 the ancient inhabitants had constructed with a skill which would do no 
 discredit to our own engineers, a system of connecting canals which 
 must have been necessitated by an extended internal trade, and which 
 required boats of respectable dimensions. The evidences of work of 
 such magnitude as canals, widen the "broad chasm" which is to be 
 spanned before we can link the Mound-builders to the North American 
 Indians, until it becomes an impassable gulf. 
 
 ' In reply to a subsequent note of inquiry as to the length of this water-course, in- 
 ■cluding canal and bayou, Mr. Carlton estimates it to be about seventy mUes. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 Pottery.— Superiority of Pre-Historic American Wares over Those of Europe.— 
 Imitations of Living Objects.— The Materials Used.— Reliquaries.- Skulls En- 
 closed IN Earthen Vessels.— Bowls with Ornamental Heads. — Probabilities 
 of Higher Art Among the Ancients. 
 
 The number of vessels of pottery which have been taken from the 
 mounds in Missouri is prodigious, and almost endless in variety. In an 
 instance which fell under my own observation, nearly, if not quite, one 
 thousand pieces were obtained from a single burial mound ; and these 
 were of various sizes and great diversity of form and workmanship. 
 Some of the most characteristic ex- 
 amples will be presented as we pro- 
 ceed. The skill displayed by the 
 pre-historic Americans in everything 
 they manufactured from common clay 
 is vastly superior to that of the 
 ancient civilizations of Europe, to 
 which, in other respects many strik- 
 ing similarities may be traced. 
 
 From the fact that few articles 
 which are the products of human 
 ingenuity and skill are more enduring 
 than earthen-ware, this class of anti- 
 quities, to the archaeologist, is very 
 interesting and instructive. The skill 
 and taste displayed in its various im- 
 itative forms, in outline and deco- Fig. i. 
 ration, give us an insight into some 
 
 phases of the domestic life, social condition and sesthetic taste of ancient 
 peoples, which can be derived from no other source. Fragments of 
 pottery, to the archaeologist, therefore, are the imperishable leaves of a 
 book, inscribed by the truthful hand of humanity, in legible characters, 
 with the precious records of those feelings and tender sentiments which 
 are recorded nowhere else, and which need no translation. Their value 
 is enhanced so much the more by the fact that we possess specimens of 
 these records from every quarter of the globe, and coeval with the remotest 
 civilizations. 
 
80 
 
 AKCH.EOLOGY. 
 
 Fie. 2. 
 
 The successful attempts of the ancient Americans to imitate the forms 
 
 of beasts and birds, which they saw every day around them, evince a 
 
 contemplation, observation and affectionate communion with nature which 
 
 fills us with surprise. 
 
 The drinking vessel molded into the 
 
 form of an owl, a representation of 
 
 which is given in Fig. I, seems, by 
 
 its frequent occurrence in the mounds, 
 
 to have been a favorite model. The 
 
 most common form is the universal 
 
 gourd-shaped water jug (Fig. 2). 
 
 These are of various sizes, the largest 
 
 being from eight to ten inches high, 
 
 and the largest diameter not exceeding 
 
 eiojht inches. Sometimes the body of 
 
 the jug is more globular on the top 
 
 than this figure shows. Fig. 8 presents 
 
 a form of water jug which, as far as 
 
 my own observation extends, is much 
 
 more rare than the preceeding. The engraving was made some years 
 
 ago ; I have since seen a sufficient number to prove that the reconstruction 
 
 of the neck is correct. From the greater size of the neck I am led to 
 
 believe that it was an ordinary drinking-vessel ; while the form repre- 
 sented in Fig. 2 is more properly that of a 
 water-cooler, which, when filled, was hungup 
 until the water was reduced in temperature 
 by its slow evaporation through the poi-es 
 of the vessel, after the manner of the in- 
 habitants of the American tropics at the 
 present time. 
 
 In reference to the superiority of the skill 
 displayed by the Mound-builders in the ce- 
 ramic arts, to the corresponding civilization 
 of ancient Europe, I can not do better than 
 quote the words of Dr. Foster. ^ 
 
 " In the plastic arts, the Mound-builders 
 
 attained a perfection far in advance of any 
 
 samples which had been found characteristic 
 
 and even the Bronze Age of Europe. We can readily 
 
 of the Stone, 
 
 • Pre-historlc Races of the United States, p. 236. 
 
POTTERY. 81 
 
 conceive that, in the absence of metallic vessels, pottery would be em- 
 ployed as a substitute, and the potter's art would be held in the highest 
 esteem. From making useful forms, it would be natural to advance to 
 the ornamental. Sir John Lubbock remarks that ' few of the British 
 sepulchral urns, belonging to the ante-Roman times, have upon them 
 any curved lines. Representations of animals and plants are almost entirely 
 wanting.' They are even absent from all the articles belonging to the 
 Bronze Age in Switzerland, and I might almost say in Western Europe 
 generally, while ornaments of curved and spiral lines are eminently char- 
 acteristic of this period. The ornamental ideas of the Stone Age, on 
 the other hand, are confined, so far as we know, to compositions of 
 straight lines, and the idea of a curve scarcely seems to have occurred to 
 them. The most elegant ornaments on their vases are impressions 
 made by the finger-nail, or by a cord wound round the soft clay." 
 , " The commonest forms of the Mound-builders' pottery represent kettles, 
 cups, wflter-jugs, pipes, vases, etc. Not content with plain surfaces, they 
 frequently ornamented their surfaces with curved lines and fret-work. 
 They even went farther, and moulded images of birds, quadrupeds, 
 and of the human form. The clay, except for their ordinary kettles, 
 where coarse gravel is often intermixed, is finely-tempered, so that it 
 did not warp or crack in baking, — ^the utensils, when completed, having a 
 yellowish or grayish tint." 
 
 In the group of vessels shown in Fig. 4, while the human faces and 
 heads of birds are crudely expressed, we find much to admire in the 
 tasteful forms of the birds themselves. The flow of their outline, so to 
 speak, evinces a degree of refinement of feeling which could only result 
 from a culture of the sense for beauty, which must have required a long 
 time for its realization. It will be noticed that the mouths or openings 
 were, on all, made at the back side of the head. This seems to have 
 been the uniform practice, whether the head of the vessel was that of 
 man, beast or bird. Sometimes the vessels with vertical openings, as 
 of h and I, are fitted with covers of the same material, with projecting 
 knobs on the top for handling them. Sometimes, again, the smaller jugs, 
 or bottles as they should be called, have nicely-adjusted stoppers, as 
 shown at i. These latter bottles are made of much finer material, and 
 while they are generally quite thin, they are so well baked that they 
 seem to be almost as tough and strong as our own ware. On page 23 
 of the Eighth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Peabody Museum, 
 a representation of two of these stoppers is given ; one of which is the 
 same as shown at i (Fig. 4). They are described as "two articles 
 6 
 
Flg,_4 Varieties of Drinkine; Vessels 
 
 from Southeast Missouri, a and b Front and Back View of same Vessel, i Small Bottle and Stopper. 
 
POTTERY. 
 
 83 
 
 carved from a hard clay slate and carefully smoothed. Their use is 
 problematical, but they so closely resemble lip ornaments as to suggest 
 tliat they were such." These are now in the " Swallow Collection '' of 
 the mu.«!eum. In its transportation from Missouri to Massachusetts, the 
 report informs us, many of the articles were so broken as to make their 
 reconstruction impossil^le. When I had the jjleasure of examining this 
 collection, some 3'ears since, these stoppers were then attached to the 
 bottles with which they were found. The smaller bottle of the two, 
 Professor Swallow informed me, when taken from the mound, contained 
 a red liquid. 
 
 Some, of the representations of the human figure are executed with a 
 good degree of fidelity to nature, through all the members ; showing 
 that the artist had studied carefully his model, and had evidently labored 
 to tell the truth as he saw it. Some of the human figures have an ex- 
 pression so striking and individual that we can hardly believe that they 
 
 are not portraits. This becomes more prob- 
 able when we examine the animal represent- 
 ations, or rather the heads of birds, with 
 which the pottery is very often ornamented ; 
 particularly those of the different varieties 
 of ducks, in which we observe in the shape 
 of the head, line of neck, etc., the nicest 
 distinctions in particular varieties, which are 
 expressed with remarkal)le skill. This will 
 be apparent when we come to the consider- 
 ation of Food Vessels. 
 
 In the annexed group (Fig. 5) are four 
 varieties. In one, the head of the horned owl 
 is skillfully joined to the body of the vessel. 
 Another form of jug, which is of less frequent 
 occurrence than the gourd-shape, is, as 
 shown in the cut, supported by four and sometimes three hollow bulbous 
 lee's. The two human figures are coarsely executed, exceiDt the heads. 
 They usually represent a hump-backed female figure in a sitting position, 
 and the leo-s, when they are suggested, bent under the body, with arms 
 resting upon the knees. They are simple water-jugs, having the mouth 
 alwaj^s in the occipital region of the head. Occasionally one is met with 
 which is grossly indelicate. The vessels representing the human figure 
 vary much in size. Some are so small that their capacity is not greater 
 than two fluid ounces. The larger are from four to ten inches in height 
 
 Fig. 5. 
 
84 
 
 AECBL^OLOGY. 
 
 and hold from one to four pints. This is, however, a proximate esti- 
 mate, but can not be far wrong. 
 
 Some of the smaller images nre, of all that I have seen, altogether the 
 mo^t artistic and expressive. They have been by some supposed to be 
 idols, but there is no evidence whatever, that I have seen, which favors this 
 supposition. They all have au orifice through which the cavities could 
 be filled, which is constructed precisely like the commonest jugs ; while 
 their relative pf)sition in the mounds, in companionship with other ves- 
 sels, is conclusive to my own mind that they were used as receptacles of 
 some precious articles of domestic use ; such as medicines, ointments, and 
 the like. And again, there is very 
 little in all we know concerning this 
 poeple that would favor the idea 
 that they had any idols, unless it 
 ma}' have been symbolic represent- 
 ations of the heavenly bodies, 
 which we know were the chief 
 objects of their worship. In ad- 
 dition to all this, they made images 
 of beasts, as we shall see, which 
 were unquestioiiably humorous car- 
 icatures. 
 
 The most elegant and artistic specimens of pottery which have been 
 taken from the mounds in Missouri were quite recently discovered. 
 Some vessels now in the museum of the St. Louis Academy of Science 
 are very suggestive of the pottery of Ancient Egypt, and indeed, in their 
 decorative forms, and coloring of black, red and white tigures, are not 
 greatly inferior to Etruscan art.i 
 
 The material of these articles is much finer than that of the common 
 ware, which in the larger vessels, having a capacity of several gallons, is 
 generally mixed with sand, and the medium sizes with pounded shells ; 
 while the finest seems to be composed of a light-colored, very fine- 
 grained, yellowish clay — perhaps mixed with gypsum. The different 
 vai-ieties of ware, the different materials of which they are composed, 
 and the diversity of tastes displayed in their decoration, would " suggest 
 a division of labor" among several classes of skilled artisans and artists. 
 
 Fig. 6. Two Views. 
 
 1 The St. Louis Academy of Science, under the supervision of the Archaeological 
 Section, will soon publish a series of plates of these decorated jugs and vases, drawn 
 on stone and printed in fac simile colors, with descriptive text by F. F. Hilder. 
 
POITEKY. 
 
 85 
 
 This was probably the case ; for, as is well known, however common the 
 articles manufiictured may be as to their uses, in everything which 
 comes from the hand of the skillful there is a finish or refinement of 
 treatment which is never seen in the work of the unpracticed hand. The 
 annexed engraving (Fig. 7) represents a jug, about 
 nine inches in height, of a light yellowish color, orna- 
 mented around the neck with red and black lines, and 
 around its greatest diameter with curved lines in red, 
 white and black. It is very symmetrical in form, with 
 a bottom sufficiently flat to cause it to stand firmly. 
 I have exhumed one similar in shape and color,, but 
 diffei-ently ornamented. Around the largest circumfer- 
 ence were six red circles ; close to these, and on the inside, 
 are white circles. Within these again, is a red circle, and in each of the 
 spaces thus enclosed by the circles, is a white cross with arms of equal 
 
 Fig. 7. 
 
 Fig. 8. 
 
 length. The stripes are about three-tenths of an inch in width. This 
 combination of color and form has a striking and not unpleasing efi'ect. 
 The knowledge and feeling evinced by the combination and contrast of 
 
86 AUCH^OLOGY. 
 
 angles and circles, in colors, is certainly quite remarkable. The colors 
 of the stripes were mixed with some sort of article which preserved them, 
 and gave them a lustrous or varnished appearance, which they still to 
 some degree retain. 
 
 In the next groujj (Fig- 8) are presented a few of the endless forms 
 of the more common utensils. Thej^ are interesting as showing the 
 constant and active presence of the inclination to beantify whatever 
 vessel they manufactured. There are very few that are not ornamented 
 in some manner. Some liave the edges indented or dotted, as with the 
 point of a stick or the finger-nail, while otlieis have the rim slightly 
 enlarged and marked with a spiral line, which gives the edge a beaded 
 appearance. Some of these bowls and pans have a very familiar look as 
 to their form. 
 
 This class of pottery, as well as the ordi- 
 nary jugs, are usually of dark gray and well 
 baked, the clay, as before stated, having been 
 tempered with pounded shells. 
 
 In a previous chapter, describing the mode 
 of burial in one of the mounds near West 
 Lake, it was stated that with the skeletons 
 were usually found two or three vessels, one 
 
 Fig, 9 
 
 or two jugs near the head, and a food-vessel 
 
 in the bend of the arms, which were folded across the breast. The 
 forms of food-vessels here presented are those most frequently found 
 in that position. In some of them I have observed a very small pot, 
 not much larger than a hen's egg : in some instances containing a 
 bone. In others carbonized fruit, resembling wild grapes, has been found ; 
 in others, again, the soft remains of muscle shells, thoroughly decayed. 
 The jugs and bowls which were interred with the corpse, no doubt, con- 
 tained food and drink, for the purpose of sustaining the traveler during^ 
 the long journey he was supposed to have entered upon. These pots 
 suggest many interesting reflections concerning their faith and notions 
 of a future life. 
 
 The forms represented in the preceding group are the simplest of all 
 but not more frequent than those which are much more ornamental. 
 Vessels in the form of the muscle-shell, and holding fully one pint, are 
 by no means unfrequent ; and again a fish or frog will be used as a 
 model. The two presented in Fig. 9 are quite common. Sometimes 
 the legs and feet of the frog are well defined, but folded along the sides 
 of the body. Usually, when 'a fish is represented, it is done by simply 
 
POTTERY. 
 
 87 
 
 moulding the head, tail and fins upon the side of the dish, but occasion- 
 ally the exact form of the fish is represented, scales and all. In such 
 cases, the orifice is in the side, and furnished with a tube which projects 
 ail inch or two, forconvenience in use as a drinking- vessel. In one in- 
 stance, which came nnder my notice, the body of a man h'ing nj)on the 
 back was represented, with legs and arms rudely made oul, and the tube 
 projecting from the stomach. 
 
 Fig. 10. Cooking Vessels. 
 
 Their imitative faculties, as illustrated in their pottery, were ccrtiiinly 
 remarkable, and to give an adequate idea of the variety of their work in 
 the suljjects which might be chosen for illustration would require more 
 space than is allotted to this essay. We proceed, therefore, to consider 
 their cooking utensils. Some of the more frequent forms are gi-ouped 
 together in Fig. 10. 
 
88 ABCILEOLOGY. 
 
 "While these vessels were doubtless for common, every-day use, some 
 of them are really quite artistic and graceful. The three larger ones 
 (a, b, c) are particularly so. The forms and ornamentation of the others 
 seem to be more experimental, and perhaps transitional, as though the 
 maker varied a little from his usual manner just to see how they would 
 look. The one at g, however, is a much bolder innovation, and is 
 finished as there shown, with six hemispheroidal projections. It will 
 be observed that all have two or more handles, by which they were 
 probably suspended over the fire by passing through them green twigs , 
 
 which they covered with moist clay to 
 prevent them from burning. Examples 
 might be multiplied, ad infinitum almost, 
 of this class of vessels, but the above are 
 sufficient to illustrate the inventive powers 
 of their aiithors in this direction, as well 
 as their constant striving to gratify their 
 sesthetic feeling in the manufacture of those 
 fragile articles which were designed for 
 the commonest uses. 
 
 Fig. 11 represents a pot very similar to 
 a, of the pi'eceding group, but entirely 
 unique in this, that it contained the upper 
 portion of a human skull and one vertebra. It was taken from a mound 
 near New Madrid, by Prof. Swallow, who tells us that the vessel must 
 have been moulded around the skull, as it could not be removed without 
 breaking the pot. It is now in the Peabody Museum. The top of the 
 skull is shown in the engraving. This is certainly a curiosity. Nothing 
 like it has been found in any other burial mound here or anywhere else, 
 as far as known. 
 
 It may be remembered, however, in this connection, as before re- 
 marked, that small pots have frequently been found in the larger pans, 
 and which contained a decayed shell or fragment of bone. These were, 
 very likely, valued relics or charms which were buried with their pos- 
 sessor. 
 
 In Herbert Spencer's "Principles of Sociology, "^ in the chapter upon 
 Idol-Worship and Fetich-Worship, the following interesting statements 
 occur, which seem quite pertinent in this C(mnection : 
 
 "Facts, already named, show how sacrifices to the man recently dead 
 
 1 Popular Science Monthly for December, 1S75, p. 158. 
 
POTTERY. 89 
 
 pass into sacrifices to his preserved body. We have seen that to the 
 corpse of a Tahitian chief daily offerings were made on an altar by a 
 •priest; and the ancient Central Americans performed kindred rites before 
 bodies dried by artificial heat. That, along with a developed system of 
 embalming, this grew into mummy-worship, Peruvians and Egyptians 
 have furnished proof. 
 
 " Here the thing to be observed is that, while believing the ghost of the 
 dead man to have gone away, these peoples had confused notions, either 
 that it was present in the mummy, or that the mummy was itself con- 
 scious. Among the Egyptians, this was clearly implied by the practice 
 of sometimes placing their embalmed, dead at table. The Peruvians, 
 who by a parallel custom betrayed a like belief, also betrayed it in other 
 ways. By some of them the dried corpse of a parent was carried round 
 the fields that he might see the state of the crops. 
 
 " How the ancestor, thus recognized as present, was also recognized as 
 exercising authority, we see in the story given by Santa Cruz. When 
 his second sister refused to marry him, ' Huayna Gapac went with;pres- 
 ents and offerings to the body of his father, praying him to give her for 
 his wife, but the dead body gave no answer, while fearful signs appeared 
 in the heavens.' 
 
 " The primitive idea that any property characterizing an aggregate inheres 
 in all parts of it, implies a corollary from this belief. The soul, present 
 in the body of a dead man preserved entire, is also, present in preserved 
 parts of his body. Hence the faith in relics. Ellis tells us that, in the 
 Sandwich Islands, bones of the legs, arms, and sometimes the skulls, of 
 kings and principal chiefs, are carried about by their descendants, under 
 the belief that the spirits exercise guardianship over them. The Crees 
 carry bones and hair of dead persons about for three years. The Caribs, 
 and several Guiana tribes, have their cleaned bones distributed among the 
 relatives after death. The Tasmanians show ' anxiety to possess them- 
 elves of a bone from the skull or the arms of their deceased relatives.' 
 The Adamanese ' widows may be seen with the skulls of their deceased 
 partners suspended from their necks.' This belief in the power of relics 
 leads in some cases to direct worship of them. Erskine tells us that the 
 natives of Lifu, Loyalty Islands, who 'invoked the spirits of their 
 departed chiefs,' also 'preserve relics of their dead, such as a finger 
 nail, a tooth, a tuft of hair, and pay divine homage to it.' Of the New 
 Caledonians, Turner says: 'In cases of sickness, and other calamities, 
 they present offerings of food to the skulls of the departed.' Moreover 
 we have the evidence furnished by conversation with the relic. Landei: 
 
90 
 
 ARCIL^OLOGY. 
 
 says : ' In the private fetich hut of the King Aclolee at Badagry, the 
 skull of that monarch's father is preserved in a day vessel placed in the 
 earth.' He 'gently rebukes it if his success does not happen to answer 
 Ills expectations.' 
 
 Bowls With Ornamental Heads. 
 
 " Similary, Catlin describes the Mandans as placing the skulls of their 
 dead in a circle. Each wife knows the skull of her former husband or 
 
POTTEBY. 91 
 
 child, ' and there seldom passes a day that sne does not visit it, with a 
 dish of the best cooked food. There is scarely an hour in a pleasant 
 day, but more or less of these women may be seen silting or lying by 
 the sknll of their child or husband, talking to it in the most pleasant and 
 endearing langnage that they can use (as they were wont to do in former 
 days) and seemingly getting an answer back.' 
 
 "Thus propitiation of the man just dead leads to propitiation of his 
 preserved body or a preserved part of it; and the ghost is supposed to 
 be present in the part as in the whole." 
 
 From the foregoing remai-ks and array of facts presented by Mr. 
 Spencer, there can be but little doubt that the presence of the skull in 
 the earthen vessel from the New Madrid mound is due to a belief in the 
 presence of the soul in the relics of the departed, and which seems to- 
 have been a common belief among many savage and uncivilized nations. 
 
 In the next group (Fig. 12) are presented a few of the most com- 
 mon varieties of another and quite distinct class of bowls. They are 
 peculiar in this : the bodies of the vessels are entirely devoid of orna- 
 mentation. From the edge of the lip on one side projects a small handle : 
 on the opposite side is moulded the head of some beast or bird, and quite 
 often a human head is represented. 
 
 The thing to be specially noticed is the diversity of form in the heads- 
 of the ducks. So faithfully are the distiitctive features of the diiferent 
 varieties delineated, that those at all familiar with them must believe that 
 the artist, according to the best of his skill, conscientiously copied 
 nature. The beautiful curve of the neck, and its union with the outline 
 of the vessel itself, could not possibly have been accidental. 
 
 The best which these ancient workmen could do is so far inferior to the 
 ai't of our own times, that it is not easy for us to appreciate the difficulties 
 they must have overcome, their many failures, the long time necessary for 
 the acquisition of those habits of observation, and the development of 
 the skill of hand sufficient to enable them to express themselves as cred- 
 itably as they have done in all their imitative work. In the class of ves- 
 sels under consideration, examples decorated with the human head and 
 features are by no means rare. If the credit given them for conscien- 
 tious observation of nature, and skill in expression of what they saw, is 
 not an over-estimate, then we may believe that, in their delineation of the 
 human face, they also copied nature with a sufficient degree of accuracy 
 to warrant us in the idea that in their work we have at least character- 
 istic likenesses of themselves. In the examples presented, in Fig. 13, 
 there is wanting that refinement of feeling and realistic portraiture which 
 
92 
 
 AKCH^OLOGY. 
 
 are displa3'ecl in the preceding representations of animal heads ; but still 
 sufficient individuality to make them very interesting, and, as before re- 
 marked, to impress us with the belief that they too were copied from 
 life. 
 
 In the examples thus far given of the pottery of the Missouri Mound- 
 builders, the aim has been 
 to show the leading varieties 
 and mode of decoration. 
 The subject is by no means 
 exhausted ; in fact, almost 
 every mound opened discloses 
 some new variety, audi have 
 seen many other specimens 
 of their ware entirely dif- 
 ferent in form — some of them 
 are beautifully decorated — 
 but which are now scattered 
 among private collections, 
 and therefore not available 
 for illustration here. There 
 is one other curious form of 
 :^ drinkiiia; vessel which should 
 be noticed. It has elicited 
 much speculation as to what 
 it was intended to represent. 
 Several of this variety have been found in the Missouri mounds, unmis- 
 takably representing the same animal, but no two alike. The general 
 figure of this "what is it" is shown in the engraving. It has four clumsy 
 legs, a thick body, the usual drinking neck projecting 
 from the hack, and a swinish hcnd. Sometimes they 
 are made of very fine and finely-tempered yellowish 
 clay, — the larger ones of the usual material of the dark 
 gray ware, with a capacity of from one to two pints. 
 The light-colored and finer ones are decorated with 
 scroll-work made out with red and white lines. Some 
 of the lax'ger ones have human faces moulded upon the sides of the 
 body, midway between the legs. In some instances the head proper 
 has the eyes of a human face and the snout turned up to such an 
 extent as to completely obstruct the front line of vision, which, with 
 its half-human expression, make it very grotesque. If the hog were 
 
 Fig. 13. Bowls With Human Heads. 
 
 Fig. 14. 
 
POTTERY. 93 
 
 indigenous to America, it would at once be pronounced a represen- 
 tation of tliat animal. The nearest approach to it which is native here, 
 is the peccary, or Mexican hog, hut that has no tail, while on one 
 example of this figure a tail was well represented ; and as it would have 
 been too easily broken in the natural position it was curled up on the 
 hip. Some have pronounced it the hippopotamus. To my own e3'e it 
 is intensely hoggish. But whatever was intended to be rejDresented by 
 it, — hog or hippopotamus, — it introduces a disturbing factor into the 
 question of chronology which may require some time to adjust ; unless 
 we can credit La Ves-a's statement in his Iloval Commentaries of Peru, 
 that the ancient Peruvians who dwelt in the mountains had ho^s similar 
 to those which the Spaniards introduced. Again, if the model after 
 which these were moulded was the common hog, which was introduced 
 by the first white settlers in this region, why is it that they took no 
 notice of any other animal or bird which the earliest settlers brought 
 with them, or why do we not find in companionship in the mounds some 
 other human vestigia of European origin? For the present we can only 
 state the facts, with the questions which they suggest, and wait for further 
 developments. 
 
 Writers upon American archaeology have been able to find no evidence 
 that the Mound-builders knew anything about the use of the potter's 
 wheel ; but it is difficult to believe that some of the finest of their work 
 could have been so gracefully and symmetrically moulded by ordinary 
 manipulation, and without some mechanical appliances 
 and adjustments, by which a uniformity of action and 
 pressure would be brought to bear upon the whole 
 mass. Without discussing the question, however, I 
 desire simply to call attention to two discoveries, which 
 at first sight may seem unimportant, but after all may 
 have some value, should they stimulate further and 
 more careful observation in this direction. The first '^' 
 
 is represented in the engraving. Fig. 15, and was taken from a New 
 Madrid mound by Prof. Swallow. "It is one-half of a rough ball of 
 burnt clay, about 3.5 inches in diameter, and shows the impression of 
 the skin and finger-marks of the hands that moulded it. This mass was 
 perforated through the center, as shown in the figure giving a section of 
 it."^ It had perhaps been designed to be fashioned into a vessel of some 
 
 1 Eighth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Peabody Museum. 
 
94 ARCHAEOLOGY. 
 
 sort, l)iit hy some means burnt before the design was carried out. The 
 perforation would suggest that it had V)een attached to a stick or spindle 
 for convenience in handling. Tlie other article is much more suggestive. 
 It belongs to that class of implements usually denominated spindle- whorls. 
 They are found scattered over the whole country, at least wherever the 
 principal woi'ks of the Mound-builders are to be seen. This was taken 
 from a mound about eighteen miles from New Madrid. When I attempted 
 to wash it, I discovered that it had not been hardened in the fire, but 
 only sun-dried, as it fell into fragments under 
 the action of the water. With great care, these 
 were collected and glued too-cther again. It is 
 about 2.5 inches in diameter, and three-fourths 
 of an inch in thickness at the periphery. Both 
 sides are concave. The most interesting fact about 
 it is this : It has around the outer edge a rudi- 
 mentary groove, as represented in the engraving. 
 Fig. 16. I can only wish the groove had been 
 deeper. But as it was unburnt, 1 am led to be- 
 lieve that the article was unfinished ; and that 
 had it been, it would have furnished some evidence that the maker was 
 not unacquainted with the use of the pulley, or potter's wheel. 
 
 The necessitjr fur condensation demands that here our consideration of 
 this part of our subject should end. The variety and beauty of many of 
 the olyjects of their fictile skill are very suggestive, and furnish much 
 material for extended generalization. But a remark or two must suffice 
 in this connection. To suppose that all this taste and feeling — this close 
 observation of nature and fidelity in delineation, displayed in the pottery 
 of the Mound-builders, found no expression in any other direction, and 
 was expended upon their domestic utensils alone, is simply incredible. 
 Very different must have been the homes of a people furnished with 
 such tasteful articles, from those miserable huts which the nomadic 
 Indians constructed for their habitations ; and it is quite likely that in 
 their dress as well as their dwellings they evinced the same ideas of taste 
 and convenience which we perceive in their domestic utensils. In some 
 of their human effigies we do find the manner of arranoin£r the hair dis- 
 tinctly delineated, and we may yet discover those which shall furnish us 
 with correct representations of their mode of dress. Indeed I have seen 
 one vessel with figures of men riidely painted in outline upon its sides, 
 who were clad iu a flowing garment, gathered by a belt around the 
 waist, and reaching to the knees. In this connection I ma}' mention the 
 
ENGRAVED SHELLS. 95 
 
 engraved shells which have frequently been found with skeletons, both 
 in Missouri and Illinois. One of the most interesting is represented 
 in Fig. 17,1 which gives also the natural size. When taken from the 
 inound, the shell was quite soft and brittle, and easily cut vrith the finger- 
 
 i[r*^-:i-- 
 
 
 V 
 
 ^.^ 
 
 ->l 
 
 ■^N. 
 
 
 \ 
 
 
 , *-, V**^ 
 
 1 » 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 ' ,1 " 
 
 'v> 
 
 ^.'■; 
 
 ^r. ,, 
 
 
 — 1 — ■•- 
 
 ■s^- 
 
 t 
 
 /' 
 
 Fig. 17. 
 
 nail. The outer edge was much broken or worn away, as shown in the 
 engraving. The design was enclosed by six circular lines, portions of 
 which still remain. On one side were two perforations, designed doubtless 
 for the string by which it was suspended from the neck. All similar 
 shells that I have seen are so perforated. It seems quite evident from 
 the picture that it memorializes the victory of the individual represented 
 as standing over an enemy who lies on his face at his feet. The victor, 
 
 1 For the photograph of which this is an accurate copy, I am indebted to the late 
 Captain Whitley. 
 
96 
 
 AKCH^OLOGY. 
 
 it will be observed, holds in his right hand a weajpbn or symbol of^ 
 authority, with which he seems to be pressing the prostrate figure to the 
 earth. Many of the accessories are unintelligible. While the .whole: 
 work is very crude, and the figures out of all proportion, there is here 
 and there an outline which shows earnest endeavor ; as the leg of the 
 standing figure, for example, in which also the action is so well expi'essed 
 as to suggest that, by an impetuous onset, he has just felled his antago- 
 nist to the ground. The artist seems to have had most difficulty with the 
 eye, or rather, has made no attempt at imitating that organ. 
 
 There is now in the museum of the St. Louis Academy of Science a 
 similar shell, upon which is portrayed, in a creditable manner, the figure 
 of a spider. I have also been shown another by Dr. Bichardson, from 
 a mobnd in Illinois, almost precisely like it, and differing only in a small 
 symbolic device, which is carved upon the back of each. Engraved 
 shells are generally found upon the breast of the skeleton, or in such 
 a position as shows that they were originally placed there, and also 
 where they were probably worn during life. According to Mr. Pidgeon, 
 the spider emblem is perpetuated in the mounds far to the north. He 
 describes one which he saw in Minnesota, about sixty miles above the 
 junction of the St. Peters river with the Mississippi, which covered 
 nearly an acre of ground. Upon ascending its highest elevation, he 
 tells us, it was very evident that the spider was intended to be repre- 
 sented by it. I bring these facts together for the benefit of future 
 observers, without speculating as to their significance, further than to 
 venture the remark that they point to a great diffusion of one people, or 
 their migration from the north, southwardly along the Mississippi, valley. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Crania — Differences Between the Skulls of the Mound-Builders and the Indians. 
 — Difficulties of the Subject.— Two Tabiktibs of Crania in the same Mounds. — 
 Principles of Classification.— Influence of Local Customs.— Peruvian Skulls.— 
 Characteristics of Missouri Specimens, etc.— The Tools of Ancient Americans. 
 —Proofs of a Knowledge of Iron. 
 
 To the common observer, the unnumbered stars which shine nightly 
 in, the firmament above utter no voice, and give no sign concerning their 
 physical condition, their individual motions, or relative distance from 
 each other. AH seemingly sweep on together with undeviating regular-, 
 ity-^difiering only in the intensity of their light. But when the appliances 
 of modern science are brought to bear upon the facts within our grasp 
 concerning them, and their dim rays are gathered up by the spectroscope,, 
 the faint star becomes a fiery orb and the theatre of the conflict of forces 
 of prodigious power. The sun is seen to be a fiery, fluid mass, in whose 
 atmosphere are ceaseless storms of flaming elements and tempestuous 
 cyclones, which burst forth on every side with awful grandeur and incon- 
 ceivable velocity. 
 
 Alike unintelligible to a common observer, in their ethnic relations, 
 would be a collection of skulls brought together from difierent lands, as 
 throwing any light upon the long history of the diflferent races of man- 
 kind. Some would appear shorter, rounder or more irregular than 
 others, but the same general features which characterize them all — ^with 
 the exceptions named — would be about all that would be specially 
 noticed. But when viewed in the resultant light of all the study which 
 has been bestowed upon them, and the cautious inductions of the wisest 
 ethnologists, they become vocal with revelations of transcendant interest. 
 We are not to suppose, however, that there are no great and decided 
 variations in the crania of a particular race, for these are as widely diff'er- 
 ent as the varying expressions of the human face, and yet all the while 
 presenting certain broad distinctions and characteristics by which the 
 particular race to which they belong may generally be determined. 
 
 Says Dr. Foster: " While the individual variations in the crania of a 
 particular race are so great as to j)resent intermediate gradations from one 
 extreme to another, thus forming a connecting link between widely sepa- 
 rated races, yet, in a large assemblage of skulls derived from a particular 
 race, there is a general conformation, a predominant type ; which appears 
 7 
 
98 
 
 AECH^OLOGY. 
 
 to have been constant as far back as human records extend; to have 
 been unaffected by food, climate, or personal pursuits ; and which has 
 been regarded among the surest guides in tracing national affinities. 
 Hitherto, our knowledge of the mound-builders' crania has been exceed- 
 ingly scant — restricted to less than a dozen specimens — which, if authen- 
 tic, clearly indicate for the most part the Indian type. The results of 
 my observations have led me to infer that the mound-builders' crania were 
 characterized by a general conformation of parts, which clearly separated 
 them from the existing races of man, and particularly from the Iiidians of 
 North America." 
 
 While the number of authentic skulls from the mounds has been 
 greatly multiplied since the above was written, not much has yet been 
 done in the way of classification, measurement and tabulation, so as to be 
 available for serious study. But enough has been already determined to 
 show how premature were the broad generalizations of Dr. Morton — and 
 others who accepted his opinions — deduced from the few examples of the 
 crania of the mounds which he was able to add to his large collection of 
 other types from all parts of the world. While questioning some of his 
 conclusions with which he sums up the results of his long-continued 
 labors, no contrary deductions can detract in the slightest degree from the 
 inestimable value of his labors and splendid contributions to ethnological 
 science. While many, in view of more extended observations and discov- 
 eries since his time, will withold their assent to the proposition, "that 
 the American nations, excepting the polar tribes, are of one race and one 
 species, but of two great families, which resemble each other in physical, 
 but differ in intellectual character," all will heartily subscribe to the 
 statement of Dr. Daniel Wilson that, "following in the footsteps of the 
 distinguished Blumenbach, Dr. Morton has the rare merit of having 
 labored with patient zeal and untiring energy, to accumulate and publish 
 to the world the accurately observed data which constitute the only true 
 basis of science. His Crania Americana is a noble monument of well- 
 directed industry ; and the high estimation in which it is held, as an ac- 
 curate embodiment of facts, has naturally tended to give additional 
 weight to his deductions." 
 
 Nor was this great naturalist less mistaken in his opinion as to the 
 mode of burial practiced by the aborigines of the American continent. 
 He tells us "that from Patagonia to Canada, and from ocean to ocean, 
 and equally in the civilized and uncivilized tribes, a peculiar mode of 
 placing the body in sepulture has been practiced from immemorial time. 
 This peculiai'ity consists in the sitting posture." That this was not the 
 
CEAOTA. 9^ 
 
 Oniversal, nor even the most common mode of burial, those who have 
 read the foregoing accounts of explorations in burial mounds in various 
 parts of the continent, have already seen. 
 
 He found some difficulty at iirst in reconciling the peculiarities of the 
 long and flattened Peruvian skulls with the round-headed type of the red 
 Indian, but finally decided that these were only variations of the same 
 type produced by artificial pressure in infancy. But the evidence is 
 abundant and convincing that there was one race in Peru — probably older 
 than the Incarace — with which this peculiarity was not artificial, but con- 
 genital, and the skull of the adult retained through life the strangely 
 elongated shilpe with which it entered the world. Dr. Wilson further 
 remarks in this connection : " The comprehensive generalization of the 
 American cranial type, thus set forth on such high authority, has exer- 
 cised an important influence on subsequent investigations relative to the 
 aborigines of the New World. It has, indeed, been accepted with such 
 ready faith as a scientific postulate, that Agassiz, Nott, Meigs, and other 
 physiologists and naturalists adopted it without question, and have rea- 
 soned from it as one of the few well-determined data of ethnological sci- 
 ence. It has no less effectually controlled the deductions of observant 
 travellers." 
 
 With such examples 'before us, a becoming modesty should character- 
 ize the conclusions of those laborers in the same great field, who at best 
 may only hope to contribute a page or two to the volume of truth which 
 he has bequeathed to his followers. 
 
 The caution with which we should proceed in every step of our inves- 
 tigations becomes all the more imperative on account of the difficulties 
 which meet the observer at the very threshold of his enquiries. One of 
 the difficulties has been already suggested, which is the small number of 
 skulls concerning which there can be no doubt whatever, that they be- 
 longed to the race of men who erected the mounds. Whjle it was the 
 custom of the Indian tribes to bury their dead in the mounds which they 
 found ready made, yet their interments may generally be easily distin- 
 guished from those of the race of the mounds themselves by the shallow- 
 ness of the graves, which are usually near the surface. Still, for the want 
 of close observation among cranial collectors, and attention to this fact, 
 much confusion has been the result. Another perplexity is caused by 
 the fact that in the same burial mound are sometimes found — at least in 
 Missouri — two entirely different classes of skulls, with distinctions al- 
 most as strongly marked as those which pertain to the Caucasian and Ne- 
 groid types, whose position in the mound and companionship iu the 
 
100 AECH-iEOLOGY. 
 
 way of- implements and utensils invest neither class, with anydistincfci 
 ive claim over the others ns being the individuals for whom the memorial 
 was erected. But, not to specify further, it may be remarked that so 
 great are the perplexities caused by these disturbing elements, in the minds 
 of somcj that they have been led to question whether we are justified in 
 assuming that we have a predominant cranial type of the Mound-building 
 race, with characteristic conformations so constant as to distinguish them 
 from all others, wherever found, so that they may be relied on as sure 
 guides in our investigations. 
 
 Assenting, as I do, to the conclusions of such distinguished naturalists 
 as Wilson and Foster, to the eflTect that we are justified in assuming that 
 the crania from localities so far asunder as Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Ohio 
 and Missouri, present a " similarity of type in those crania, apart from the 
 similarity in weapons of warfare, pottery, personal ornaments and earth- 
 works, which would indicate a homogeneous people distributed over a 
 wide area," yet, to present representative specimens of the skulls which 
 have been collected from the mounds which are scattered over such an 
 extended' territory, along with the necessary descriptions, measurement? 
 and illustrations as would be requisite for scientific accuracy and indncr, 
 tion, would extend our investigations far beyond the limits of the pres- 
 ent essay. We must content ourselves, therefore, with such illustrations 
 and considerations as are more general in their character, but sufficiently 
 specific and particular, it is hoped, to make them of sonie scientific valiie, 
 at least in clearing the way somewhat for other observers. 
 
 For convenience in the study of ethnic relationships, craniologists have 
 recognized three distinct classes of skulls under which all are grouped. 
 The principle upon which this classification is made, is based simply upon 
 the relation of the breadth to the length of the skull. Taking the length 
 of a skull to be one hundred, when the breadth is less than seventy- 
 three to one hundred, it is called Dolicocephalic, or long head ; those 
 whose proportions are from seventy-four or seventy-nine to one hundred 
 are termed Orthocephalic, or regularly formed ; those skulls whose pro- 
 portions are from eighty to eighty-nine to one hundred are called Brachy- 
 cephalic, or short, heads. It may be remarked with reference to the 
 classification of skulls, that some have been found in Europe presenting 
 Buch phenomenal characteristics that another class has been proposed, 
 called Scephocephalic. But, as it is quite likely that the peculiar elonga- 
 tion of those classed under this head may have been produced by artificial 
 means, they need not be dwelt upon here. Concerning the skull known 
 *s the "Scioto Mound Skull", which was taken by Squire and Davis from 
 
CKANIA. 101 
 
 a mound in the Scioto valley, and figured and described in their great 
 work, Dr. Morton says it is "perhaps the most admirably formed head 
 of the American race hitherto discovered. It possesses the national 
 characteristics in perfection, as seen in the elevated vertex, flattened 
 occiput, great interparietal diameter, ponderous bony structure, salient 
 nose, large jaws and broad face." This skull was regarded by the 
 discoverers as the one of all others concerning which there could be no 
 doubt that it belonged to the racu of the mounds ; and other eminent 
 writers have accepted the opinion of the finders. Dr. Foster, however, 
 (because of its decided Brachycephalic form doubtless), says that "any 
 comparative anatomist will instantly recognize it as of the Indian type." ^ 
 
 As far as my own observation goes, I am persuaded that those ethnol- 
 ogists who have taken one specific form as the tjpey rejecting all others 
 which do not closely resemble it, do not make sufficient account of the 
 wide extent of territory in which they are found, the length of time 
 which must have passed while the civilization of the race was being 
 developed, nor the influence of local habits and customs in modifying the 
 estoological conditions of the individual members of communities isolated 
 as they must have been for a long series of years ; nor of the recognized 
 fact that "individiiail variations in the crania of a particular race are so 
 great as to present intermediate gradations all the way from one extreme 
 to anotherj thus forming a connecting link between widely separated 
 races." The burial mounds of Missouri present well-defined Brachy- 
 cephalic specimens, often flattened in the occipital region, as well as the 
 longer and more symmetrical Orthocephalic type ; and s,ometimes, both 
 are observed jn one mound. The assumption, therefore, that the one or 
 the other is the exclusive typal form, cannot be maintained ; nor on such 
 a narrow basis can these seemingly wide divergencies in the shape of 
 individual skulls be satisfactorily explained. We may safely conclude, 
 therefore, that the idea that one uniform constant type prevailed during 
 the centuries of the occupancy of the Mound-builders of the vast con^ 
 tinent of America, through all its fixed comniunities, is a sweeping 
 assumption which finds no support from the history of other races of 
 men, nor from the facts which the mounds disclose. 
 
 The influence of local customs, as exhibited in the different haanner of 
 flattening the skull by related tribes of Indians, is a case in point. 
 
 1 It should be remembered that very many other considerations enter into the account 
 jn determining the class to -which certain skulls belong besides the proportion of 
 breadth to l,ength. This, however, is the first and most important, and the one which .J 
 shall chiefly consider 
 
102 AKCH^OLOGY. 
 
 Included under the general name of Flatheads, are at least twenty 
 different tribes. With some, the head of the child is strapped to the 
 cradle-boai'd until its transverse diametei is enormous, when seen in 
 front or from behind, while the longitudinal diameter is only about half 
 as great. In others the skull is shaped by winding a deer-skin cord 
 around the head, beginning just above the ears and winding in such a 
 manner that a uniform pressure is brought to bear upon the skull, forcing 
 it upward until it assumes a tapering form, almost terminating in a point 
 at the vertex. In others again, the pressure is so applied as to press 
 back the frontal bone to such a degree that the forehead is almost entirely 
 obliterated. Concerning the origin of these diverse customs among 
 aflSliated tribes we need not stop to enquire. They are sufficient to 
 
 prove that peculiar practices, affecting 
 the shape of the skull in contrary ways, ' 
 do originate in communities dwelling 
 near each other, and are persisted in, 
 notwithstanding their constant famili- 
 arity with the different customs of their 
 neighbors. It is not surprising then, 
 .H f .1^ we repeat, that mounds a thousand 
 
 \ Vtt iaBf ^^^^^ from each other, or the same 
 
 «,S^ ^ktli/' Vv mounds even, should disclose cranial 
 
 hlCr ^SKj\y ./^j^fr".. W forms presenting distinct and contrast- 
 ing characteristics. 
 
 The skull represented in Fig. 1, it 
 will be obseiTed, is very globular in 
 shape, with transverse diameter almost equalling the longitudinal, as 
 will be apparent by comparing the front with the side view which is 
 represented in the next engriiving, Fig. 2. From the supercilliary 
 ridges, which are prominent, the line of the forehead ascends almost 
 vertically to a great height, and then sweeps in a well-rounded curve to 
 the apex, from whence it suddenly slopes off in an almost straight line 
 to the occipital protuberance. The squamosal suture is exceptionally 
 straight. The chief point to be noticed in the shape of this skull, is the 
 evidence of artificial flattening seen in the almost straight line from' the 
 occipital protuberance to the top of the skull. With few exceptions, all 
 the crania from the Missouri mounds which I have seen are more or less 
 flattened in the occipital regions. Sometimes the pressure seems to have 
 been applied to the right, or to the left of the occipital protuberance, 
 and occasionally directly to the back of the head, and so low down that 
 
 Rg. I. Front View of Skull from Bayou St John Mound 
 
CRANIA. 103 
 
 the line of the skull from the foramen magnum to the apex of the lamb- 
 doidal suture is- almost vertical. And j'et I cannot believe that this 
 artificial conformation was designed. The absence of any sort of 
 uniformity in the extent to which it was carried, as well as tlie indis- 
 criminate application of the pressure to any part of the occipital regions, 
 would suggest that it resulted solely from the method of treating the 
 infant during the first year or two of its existence. The custom of the 
 North American Indian nomads, of strapping the infant to a board or 
 basket, for convenience in carrying, and from which it was removed but 
 seldom until it was at least one year old, need hardly be mentioned. 
 There is evidence that certain semi-civilized nations so treated their 
 children as to produce an abnormal shape of their skulls. One reference 
 must sufiBce for illustration. Garcel- 
 lasso de la Vega ^ in speaking of the 
 manner in which the Peruvian in- 
 fants were reared, tells us that all 
 classes, rich and poor, "bred up their 
 children with the least tenderness 
 and delicacy that was possible ; for 
 as soon as the infant was born they 
 washed it in cold water. Their arms 
 they tept swathed and bound down^ 
 for three months, upon supposition 
 that to loose them sooner would 
 
 weaken them; they kept them always p.^ j side view. 
 
 in their cradle, which was a pitiful 
 kind of a frame, set on four legs, one of which was shorter than the rest, 
 for convenience in rocking ; the bed was made of a sort of coarse knit- 
 tin«>- which was something more soft than the bare boards, and with a 
 string of this knitting they bound up the child on one side and the other 
 to keep it from falling oiit. When they gave them suck they never took 
 them into their lap or arms, for if they had used them in that man- 
 ner, they believed they would never leave crying, and would always 
 expect to be in arms, and not lie quiet in their cradles; and, therefore, 
 the mother would lean over the child, and reach it the breast, which they 
 did three times a day, that is, morning, noon and night, and unless it 
 were at these times, they never gave it suck." He tells us in the previ- 
 ous chapter that they were not weaned until they were two years of 
 
 ' Boyal Commentaries of Peru, Chap.'^lZ. 
 
104 
 
 AKCH^OiOGY. 
 
 age. Some of the Peruvian skulls present a flattened occiput so similar 
 to those of the mounds that it is highly pro'bable this formation was 
 produced by the same means, that is by fastening the infant to the cradle 
 either upon its back, or with the head turned more or less to the one side 
 or the other, in which position it remained until the head became 
 flattened in the region of its contact with the hard bed, thereby receiving 
 a form which it ever afterwards retained. 
 
 The skull represented in Fig. 3, when viewed from the front, shows 
 much the same globular form of the brain-case as the preceding ones 
 (Figs. 1 and 2), The vertical view, however, is very different. The 
 flattened portion is more lateral, the pressure having been brought to 
 bear upon the right side of the occiput. 
 
 Fie- 3 , 
 
 These decidedly Brachycephalic skulls are very far from conforming to 
 the Mound-builders' type for which Dr. Foster contends. Those rep- 
 resented in his work, taken from mounds in Illinois and Indiana, and 
 undoubtedly authentic, a:re Ortbocephalic or I'egularly formed. Nor do 
 they ptesent this abnormal deformity of the occiput which characterizes 
 the large majority of those from Missouri. I regret that circumstances 
 forbid the reproduction here of the many cranial forms which are ne- 
 cessary to properly illustrate this part of our subject. But as those 
 figured above, according to the Doctor's views, should be regarded as 
 belonging to the Indian type, I transcribe what he says concerning 
 their peculiarities of form : " The Indian possesses a conformation of 
 skull which clearly separates him from, the pre-histoilc. Mound-builder, 
 
CRANIA. 105 
 
 and such a conformation must give rise to different mental traits. His 
 brain, as I compared with the European, according to George Combe, 
 differs widely in the proportions of the different parts. The anterior 
 lobe is small, the middle lobe is large, and the central convolutions on 
 the anterior lobe and upper surface are small. The brain-case is box- 
 like, with the corners rounded off; the occiput extends up vertically ; 
 the frontal ridge is prominent ; the cerebral vault is pyramidal ; the 
 interparietal diameter is great; the supercilliary ridges and zygomatic 
 arches sweep out beyond the general line of the skull ; the orbits are 
 quadrangular ; the forehead is low ; the cheek-bones high ; and the jaws 
 prognathous. His character, since first known to the white man, has 
 been signalized by treachery and cruelty." "He was never known volun- 
 tarily to engage in an enterprise requiring methodical labor ; he dwells 
 in temporary and movable habitations ; he follows the game in their 
 migrations; he imposes the drudgery of life upon his squaw; he takes 
 no heed for the future. To suppose that such a race threw up the strong 
 lines- of circuntv-allation and the symmetrical mounds which crown so 
 many of our river-terraces, is as preposterous, almost, as to suppose that 
 they built the .pyramids of Egypt." 
 
 In the examples I have given, many of the above traits of the IndiaEn 
 skull are wanting. The anterior lobe is not small ; the brain-case is not 
 box-like, nof is the cerebral vault pyramidal ; the forehead cannot be said 
 to be low, nor are 4he orbits quadrangular, or the jaws prognathous. 
 Still, in some other particulars there is a striking conformity to the Indian 
 portraiture. For example, the supercilliary ridges and zygomatic arcnes 
 in the second example "sweep Qut beyond the general line of the sjiull." 
 They are decidedly of the short-head type, and were it not for the de- 
 rangement of the general outline by artificial means in infancy I imagine 
 they would correspond in a striking manner to the, Scioto Mound skull, 
 which Foster believes to belong to the red race. The occipital and lat- 
 eral depression shown in the vertica,l view. Fig. 3, is by no means 
 confined to the skulls of the Missouri mounds, but is found in Peru. If 
 the reader will consult Morton's Crania Americana, Plates B and C, he 
 will find skulls with the identical characteristics of the one at Fig. 3. 
 They occur in the mounds of the upper Mississippi region, and in Ten- 
 nessee. In Harper's Magazine of December, 1876, is a valuable arch- 
 jeological article by Dr. Jones, in which I find the engraving of a sktill 
 whose resemblance to Fig. 3 is so striking that I reproduce them both 
 side by side. The thing to be noticed is the general outline in which the 
 similar depression is shown. In the Tennessee .skullr— assum^ing that 
 
106 
 
 ABCH^OLOGY. 
 
 the same point of view is taken in both — the zygomatic arches are 
 scarcely seen, while in that from Missouri they bulge out far beyond 
 the general outline. 
 
 While, as before remarked, the majority of the skulls found in the 
 Missouri mounds possess the characteristics shown in the examples here 
 given ; some which occur more rarely are so strikingly different that they 
 can not by any reasonable theory be classed with them. While exploring 
 a mound in southeast Missouri, before referred to as having been the 
 burial-place of many hundreds, two skeletons were found. Ijing beside 
 each other, so decayed that the bones could scarcely be handled at all 
 without crumbling to pieces. The skulls were entire when passed up to 
 me from the excavation. They were so peculiar that I was filled with 
 
 Skull from Mound in Tennessee. 
 
 Fig. 4. 
 
 Skull from Mound in Southeast Missouri. 
 
 astonishment the moment I saw them. One crumbled to dust in a few 
 moments after its exposure to the air, and fell from my hands, along with 
 the earth with which it was filled, like all others, which are — as well as 
 bowls and small-necked water-jugs — always densely packed with the loam 
 which covers them. I proceeded to a more careful examination, as I 
 suspected an intrusive burial. With much painstaking I was able to pre- 
 serve the upper pf)rtiou of the second skull, which was a duplicate of the 
 one destroyed. The outline of this fragment is well represented in the 
 engraving. Both skeletons were lying upon the back, with the head 
 toward the center of the mound, with the usual drinking vessels close to 
 the head, and a food-vessel in the angle of the folded arm upon the 
 breast. It will be seen at a glance that the forehead is annihilated ; the 
 frontal sinus is quite prominent, which, along with the almost horizontal 
 
CEANIA. 
 
 107 
 
 Fig. 5. 
 
 line of the frontal bone, makes this part of the skull resemble that of a 
 beast more than a human head ; and yet I am qnite sure that its form 
 was perfectly natural, for I could detect no iudicntion of an artificial de- 
 pression in any part of it. The frontal bone was curved backward, on each 
 side of the occiput, and from the foramen magnum, or from the bottom of 
 the brain-case to the apex, was one graceful curve. It might be suggested 
 — as has been done in the case of the Neanderthal skull — that these were 
 the skulls of idiots. But whoever they were, they were buried with 
 tender care, and in the belief 
 that the}' would enjoy an- 
 other life beyond the grave 
 in companionship with the 
 many hundreds of others 
 who were provided with the 
 necessary food and drink to 
 sustain them during their 
 long journey. As so large 
 a portion of the skull is wanting, it is perhaps useless to generalize upon 
 so small a fragment.^ Still I can but record my own strong conviction 
 that we have here no idiotic anomaly, but characteristic examples of a 
 race of men entirely distinct from those who piled up the mounds in 
 southeast Missouri. Much evidence is gathered from widely separated 
 localities upon the American continent, which suggests more than the 
 probability that it was once inhabited by a race of men whose origin 
 must ever be hid in the night of oblivion, and the date of whose occu- 
 pancy may not be far from that of the Paleolithic races of Europe. 
 
 The same configuration has been found in the bone caves of Brazil, 
 and in companionship with extinct animals. Dr. Lund thinks they were 
 contemporaneous. In some which he describes, the peculiarities which 
 characterize them are "in excessive degree, even to the entire disappearance 
 of the forehead." The same form appears in the sculptures on the most 
 ancient monuments of Mexico, as also in the bas-reliefs of Uxmal and 
 Copan, in Central America. "Humboldt and Bonplaud," says Foster, 
 "were the first to draw attention to this remarkable configuration of 
 skull. The former, as far back as 1808, thus stated : "This extraordinary 
 flatness is found among nations to whom the means of producing arti- 
 ficial deformity are totally unknown, as is proved by the crania of Mex- 
 
 ^ For the distinguishing traits of idiotic skulls, consult Humphrey's Treatise on tho 
 Human Skeleton, p. 233. 
 
108 AKCiH^OLOGY. 
 
 ifcan Indians, Peruvians, and Atiires." Pentland, Cuvier, Gall and 
 Tiedeman believed this strange cranial form to be congenital. Kogers 
 and Tschudi both were convinced of the former existence of an Autoch- 
 tlionous race in Peru with this peculiarity of skull, and " state that it is 
 seen in the foetus of Peruvian mumraiesi" Dr. Lapham has observed 
 what seems to be the same type, iu Wisconsin. In a private note to Dr; 
 Foster he says, concerning two skulls found at Wauwatasa: "The pe- 
 culiar characteristics indicating a low grade of humanity, common to 
 Doth, are a low forehead, pi'ominent superciliary ridges, the zygomatic 
 arches s^velling out beyond the walls of the skull, and especially the 
 prominence of the'dccipital ridge. The antei-lor portion of these skulls, 
 besides being low, are "much narrowed, giving the outline, as seen from 
 above, of an ovate form. It seertis quite probable that men with skulls 
 of this -low grade were the most ancient tipon this continent, that they 
 were' the first to heap up those curioiigjyrshaped mounds of earth which 
 now so much puzzle the antiquary ; that they were gradually superceded 
 and crowded out by a superior race, who, adopting mainy of their cus- 
 tonis, continued to build mounds and bury their dead in mounds already 
 built. Hence we find Mound-builders' skulls with this ancient form, 
 Associated with others of more modern type. The discovery of these 
 skulls, with characteristics so much like those of the most ancient of the 
 pre-historio types of Europe, would seem to indicate that if America 
 was peopled by emigration from the Old World, that event must h.ave 
 taken place at a very early time — ^far back of any of which we have any 
 record." The occurrence of skulls with this unique and congenital con- 
 figuration, in both^ continents of America, from Wisconsin to Peruj 
 and many of them associated with those ancient structures whose authors 
 are unknown to history or tradition, are facts not to be overlooked or 
 lightly considered in tracing the ethnic distinctions of the pre-historic 
 inhabitants of the, so-called, New World. They are certainly very 
 suggestive, and invite the serious study of future observers. 
 
 There are certain facts which have been noted from time to time, 
 which fit into none of the popular theories concerning the state of the 
 arts of the Mound-builders. It has been stated, and often repeated, that 
 they had no knowledge of smelting or casting metals; yet the recent 
 discoveries in Wisconsin of implements of copper cast in molds — ^as well 
 as the molds themselves, of various patterns, and wrought with much skill 
 -^prove.that the age of metallurgical arts , bad dawned; iu that regionat 
 least. - - ■ . •■-■ ■-■■■- ■'■■'■''■ -^ 
 
CEAmA. 109 
 
 , And again: what; shall be said concerning the traces of iron imple- 
 ments which have been discovered from time to. time in the mounds, but 
 more frequently at great depths below the surface of, the soil. Though 
 accounts of such discoveries are generally from reliable sources, they 
 have latterly received no attention, and alwaj-s have been considered as 
 so much perilous ware which no one cared to handle. The peculiar 
 ovate form of skull with the retreating forehead, as has just been shown, 
 points to the presence, in remote times, of a race of men entii-ely dif-r 
 ferent from that to which the authors of many of the earthworks of the 
 Mississippi valley belonged. This form has been traced to Mexico and 
 Peru. When the Spanish conquerors pillaged those countries and laid 
 waste their beautiful cities, tbey observed vast structures and ancient 
 temples built of hewn stone, with consummate skill. When they ques- 
 tioned the Aztec and luca races concerning their origin they could give 
 no answer but this : they were here when our fathers came ; they belonged 
 to a people of whose history we know nothing. The Incas copied these 
 ancient models in the great structures which thej'^ erected. But with 
 what tools did they perform such wonders — were they of copper only? 
 So we are told ; or copper alloyed with tin. It is said they had some 
 secret method of making it hard as iron, but none of the copper tools 
 which have been found confirm the statement. Mountains of stone were 
 wrought into dwellings and temples of the gods ; huge walls were cut 
 from the solid rocks ; the mountains themselves divided into galleries 
 and fortifications rising one above the other, connected here and there 
 by artificial breastworks, but generally cut out of the strata of the 
 mountain and left standing, one solid mass of stone. Common dwell- 
 ings built of enormous slabs of stone seven feet wide and twelve feet 
 long are met with. Porphyry, basalt and marble yielded alike to their 
 magic touch, like clay iu the hands of the potter. Vitreous obsidian 
 was utilized by the excellence of their tools and the delicacy of their 
 manipulation. Plates and cylinders of exquisite thinness they made of 
 this fragile substance for ornaments for their women. 
 
 The dexterity of these ancient lapidaries in cutting the hardest stone 
 is amazing. And it is difficult to conceive how, without cutting imple- 
 ments equal, at least, to our own in hardness, such delicate and such stu- 
 pendous works could have been executed. And to the question whether 
 they possessed a knowledge of working iron, the wise man will hesitate 
 long before he answers in the negative. It should be remembered, too, 
 how quickly — unless under most favoring conditions — iron corrodes to 
 dust and leaves scarcely a trace behind. The piles of the Swiss lake- 
 
110 AECH^OLOGT. 
 
 dwellings, the cedar posts of the mounds, may endure for ages, while 
 iron — so hiird, and more precious than gold in the advancement of the 
 world's civilization, — speedily melts away before the gentle dews and air 
 of heaven. 
 
 The idea that there once existed on this continent a race anterior to, 
 and entirely distinct from, that which immediately preceded the red men, 
 is no new and fanciful conjecture, but one which was held by the earliest 
 and most cautious observers of the antiquities of America ; and we may 
 yet be forced to adopt their conclusions, not only upon this point, but 
 also their opinions as to the state of the arts in those remote times. 
 
 According to Morse, the geographer: "In digging a well in Cincin- 
 nati, the stumi) of a tree was found in a sound state, ninety feet below 
 the surface ; and in digging another well, at the same place, another 
 stump was found at ninety-four feet below the surface, which had evident 
 marks of the axe ; and on its top there appeared as if some iron tool 
 had been consumed by rust." 
 
 Says Priest : " We have examined the blade of a sword found in Phil- 
 adelphia, now at Peale's Museum, in New York, which was taken out 
 of the ground something more than sixty feet below the surface. The 
 blade is about twenty inches in length, is sharp on one edge, with a 
 thick back, a little turned up at the point, with a shank drawn out three 
 or four inches long, which wks doubtless inserted in the handle, and 
 clinched at the end." 
 
 "Twelve miles west of Chillicothe, on Paint Creek, are found the 
 remains of a furnace, ten or twelve feet square, formed of rough stones, 
 surrounded by cinders, among trees of full size. There are, at this 
 place, seven wells situated within the compass of an acre of land, reg- 
 ularly walled up with hewn stone, but are now nearly filled up with the 
 accumulating earth of ages. Eight miles further up the creek, a small 
 bar of gold was taken out of a mound, which sold in Chillicothe for 
 twelve dollars. A piece of cast iron, we are further told, was taken 
 from a circular embankment in Circleville." 
 
 From the distinguished antiquary, Mr. Atwater, who was present 
 when a large mound^near Circleville was removed, we learn that iu addi- 
 tion to the skeletons it contained, along with stone implements, was ' 
 found " the handle, either of a small sword or large knife, made of elk's 
 horn ; around the end, where the blade had been inserted, was a ferrule 
 of silver, which, though black, was not much injured by time ; though 
 the handle showed the hole where the blade had been inserted, yet no 
 iron was found, but an oxide, or rust, remained, of similar shape and 
 
CKANIA. Ill 
 
 size." With anothei- skeleton, in the same' mound, was found a large 
 plate of mica, three feet in length by one and one-half in width, and one 
 inch and a half iu thickness. On this was a plate of iron thoroughly 
 oxydized, which crumbled to dust when disturbed by the spade, but 
 resembled a plate of cast iron. This was doubtless a mirror. Both 
 bodies had been burned, and mingled with the bones and implements 
 were quantities of charcoal and ashes. The same author thinks that 
 some of the supposed iron knives which have been discovered in the 
 mounds may have been steel instead. The "huge iron weapon" found 
 in the hand of the skeleton in the Utah mound before described, which 
 crumbled to dust on exposure to the air, will be remembered. But here 
 I must desist from further consideration of the question — for the present 
 at least — as to the extent of the knowledge and uses of iron among the 
 ancient Americans, as I am not aware of any relics of this metal having 
 been found among the antiquities of Missouri, save those made of native 
 ore. But, as similar notices of its occurrence in the mounds and on 
 ancient levels, far below the present surface of the alluvial plains, are 
 abundant in all the current antiquarian literature of the last half century, 
 I felt that the subject was too important to be passed over in silence, 
 especially as I had reason to suspect that those remote dwellers upon 
 this continent, whose peculiar form of skull has been noticed by Hum- 
 boldt, Foster, Lapham and many others, sffid lastly by myself in Missouri, 
 were not unacquainted with the uses of iron and other metallurgical arts. 
 That these were the opinions of that distinguished scholar and states- 
 man, William Wirt, the following quotation from his writings will show. 
 After speaking of the various relics of vanished races, iimong which he 
 mentions "iron and copper, buried in a soil which must have been undis- 
 turbed for ages," he proceeds to say : "The mighty remains of the past, 
 to which we have alluded, indicate the existence of three distinct races 
 of men, pi'evlous to the arrival of the existing white settlers. The 
 monuments of the first or primitive race, are regular stone walls, wells 
 stoned up, brick hearths found in digging the Louisville canal, nineteen 
 feet below the surface, Avith the coals of the last domestic fire upon them, 
 medals of copper and silver, swords and other implements of iron. Mr. 
 Flint assures us that he has seen these strange ancient swords. He has 
 also examined a small iron shoe, like a horse-shoe, encrusted with the rust 
 of ages, and found far below the soil, and the copper axe, weighing about 
 two pounds, singular-ly tempered and of jjeculiar construction." The 
 second race, he thinks, were the authors of the mounds, who, in time, 
 were succeeded by the Indians. 
 
312 ABCaffiOLOGY 
 
 ■ A few weeks since I received, in a private letter from Prof. Tice, the 
 distinguished meteorologist, an interesting account of the discovery, in 
 one of the interior counties in Illinois, of the corroded ; remains of some 
 sort of cutting implement of iron or steel. As I have not his communi- 
 cation at hand at this moment, I cannot give the details ; but as I recall 
 the statement, it was found several feet below the surface, in a gravelly 
 river bank which had been washed away by the floods and thus exposed, 
 and linder such circumstances as to convince intelligent" observers who 
 saw it, and the . bed from whence it was taken, that it was of great 
 antiquity. What shall we say to these numberless and constantly 
 recurring notices of the discovery of traces of iron? The journey of 
 De Soto across the continent has been made to do good service in 
 explaining the presence in the mounds of metal implements, as well as 
 the immense defensive structures in some of the Southern States, which 
 were thought to be beyond the- skill of the ancient inhabitants. A topo- 
 graphical representation of all of the supposed routes of his journeyings 
 would resemble a western railway chart. Had De Soto lived till now, 
 and traveled incessantly, like the Wandering Jew, he could not have 
 accomplished all that has been placed to his credit. Again, the bold 
 Norsemen, under Eric the Red, and other adventurers on the ocean, 
 whose ships, by adverse winds or favoring gales, were driven to these 
 far off shores, — colonies of Welsh, Malayans— and the lost ten tribes of 
 Israel — all have been marshaled by different authors in the interest of 
 their particular theories, and made to do duty in explaining the inexpli- 
 cable problems of our antiquities. In regard to the question thiis touched 
 upon, as well as many others equally perplexing, is it not better to sift 
 and garner the grains of truth we have, and with childlike receptivity 
 wait for greater light? 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Concluding Observations.— The Origin of the Pre-Historic Races of America.— 
 Theort of Spontaneous Generation.— The Law Governing their Migrations.— 
 Successive Movements of the Nahua Eace.— The Aztecs the last Colony of 
 that People. — Opinions op Baron Humboldt. — Our own Country probably the 
 Original Home of the Aztec Civilization. — The Indian Baces of Asiatic Ori- 
 gin.— Facilities OF Immigration via. Behring's Straits.— A Personal Word.— Dry 
 Bones Clothed. 
 
 A proper completion of our investigations demands a brief notice ot 
 the current opinions which relate to the origin, migrations and the ulti- 
 mate fate of the race whose relics and monuments have been considered 
 in the preceding pages. By whatever theory we may be pleased to 
 adopt as to the manner in which was first peopled, we are carried back 
 irresistably to times so remote that we rise from our study of this sub- 
 ject with the conviction that the origin of the first inhabitants of 
 this continent must ever remain hidden in the darkness of oblivion. 
 
 None of the many theories, some of which seemed quite probable at 
 first view, have withstood the test of later investigations. One nation 
 after another — European or Asiatic — has been put forward, as entitled to 
 the honor of having been first in the field with its peopling or civilizing 
 colonies ; prior to whose coming, it was assumed, this continent must 
 have been a desolate waste, without inhabitants, or, in the latter case, at 
 best, the home of wild and barbarous tribes. Another theory, which is 
 maintained by a few distinguished writers, is based upon the hypothesis 
 of spontaneous generation ; the natural sequence of which is that the abo- 
 riginal inhabitants of America were Autochthons ;i or in other words, that 
 man — in common with the plants and lower orders of animals — made his 
 appearance on the earth spontaneously, when, in the fullness of time, it 
 had reached that condition which presented all those favoring and con- 
 current circumstances which made his appearance a natural necessity. 
 
 The spontaneous generation hypothesis is still so far from being verified, 
 that) the question of an autochthonous population need not be discussed ; 
 
 ' Humboldt suggestively asks, " Did the nations of the Mexican race, in their migra- 
 tions to the south, send colonies towards the east, or do the monuments of the United 
 States pertain to the Autochthone nations? Perhaps we must admit in North America, 
 as in the ancient world, the simultaneous existence of several centers of civilization, of 
 which the mutual relations are not known in histoiy." Personal Narrative, Vol. VI., p. 
 322. 
 
 8 
 
114 AECH^OLOGY. 
 
 inasmuch, also, as what we have to cousider farther, relates to the ancient 
 people of Missouri ; who, whatever may have been their origin, were so 
 far removed in time from the parent stock, and changed in their physical 
 and social condition by their evident subsequent commingling with the 
 Indian tribes, that they furnish us with few, if any, facts which can be re- 
 lied on as sure guides in conducting us to the origin of their national life. 
 
 We must take them, therefore, as we find them, and in the light of such 
 facts as we have been able to gather, and, applying also the mysterious, 
 yet well-established law which seems ever to have controlled the migra- 
 tory movements of the various nations of both hemispheres, deduce such 
 conclusions as we may be justified in doing concerning their own migra- 
 tions and their ultimate fate. 
 
 The student of ancient history will observe that the migrations of rude 
 and semi-civilized nations have generally, if not always, been from north to 
 south. The exceptions to this, which are exceedingly rare in proportion 
 to the vast number of known movements of tribes and peoples in this 
 direction, it is believed may readily be accounted for by some local and 
 temporary cause — as stress of war, for example — which turned them for 
 a time from their normal course. The constancy of the operation of this 
 law — the causes of which are yet the subject of much learned specula- 
 tion — I shall assume without stopping to illustrate it by quoting 
 the numerous examples with which the pages of history abound, further 
 than to give the opinion of one distinguished naturalist in its support. 
 Says Von Hellwald,^ " If we seek, however, to establish for historical 
 events a basis in geographical relations — that is to say, if we carefully 
 compare them together, analyzing the former and investigating their pos- 
 sible causes, studying the latter and deducing as far as possible the 
 resulting consequences-^we shall find that certain generally valid laws, 
 which resolve in the simplest manner many an unexplained riddle, are 
 evolved from such a study through the remarkable correspondence of 
 facts. Thus, in reference to the migrations of mankind, it seems to 
 result from the geographical structure of the continent that, as by virtue of 
 an historical law we are not to look for men of comprehensive and 
 deeply penetrating intellect in Laplafld or Malta, in Bosnia or Asturias ; 
 so, conformably with a strict geographical law, the direction of the migra- 
 tory stream will he found always to lie in the axis of the greatest lorigitudi- 
 
 ' The American Migration, by Frederic Von Hellwald — an admirable essay. Some of 
 his facts and dates I have adopted. 
 Smithsonian Eeport, 1860. 
 
OEIGET 9^ THE PBE-HISTOEIC KACES. 115 
 
 nal exteriMon of the continent. In feretik iio example from history inform* 
 us that the Tchapogires, Tunguses, Jakoota or people from the banks of 
 the Amour, have ever descended into the Deccam or Malacca ; that the 
 Ethiopians have ever migrated into Sennegambia, or the Finns into 
 Greece. As a new proof how much nations and men depend on geo- 
 graphical circumstances, and even when they believe themselves guided 
 by their own will, merely obey a great natural law, the fact is of much 
 significance that the American tribes form no exception to this general 
 rule ; for here, also, the procession of the migratory races is in the longer 
 axis of the continent, namely, from northto south. 
 
 " That America, as well as Europe and Asia, was already inhabited 
 before this great migration, and in many parts possessed of an ancient 
 civilization, admits of no doubt. Occasional traditions of those early 
 periods of culture have penetrated to us, and I cannot forbear soliciting 
 the attention of the learned world to this legendary cycle of America, 
 which is certainly worthy in many respects of a critical scratiny ; for to 
 judge from so much as is yet known, the inquiry cannot but yield inter- 
 esting and valuable disclosures respecting the cosmogonic views of the 
 American aborigines and the general tendencv of their ideas ; perhaps 
 endow even the historian here and there with a fact of value. But to 
 determine, from our present knowledge of the mystical traditions of 
 these races, which of the tribes in America may have been the oldest, 
 seems to me as impossible as superfluous. 
 
 " Upon this soil multitudes of nations have moved and have sunk into 
 the night of oblivion, without leaving a trace of their existence ; without 
 a memorial, through which we might have at least learned their names. 
 Those nations only, which by tradition, written records, monuments, 
 or whatever other means, first guaranteed the remembrance of their own 
 existence, belong to the domain of history ; and history which, to be true, 
 accepts nothing but what is actually known, points to those as the primi- 
 tive races which first transmitted a knowledge of themselves; time 
 begins for us when the chronology of such nations takes its rise. But 
 all these so-called aboriginies might be only the remainder of previously- 
 existing races, of whom, again, we know not whether they were indeed 
 the first occupants of the land. In truth we meet in America, at more 
 than one point, with traces of a rich civilization, proceeding demonstra- 
 tively from much earlier epochs than the tribal migration itself; as, for 
 example, in upper Peru, the gorgeous structures of the Aymaras,. near 
 Tiahnanco, on the beautiful shores of Lake Titicaca ; the mysterious 
 monuments of Central America, between Chiapas and Yucatan, of which. 
 
116 AKCH^OLOGY. 
 
 the buildings of Palenque constitute the most celebrated representative ; 
 the earth and stone works of a people distinct from the above, on the 
 banks of the Mississippi and the Ohio." 
 
 In speaking of the migratory movements of the American tribes, it 
 must be remembered that several distinct expeditions of the same people, 
 at times more or less remote fi'om each other, are often spoken of as one 
 migration ; for example, the race which bore the name of Nahuatlacas, 
 was composed of seven tribes ; namely, the Xochimilcos, Chalcas, Te- 
 panicas, Tlahuicas, Colhuas, TIaxcaltecas and Aztecs. All these tribes 
 spoke the same language, and, issuing from the same region far to the 
 north, appeared in Mexico at successive periods., following each other in 
 the order named. The Aztecs, renowned in the history of the Conquest, 
 were the last to arrive. Some time prior to the commencement of the 
 Christian era — ^many think not less than a thousand years must be 
 assumed — the mysterious Nahoas, or Nahuas, appear in Mexico. Con- 
 cerning their origin little is known, and none have been able to penetrate 
 the clouds of obscurity which envelop their history. This much, however, 
 is established, namely, that all the Toltec and the later Aztec, or more 
 properly Nahuatl tribes, were only branches of the great Nahua family, 
 and all spoke dialects of this ancestral race. This is a most important 
 and significant fact, as affinities of language are considered among the 
 most certain guides in ethnological investigations. But little more is 
 known concerning the original Nahuas than to suggest the probability 
 that they were the authors of some of the stone structures in Northern 
 Mexico, and the builders of a few, and those the most ancient, mounds 
 of the Mississippi Valley. With the advent of the Toltec domination in 
 the country previously occupied by their Nahuatl^ ancestors, the thick 
 darkness begins to be dissipated, and the dawn of ancient American 
 history is ushered in. 
 
 The learned and able inteipreter of the monuments and hieroglyphic 
 annals of ancient Mexico, the Abbe Brasseur de Bourbourg, regards 955 
 years before Christ as the earliest reliable date which can be established 
 in the Nahuatl language. Although the Toltec tribes did not make their 
 appearance on the scene simultaneously, but at different times, and pos- 
 sibly by different routes, as was the case with the Aztecs who succeeded 
 them, their active occupancy began in the seventh century of our era, or, 
 to speak more accurately, in the year 648. Clavigero, however, who is 
 alone in his opinion among early writers, fixes the date at 596. This 
 
 > Pronounced " Know-all"; and according to de Boui-bourg, it has the same meaning. 
 
OKIGDf OF THE PEE-HISTOEIC EACES. 117 
 
 people, after the lapse of about four hundred years, having been almost 
 destroyed by famine, pestilence and civil wars, were succeeded by a more 
 barbarous, though neighboring tribe, known as Chichiraecs, who also 
 have been supposed by gome to have belonged to the same Nahua family, 
 but whose peculiar language is now considered as convincing proof that 
 they were from a separate and distinct stock, although they had been 
 more or less influenced by association with their Toltec neighbors, and 
 had adopted some of their arts and customs. Of course it should be 
 remembered that the large territory of Mexico was occupied conjointly hy 
 many other pre-Toltec tribes besides the Nahuas, but whose languages 
 were so radically different, so entirely wanting in linguistic affinities with 
 the Nahuatl tongues, — among which may be mentioned the Almecs and 
 the Otomi, whose speech was monosyllabic, — that they must be regarded 
 as more ancient than the Nahuas even. But the reign of the Chichimecs 
 was short. A tribe of immigrants, known as the Acolhuas, took up their 
 residence with the Chichimecs, and the union resulted in the kingdom of 
 Acolhuan. This kingdom was scarcely established when the great and 
 last migrations we have to notice' took place. The seven Nahuatla- 
 cas tribes, as before noticed, arrived upon the scene, the Aztecs bringini: 
 up the rear, after a longer interval than the others. This celebrated 
 people, who, in the year 1090, had left their home in the mysterious 
 Aztlan, after various wanderings and delays iii their southwai-d journey, 
 finally reached the table-lands of Mexico somewhere between the years 
 1186 and 1194, and took possession of the cities which the Chichimecs 
 in turn abandoned, following in the path of the Toltecs, who had fled 
 from these same seats less than two hundred years before. Adopting 
 and improving upon the civilization of their predecessors, the Aztecs 
 founded that kingdom whose magnificence and power filled the Conquer- 
 ors with wonder. They displayed a bravery and heroic devotion in the 
 defense of their rulers and their native land which awakens our liveliest 
 sympathies, and the admiration of the civilized world; and their final 
 and pitiless destruction has left a dark stain upon the character of their 
 destroyers, which no excuses in the interests of religious zeal can 
 diminish, noi: the glory of their daring deeds efface I 
 
 In the preceding and incomplete outline sketch of the leading branches 
 of the Nahua family, with some account of their migrations, I have called 
 attention to those facts only which seemed necessary to a more explicit 
 statement of what has been incidentally assumed throughout these 
 investigations. 
 
 From my point, of view then, no theory is admissible which does not 
 
118 AECHLzEOLOGY. 
 
 contemplate the migrations of the various tribes which appeared at dif- 
 ferent times upon the table lands of Mexico, during a period of two 
 thousand years or more, as the movements of the different branches of 
 the one Nahua race, whose ancient seats must be sought for in the great 
 alluvial plains of the Mississippi valley. Their precise location may 
 never be discovered ; it is, however, quite probable that the unknown 
 Aztlan, the Huehuetlapalan of the Aztecs (who, as has been shown, 
 were the last to leave their primitive home), may yet be identified. At 
 the commencement of my study of the antiquities of America, I accepted 
 without question the views of distinguished early writers upon this 
 subject, which I have since found no reason to reject during all my 
 subsequent inquiries. And had I at any time been disposed to embrace 
 opposite conclusions, I should have felt great diflSdence in suggesting 
 them, which to me would savor of presumption, thus to place myself in 
 opposition to the mature convictions of the great men who have devoted 
 years of patient labor in this direction, of whose names I need men- 
 tion but one. Among the learned in all lands, the opinions of Humboldt, 
 upon any subject which engaged the attention of his powerful intellect, 
 command the most respectful consideration. The rare opportunities 
 which he enjoyed, during his extended tra!vels and prolonged stay on this 
 continent, at a period, too, when many of the antiquities were in a better 
 state of preservation and therefore much more intelligible and instructive 
 than now, give great weight to his conclusions concerning the ancient 
 races of America. In speaking of the races under consideration, he 
 snys : " The very civilized nations of New Spain, the Tollecs, the 
 Chichimecs, and the Aztecs, pretended to have issued successively, from 
 the sixth to the twelfth century, from three neighboring countries situa- 
 ted toward the north, and called Huehuetlapalan or Tlepallan, Ama- 
 quemacan, and Aztlan or Teo-Alcolhuacan. These nations spoke the 
 same language, they had the same cosmogonic fables, the same propensity 
 for sacerdotal congregations, the same hieroglyphic paintings, the same 
 divisions of time, the same taste for noting and registering everything. 
 The namey given by them to the towns built in the country of Anahuac 
 were those of the towns they had abandoned in their ancient country. 
 The civilization on the Mexican table-land was regarded by the inhabit- 
 ants themselves as the copy of something which had existed elsewhere^ 
 as the reflection of the primitive civilization of Aztlan. Where, it may 
 be asked, must be placed that parent land of the colonies of Anahuac, 
 that officina gentium, which, during five centuries, sends nations toward 
 the south, who understand each other without difficulty, and recognize 
 
OEIGIN or THE PEE-HISTOEIC EACES. 119 
 
 each other for relations? Asia, north of Amour, where it is nearest 
 America, is a barbarous country ; and, in supposing (which is geograph- 
 ically possible) a migration of southern Asiatics by Japan, Tarakay 
 (Tchoka) , the Kurile and the Aleutian isles, from southwest toward 
 the northeast (from 40 to 55 deg. of latitude), how can it be believed 
 that in so long a migi-ation, on a way so easily intercepted,- the remem- 
 brance of the institutions of the parent country could have been pre- 
 served with so much force and clearness 1 The cosmogonic fables, the 
 pyramidal constructions, the system of the calendar, the animals of the 
 tropics found in the catasterim of daj>, the convents and congregations of 
 priests, the taste for statistic enumerations, the annals of the empire held 
 in- the most scrupulous order, lead us toward oriental Asia ; while the 
 lively remembrances of which we have just spoken, and the peculiar 
 physiognomy which Mexican civilization presents in so many other 
 respects, seem to indicate the existence of an empire in the North of 
 America, between the 36th and 42d degree of latitude. We cannot re- 
 flect on the military monuments of the United Htates without recollecting 
 the first country of the civilized nations of Mexico." On a preceding 
 page he also mentions the fact that " the country between the 33d and 
 41st degrees, of latitude, parallel to the mouth of the Arkansas and 
 the Missouri, is considered by the Aztec historians as the ancient dwel- 
 ling of the civilized nations of Anahuac." The views here expressed, 
 and which all succeeding investigations have tended to verify, carry us 
 back to very remote times, far beyond any authentic history or tradition, 
 when America was peopled by rude tribes of a low grade of humanity, 
 but which, nevertheless, possessing within themselves the germs of a 
 civilization which slowly through the ages evolved a progressive 
 national life, at length resulted in the establishment of the fixed com- 
 munities in North America, whose skillful hubsandry, arts, commercial 
 enterprise and original and complex system of religion we have already 
 contemplated. All of those, however, were but the broad beginning — 
 the prophecy of that higher development which found its fulfillment in 
 the more sumptuous civilization in the rich valleys of Central and South 
 America. The territory occupied by the Mound-builders is too large, 
 the evidences of a dense population throughout its length and breadth 
 too numerous, to permit us to suppose that its occupancy was of short 
 duration. There is also too wide a difference in the respective ages of 
 many of the mounds : some are manifestly hoary with age, while others 
 are of recent date. 
 
 While we believe, therefore, that a period of many centuries must 
 
120 AECILllOLOGT 
 
 have elapsed during the extension of a people so numerous over the vast 
 area which they inhabited, and the erection of so many structures as are 
 still to be seen, it is equally clear from my stand-point that we must also 
 believe that all facts, when rightly considered, point to a gradual disap- 
 pearance towards the south, and at different periods of time, which may 
 be found to correspond to the known dates of the migrations of the Aztec 
 tribes. As these occurred at times more or less remote from each other, 
 it is altogether probable that, to different causes mubt the separate 
 migrations be ascribed. Some tribes, as the ruins of their military forts 
 and encampments show, retreated slowly before the encroachments of an 
 invading force. Other sites seem to have been abandoned deliberately, 
 without any attempt at defence ; or perhaps the impulse which set them 
 in motion may have been the captivating accounts they had received 
 of the glory and riches of the distant land to which their brethren had 
 departed years before. While long lines of military defence may be traced 
 here and there across the continent at the north, and along the eastern 
 plains of the valleys of the Mississippi and Ohio, very few have been 
 observed upon the western side of the Mississippi, at least in Missouri, 
 and those are of small dimensions. I am led to infer that, however 
 sudden may have been their abandonment, it was voluntary, and that the 
 ancient Missourians were the last to leave the country. While it may be 
 impossible to decide whether they were the Aztecs themselves, or a 
 remnant of that tribe which was left behind, I cannot forbear to express 
 my own inclination to the latter opinion ; in which case they may have 
 proceeded no further than the regions about the Gulf, where they became 
 amalgamated with the Indians, who may have intercepted them in the 
 journey, and by whom, as a tribe, they were exterminated. That some 
 such event did take place, as before stated, many facts would induce us 
 to believe. Many of their customs survived them, in the practices of 
 the more southern tribes, when the country was £rst occupied by the 
 Europeans, which point strongly in this direction. Among these tribes the 
 Natchez will be remembered, whose arts, worship, sacerdotal system and 
 customs were very similar, and in many respects identical with those of 
 Mexico . This identity of customs , worship , etc . , I had intended to discuss 
 more at length, and also present the faclswhich bear upon the question, but, 
 as I have already transcended my limits, I must desist. It seems to me 
 to be established, that the ancestors of the Indian tribes came t^America 
 by way of Behring's Straits. These are frozen over every year as late as 
 April, according to Professor Henry, who further states that "intercourse 
 at present is constant, by means of canoes, in summer between the Asiatic 
 
ORIGIN OF THE PRE-HISTOEIO KACES. 121 
 
 ftnd American sides. As acother fact relating to tlie same question, we 
 may state that, while the Asiatic projection near Behring's Straits is 
 almost a sterile, rocky waste, the opposite coast presents a much more 
 inviting appearance, abounding in trees and shrubs. Moreover, the 
 climate, when we pass southward of the peninsula of Alaska, is of a genial 
 character, the temperature continuing the same as far down as Oregon. 
 The mildness of the temperature, and the descent of the isothermal line, 
 or that of equal temperature, along the coast, are due to a great current 
 called the Gulf Stream of the Pacific, which carries the warm water of the 
 equator along the eastern coast of Asia, thence across the opposite coast 
 of America, and along the latter on its return to the equator. The 
 action of this current, which does not appear to have been considered by 
 the ethnologist, must have had much influence in inducing and deter- 
 mining the course of the migration." He adds "that the present 
 inhabitants of the countries contiguous to Behring's Straits on the two 
 sides, in manners, customs, and physical appearance, are almost identical." 
 It is believed that the hypothesis we maintain, which holds that the 
 southern portions of this continent were peopled by tribes who had their 
 origin in more northern regions, and who, in some cases at least, were 
 driven from their ancient homes by mongrel hordes who made their 
 appearanceby way of Behring's Straits, is the only one which harmonizes 
 the many otherwise inexplicable facts which continually confront the 
 student of the antiquities of America. No other theory will satisfactorily 
 explain the presence in the same mounds of skulls of such different and 
 contrasting types, and which are so frequently met with in the tumuli 
 of Missouri. 
 
 In bringing our work to a close, I beg leave to say that, in the prepar- 
 ation of the foregoing chapters, it has been my aim to present the subjects 
 treated of in a form as attractive and popular as I was capable of, and in 
 a manner in keeping with the historical character of the work in which 
 they appear. If, to the scientific reader, I may seem at times to have 
 expressed my views with a warmth and enthusiasm not always appropri- 
 ate to scientific inquiries, my desire to invest with all possible interest, to 
 the general reader, a subject which might ordinarily be considered dry and 
 unattractive, must be my apology. Having for fifteen years devoted all 
 the time which could be spared from the labors of my profession to archae- 
 ological studies, and especially the antiquities of my native land, the 
 enthusiasm which I felt at the outset has been intensified rather than di- 
 minished, at every step of the journey. Indeed, the results which have 
 been attained already are of such absorbing interest as to arouse the 
 
122 AECH^OLOGY. 
 
 enthusiasm of every student of these antique memorials ; and the zeal of 
 the antiquary receives a fresh impulse from time to time, as he grapples 
 with those questions which relate to the origin of the different races of 
 men, their modes of development, the I'outes of their migrations and the 
 like ; as also, while he labors to construct a pre-historic history from the 
 ashes of foi-gotten cities, the debris of former habitations, and the 
 mouldering relics which ancient tombs disclose. 
 
 It is related in sacred story, of an old prophet, that he was set down 
 in a valley of dry bones, and told to pass by them round about, and 
 behold they were very many, and very dry. But, at the sound of his 
 prophetic voice, there was a noise and shaking and coming together, bone 
 to his bone, the flesh and skin covered them again, and there stood up 
 an exceeding great army. So the scientist to-day passes up and down 
 the valleys, and among the relics and bones of vanished peoples, and as 
 he touches them with the magic wand of scientific induction, these ancient 
 men stand up on their feet, revivified, rehabilitated, and proclaim with 
 solemn voice the story of their nameless tribe or race, the cotemporan- 
 eous animals, and the physical appearance of the earth during those 
 pre-historic ages. 
 
 The Christian scientist, pursuing his investigations regardless of all 
 dogmatic theories concerning divine revelation, and bringing, at last, all 
 right results of his work to the subjective light of that old record which 
 thus far they have only served to glorify, discovers now and then the 
 golden key by which the sublime and occult truths condensed in its sen- 
 tentious statements may be unlocked, and the long aeons understood, 
 which are comprehended in the evening and the morning of the creative 
 days. 
 
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