The Prehistoric World; Or, Vanished RacesAllen, Emory Adams
History
The Prehistoric World; Or, Vanished Races
Allen, Emory Adams
Archaeology; Indians; Prehistoric peoples
The work represented in the figure at left is stated to have been
in the near neighborhood of the former, and to have been
intimately connected with it. Mr. Pidgeon claims to have found
five of these circles and two pentagons. So far as we know, he is
the only authority for their occurrence, no one else having been
so fortunate as to have found them. This is surely a singular
work, and we can not fail to recognize in it a representation of
the sun and the moon. In excavating in the central mound, we are
assured that small pieces Of mica were found abundantly mixed
with the soil. “Had the surface-soil been removed with care, and
the stratum beneath been washed by a few heavy showers of rain,
so thoroughly studded was it with small particles of mica, that
under the sun’s rays it certainly would have presented no unapt
symbolic representation of that luminary.”79
Crescent Works.
Our next figure is another singular arrangement of
crescent-shaped works and mounds. Lapham says that
crescent-shaped works are found in Wisconsin. Pidgeon says that
crescent works are found in Illinois, but works arranged as shown
in this wood-cut he found in but four places in Wisconsin. Could
we verify this author’s statements, this illustration and the
preceding one would be very good evidence of the prevalence of
sun-worship among the effigy Mound Builders of Wisconsin. This
would be nothing singular, since the Indian race almost
universally reverenced the sun.80
The figure below represents a group of works which, we are told,
were of a class formerly abundant in Missouri and Iowa. The
embankments are stated to be of varying heights, but all of the
same length. They do not quite meet, but a mound defends the
opening. Sometimes a square is so represented, and sometimes but
two walls.
Triangular Works.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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