Although we cannot say positively that no other tribe occupied this particular section between 1540 and 1690, still the evidence and indications leading to that conclusion are so strong as to justify us in assuming it. We find their frontiers on the borders of Georgia in 1540; we can trace back their settlements on the Hiawassee to a period preceding 1652. We have evidence that the settlements on the Little Tennessee were still older, and that even these were made subsequent to those on the Nolichucky. We have their own tradition, as given by Lederer, that they migrated to this region about the close of the thirteenth century from a more northern section; and, finally, their uniform and persistent statement, from the time first encountered by Europeans, that when they came to this region they found it uninhabited, with the exception of a Creek settlement on the lower Hiawassee. This clearly indicates a movement southward, a fact of much importance in the study of this somewhat abnormal tribe. If, therefore, we can show that these mounds, or any of the typical ones, were constructed since the discovery of America, we have good reason to believe that they are to be attributed to the Cherokees, notwithstanding their statement to Bartram that they did not build the one at Cowe. At the bottom of one of the largest mounds found in this region, the T. F. Nelson triangle heretofore described, and by the side of the skeleton of the principal personage interred in it, as shown by the arrangement of the bodies of those buried with him, and by the ornaments and implements found with him, were discovered three pieces of iron. That one of the pieces, at least, is part of an implement of European manufacture, I think no one who examines it will doubt (see Fig. 31). It appears to be part of a sword blade or the blade of a large knife. Another of the pieces is apparently a large awl or punch, a part of the deer-horn handle yet remaining attached to it. A chemical examination made by Professor Clarke, chemist of the United States Geological Survey, shows that these were not made of meteoric iron. That these cannot be attributed to an intrusive burial is evident from the following facts: _First_, they were found at the very bottom of the pit, which had been dug before depositing the bodies; _second_, they were found with engraved shells, celts, and other relics of this character; and _third_, they were deposited with the principal personage who had been buried in the mound.