Mound builder (people)
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Mound Builder is a general term referring to the American Indians who constructed various styles of earthen mounds for burial, residential and ceremonial purposes. These included Archaic, Woodland period (Adena and Hopewell cultures), and Mississippian period Pre-Columbian cultures dating from roughly 3000 BC to the 16th century AD, and living in the Great Lakes region, the Ohio River region, and the Mississippi River region.
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[edit] Name and culture
The term "mound builder" was also applied to an imaginary race believed to have constructed these earthworks, because Americans from the 16th-19th centuries generally thought that American Indians did not build the mounds.
The namesake cultural trait of the mound builders was the building of mounds and other earthworks. These burial and ceremonial structures were typically flat-topped pyramids or platform mounds, flat-topped or rounded cones, elongated ridges, and sometimes a variety of other forms. The best known flat-topped pyramidal structure, which is also the largest pre-Columbian earthwork north of Mexico at over 100 feet (30 m) tall, is Monk's Mound at Cahokia. Some effigy mounds were made in unusual shapes, such as the outline of culturally significant animals. The most famous effigy mound, Serpent Mound in southern Ohio, is 5 feet (1.5 m) tall, 20 (6 m) wide, over 1,330 feet (405 m) long, and shaped as a serpent.
The mound builders included many different tribal groups and chiefdoms, probably involving a bewildering array of beliefs and unique cultures, united only by the shared architectural practice of mound construction. This practice, believed to be associated with a cosmology that had a cross-cultural appeal, may indicate common cultural antecedents. The first mound building is an early marker of incipient political and social complexity among the cultures in the Eastern United States.
[edit] Archaeological surveys
The most complete reference for these earthworks is Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley, written by Ephraim G. Squier, Edwin H. Davis and Samuel Morton. It was published in 1848 by the Smithsonian Institution. Since many of the features they documented have since been destroyed or diminished by farming and development, their surveys, sketches and descriptions are still used by modern archaeologists. All of their sites located in Kentucky came from the manuscripts of C.S. Rafinesque. A smaller regional study in 1931 by author and archaeologist Fred Dustin charted and examined the mounds and Ogemaw Earthworks near Saginaw, Michigan. Archaeological survey and recording of mounds is an ongoing task.
[edit] Historical eras
Mound builder cultures can be divided into roughly three eras:
- Archaic era
Poverty Point in what is now Louisiana is a prominent example of early archaic mound builder construction (c. 2500 BC - 1000 BC). While earlier Archaic mound centers, Poverty Point remains one of the best-known early examples.
- Woodland period
The Archaic period was followed by the Woodland period (c. 1000 BC). Some well-understood examples would be the Adena culture of Ohio and nearby states and the subsequent Hopewell culture known from Illinois to Ohio and renowned for their geometric earthworks. The Adena and Hopewell were not, however, the only mound building peoples during this time period. There were contemporaneous mound building cultures throughout the Eastern United States.
- Mississippian culture
Around 900-1450 AD the Mississippian culture developed and spread through the Eastern United States, primarily along the river valleys. The location where the Mississippian culture is first clearly developed is located in Illinois, and is referred to today as Cahokia.
[edit] Alternate explanations
Through the mid-nineteenth century, Native Americans were generally not believed to have built the mounds of the eastern U.S.
A key work in the widespread recognition of the true origins of the mounds was the lengthy 1894 report of Cyrus Thomas of the Bureau of American Ethnology, which concluded that the prehistoric earthworks of the eastern United States were the work of Native Americans. A small number of people had earlier reached similar conclusions: Thomas Jefferson, for example, excavated a mound and noted similarities between mound builder funeral practices and the funeral practices of Native Americans in his time.
Several alternate explanations were forwarded as to the origins of the mound builders:
- Vikings
Benjamin Smith Barton proposed the theory that the mound builders were Vikings who came to America and eventually disappeared.
- Ancient world immigrants
Other people believed that they were Greeks, Africans, Chinese or assorted Europeans. The Ten Lost Tribes of Israel were often given credit for the mounds by Euroamericans who embraced a Biblical worldview.
- Book of Mormon inhabitants
The Book of Mormon (first published in 1830) claims that a Mesopotamian group possibly around 3100 and 2200 B.C. (called Jaredites), and Israelite groups in 590 B.C. (called Nephites, Lamanites and Mulekites) settled in the Americas and built magnificent cities, only to be later destroyed by warfare around A.D. 385. Mormon apologists claim that mound builder areas may be one of the theoretical places in which Bountiful stood, a prominent city named in the Book of Mormon, though most LDS scholars believe the Book of Mormon lands to be located in Central America in the regions occupied by the Olmec and Maya cultures. The hill Cumorah (near present-day Manchester, New York) is said to be the place where the Book of Mormon record was buried, sometime after A.D. 421. The claims recorded in the Book of Mormon have never been verified by any archaeological evidence satisfactory to non-Mormon scientists.
- Black civilizations
Other groups that have developed explanations about the mound builders are certain sects affiliated with the Black nationalist Moorish Science philosophy. They argue that the mound builders were an ancient advanced Black civilization that developed the legendary continents of Atlantis and Mu as well as ancient Egypt and Mesoamerica. Like other mound builder explanations, these black groups also posit that the American Indians were too uncivilized and unable to develop cities and the technology necessary for building these mounds.
- Divine creation
Reverend Landon West claimed that Serpent Mound in Ohio was built by God. He believed that God built the mound himself and placed it in Eden, which apparently was in Ohio.
- Mythical cultures
Some people went as far as to attribute the mounds to mythical cultures: Lafcadio Hearn suggested that the mounds were built by people from the lost continent of Atlantis.
[edit] Effects of alternate explanations
The mound builder explanations were not just a simple hoaxes but an honest misinterpretation of real data from valid sources. These explanations were widely accepted by scholars and laymen. Reference to an alleged race appears in the poem "The Prairies" (1832) by William Cullen Bryant [1]
- Justification to remove Indians
The removal of most Indians from the mound builder regions by the 1830s, by means of the Trail of Tears, was partly justified by the theory that the Indians destroyed the mound builders. Because people thought that the mound builders were sometimes believed to be ancient Europeans, the removal of the savage Indian tribes was justified in order to reclaim their land, as well as to ensure the safety of civilization.
- Assumption construction too complex for Indians
One was the belief the American Indians were simple beings that could not have constructed such magnificent earthworks and artifacts. The stone, metal, and clay artifacts were thought to be too complex for the primitive Indians to make. However, in the American Southeast, Northeast, and Midwest, there were numerous Indian cultures that were sedentary and participated in agriculture. Numerous Indian towns even had walls surrounding them for defense. If they were capable of this type of construction, building mounds should have been no more difficult. People who believed that the Indians were not responsible for the earthworks also used the more plausible argument that they could have not built them because they were nomadic peoples who followed their food. In this view, they could not have devoted the time and effort to construct mounds and other time-consuming projects.
When Europeans first arrived in America they never witnessed the American Indians building mounds; and when asked about the mounds, most of the Indians did not know anything about them. Yet there were numerous written accounts about the Indians' construction of the mounds by Europeans. One detailed account was by Garcilaso de la Vega, who wrote about how they built the mounds and the temples that were placed on top of the mounds. There were even French expeditions that stayed with Indian societies who built mounds.
- Assumption construction older than Indians
People also claimed that the Indians were not the mound builders because the mounds and related artifacts were older than the Indian culture itself. Caleb Atwater's misunderstanding of stratigraphy led him to believe that the mound builders were a much older civilization than the Indians. In his book, Antiquities Discovered in the Western States (1820), Atwater claims that Indian remains are always found right beneath the surface of the earth. Since the artifacts associated with the mound builders are found fairly deep in the ground, Atwater argued that they must be from a different group of people. The discovery of metal artifacts further convinced people that the mound builders were not Native Americans because the Indians were not known to engage in metallurgy. This was another ignorant perception that was based on the assumption that all Indian cultures are similar. Some artifacts that were found in relation to the mounds were inscribed with symbols. The Europeans did not know of any Indian cultures that had a writing system, so they assumed it was another group who created them.
[edit] Hoaxes
Several hoaxes were based on the mound builders.
- Newark Holy Stones
In 1860, David Wyrick discovered the "Keystone tablet", containing Hebrew language inscriptions written on it in Newark, Ohio. Soon after, he found the "Newark Decalogue Stone" nearby, also claimed to contain Hebrew. It was later discovered that Reverend John W. McCarty created these "Newark Holy Stones" and put them in a place where Wyrick would find them.
- Davenport tablets
Another hoax related to the mound builders was the discovery of the Davenport tablets by Reverend Jacob Gass. These also bore inscriptions on them that later were found to be fake.
- Walam Olum hoax
The Walam Olum hoax had considerable influence in the mound builders. Constantine Samuel Rafinesque published in 1836 his translation of a text he claimed had been written in pictographs on wooden tablets. This text explained the origin of the Lenape Indians in Asia, told of their passage over the Bering Strait, and narrated their subsequent migration across the North American continent. This “Walam Olum” tells of battles with native peoples already in America before the Lenape arrived. It was assumed by others that these original people were the mound builders, and that the Lenape Indians overthrew them and destroyed their culture. David Oestreicher later branded Rafinesque's story a hoax, arguing that the Walam Olum glyphs derive from Chinese, Egyptian, and Mayan alphabets. Meanwhile, the belief that the Native Americans destroyed the mound builder culture had earned widespread acceptance.
- Kinderhood Plates
The Kinderhook Plates ("discovered" in 1843) were another hoax planted in Native American mounds. This hoax, however, had the aim of discrediting the supposed translation powers of Mormon prophet Joseph Smith.
[edit] See also
- Angel Mounds
- Cahokia Mounds
- Criel Mound
- Grave Creek Mound
- Etowah Indian Mounds
- Hopewell Culture National Historical Park
- Kincaid Mounds State Historic Site
- Mound Cemetery, at Marietta, Ohio
- Moundville Archaeological Site
- Moundsville, West Virginia
- Newark Earthworks in Newark, Ohio
- Petroforms
- Roods Landing Site
- Southeastern Ceremonial Complex
- Southwestern College (Kansas) School mascot: The "Moundbuilders"
- Spiro Mounds
- Toltec Mounds Archeological State Park
- Town Creek Indian Mound
- Tumulus, Mounds (or barrows) of Europe and Asia
[edit] References
- ^ http://www.4literature.net/William_Cullen_Bryant/Prairies/ Bryant, William Cullen, "The Prairies" (1832)
- Thomas, Cyrus. Report on the mound explorations of the Bureau of Ethnology. Pp. 3-730. Twelfth annual report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1890-91, by J. W. Powell, Director. XLVIII+742 pp., 42 pls., 344 figs. 1894.
- Feder, Kenneth L.. ‘’Frauds, Myths, and Mysteries: Science and Pseudoscience in Archaeology’’. 5th ed. New York: McGraw Hill, 2006.
[edit] External links
- Lost Race Myth
- LostWorlds.org | An Interactive Museum of the American Indian
- LenaweeHistory.com | Mound Builders section, The Western Historical Society 1909, reprint.
- Artist Hideout, Art of the Ancients
- Ancient Monuments Placemarks
- The Mound Builders, available at Project Gutenberg.
- With Climate Swing, a Culture Bloomed in Americas (mound builders in Peru)
