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<< Our Photo Pages >> Hopewell Culture National Historic Site - Misc. Earthwork in United States in Great Lakes Midwest

Submitted by bat400 on Monday, 10 June 2013  Page Views: 22190

Multi-periodSite Name: Hopewell Culture National Historic Site Alternative Name: Mound City, The Chillicothe Hopewell Mounds
Country: United States
NOTE: This site is 0.109 km away from the location you searched for.

Region: Great Lakes Midwest Type: Misc. Earthwork
Nearest Town: Chillicothe, Ohio
Latitude: 39.376000N  Longitude: 83.006W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
2 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
4 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
5 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
4

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I have visited· I would like to visit

eirrac5 would like to visit

stonetracker visited on 1st Oct 2019 - their rating: Cond: 3 Amb: 4 Access: 4 Site is as described in the overview and comments. A mostly faithful reconstructed site, due to damage from previous excavations and military or agricultural use of property. Many Hopewell mound and earthworks sites have suffered from similar modern activities. Some have been at least partially rebuilt.

eforrest25 visited on 21st Aug 2015 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 5 Access: 5 The National Park Service has done an excellent job of preserving and expanding the site since the last time I visited there in 1994. I don't remember the enclosing walls having been visible at that time due to shrubs and foliage. The visitors is very good and has an excellent film which talks about the various other Hopewell and Adena sites in the area.

mfrincu visited on 2nd Jul 2015 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 3 Access: 5 Rangers are very helpful and answer all questions. There is also a 20 minute film giving an overview of the culture.

rrmoser visited on 7th May 2015 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 5 Access: 4 second visit to this remarkable place. Its a knockout.

bat400 have visited here

Average ratings for this site from all visit loggers: Condition: 3.75 Ambience: 4.25 Access: 4.5

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by stonetracker : A portion of enclosure wall next to east gateway. The enclosure does not appear to have an adjacent ditch, but there are borrow pits just outside the wall. Likely were used to provide the soil for the mounds and earthwork. (Vote or comment on this photo)
Misc. Earthworks in USA. Mound City Group - Hopewell Culture NHP, Lower Ohio Valley, Ohio. A religious and civic centre consisting of earthwork enclosures, burial mounds, misc. mounds, and the location of a timber building.

The Mound City Group is part of the Hopewell Culture National Historic Park, near Chillicothe, Ohio, US. (Website)
The park consists of several separate sites. For the most part the site is a detailed reconstruction. Mound City is a group of earthen mounds within a nearly square enclosure on the banks of the Scioto River. It was built and used by the Hopewell people roughly 2000 years ago over a period of a few hundred years.

This was not a living site, although Hopewell group camps and living areas are found throughout the area. Several have been found very close to this group of mounds. The burial mounds were generally built over time and are of different types of burials. One of the most interesting mounds (the Mica Grave Mound) started as a wooden building with burials in the floor. Later the building was broken down and burnt. An earthen mound was raised over the site. The burials were accompanied by grave goods and other artifacts. Many of these artifacts (or reproductions) can be seen in the museum. The artifacts found on the site included pottery, effigy pipes, and ornaments made from copper, mica, iron ore, and shells. (The materials mentioned originated outside the Lower Ohio Valley.)

There are over twenty mounds within the enclosure. Five of them are fairly large, one about 80 feet in diameter at the base. One mound is narrow and about 100 feet long.

You enter the site from the visitor's center. The mounds and enclosure earthworks are kept clear of trees and brush and are grass covered. Beyond are the wooded banks of the river. Like most easily accessible sites in the Ohio Valley, this one was completely excavated several times. A WWI army camp stood on the site. Most of the mounds are reconstructions - although they are thought to be very good ones as the original excavators (Squier and Davis, in the 1840s) made a systematic and detailed record of the site. Early or late in the day, especially in the "off" season, it's fairly easy to ignore the fact that you're just off a major highway, with a museum and visitor's center right behind you.

Fairly unobtrusive signage near individual mounds identifies them as you walk among them with or without a guide book. You can walk out to the river as well.

Note: Like most federal and state properties Hopewell Culture NHP is about presenting the site and educating the public. Important to note that the Hopewell Mound Group referenced in some of the old map images is a geographically distinct site from "Mound City" and at a different location and river system (North Paint Creek). But both sites are under the jurisdiction of HCNHS. Posted photos here are strictly for Mound City. Note that the so-called Shriver Circle (large circular earthwork a short distance outside the Mound City enclosure shown in the Squire and Davis map) is gone, as is a smaller circle. Victims of farming, road building, and a correctional center. There is at least one mound in a wooded area on the approach road to the visitors center that is outside the enclosure, but that's it.

Note: Researchers launch a website that makes a collection of artifacts of Hopewell Culture publicly accessible. See comments.
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Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by eforrest25 : The view of the mound cluster with the long mound and the higher mound behind it gives some scale to the size. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature : Cross-section of a mound from "Mound Builders..." via archive.org (Vote or comment on this photo)

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature : Burial at Hopewell, from "Prehistoric America" via archive.org (Vote or comment on this photo)

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by Bat400 : This is a life sized reproduction of a Hopewell dog effigy pipe. (It might be a wolf.) The original was found in the "Mound of Pipes." Photo by bat400 in spring 2006. (1 comment - Vote or comment on this photo)

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by Bat400 : A life sized reproduction of a crow effigy pipe - the original found in the "Mound of Pipes." The British Museum has the original. Photo spring 2006. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by AKFisher : Very unusual pipe excavated from the original Hopewell mound group at Chillicothe, Ohio. I would expect that stem hole is on the back side. From: Sheltrone 1936. Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016). 

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by AKFisher : Pipes excavated from Mound City near Chillicothe, Ohio kept by the British Museum in London. All of these were made in Portsmouth, Ohio. From: Uldrich, E. youtube.com/watch?v=V6BMUdmfy-o Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016). 

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by AKFisher : Mid-1800s survey of mounds & earthworks a few miles north of downtown Chillicothe, Ohio. The formation on the upper center, Mound City, still exists and is the location of the museum and focal point of the Hopewell Culture National Park. The site was converted into a military base in WW-I but was later restored--it's a really great place to visit. The circular formation on the upper left is gone...

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by AKFisher : "Mound City" at Hopewell Culture National Monument in Chillicothe, Ohio. Photo courtesy Dr Greg Little, author of the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Indian Mounds & Earthworks (2016).

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by AKFisher : Photo credit Gregory L. Little, Ed.D. Moorehead & Laufer's (1922) survey of the original Hopewell site near Chillicothe, Ohio.

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by stonetracker : Interpretation re: 200 broken effigy pipes found in a smaller mound. The pipes were likely ritually broken before burial.

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by stonetracker : One of the borrow pits.

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by eforrest25 : Although this is compressed, it gives a rough layout of the complex, plus the enclosure wall.

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature : 1847 plan of the Hopewell sites around Chillicothe, from "Prehistoric America" via archive.org

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature : Old photo from "Mound Builders" via archive.org

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature : The Antlered King from "Mound Builders..." via archive.org

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature : Old plan drawing from "Archaeological History of Ohio" via archive.org "Mound City" appears at upper right along the Scioto River.

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by durhamnature : Finds from Hopewell, from "American Antiquarian" via archive.org

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by bat400 : Hopewell Culture NHP, Mound City Group. Outside the main enclosure, looking in. In the immediate foreground is a large barrow pit where the earth for the enclosure wall was taken. Photo by bat400, taken in late summer of 1999.

Hopewell Culture National Historic Site
Hopewell Culture National Historic Site submitted by bat400 : Hopewell Culture NHP, Mound City Group. Inside the main enclosure, this is a view looking toward the west. The large mound farthest back is the "Central Mound," the largest of the group. Closer is an elliptical mound, and a smaller conical mound is closest. * The "Central Mound" was erected over the remains of two timber buildings with 13 cremated burials. Artifacts found included falcon ...

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 2.2km S 187° Adena Mound* Artificial Mound
 2.6km ENE 63° Hopeton Earthworks* Artificial Mound
 3.8km NE 42° Cedar Banks Works* Ancient Village or Settlement
 3.8km S 171° Story Mound (Chillicothe)* Artificial Mound
 6.3km SSW 200° Steel Earthworks* Misc. Earthwork
 6.6km S 185° Junction Earthworks* Misc. Earthwork
 7.9km WSW 257° Hopewell Mound Group* Artificial Mound
 12.4km SE 143° High Bank Works* Misc. Earthwork
 15.9km WNW 282° Frankfort Works Mound* Ancient Village or Settlement
 15.9km SW 225° Spruce Hill* Vitrified Fort
 17.1km SE 140° Liberty Earthworks* Artificial Mound
 18.3km SW 224° Baum Earthworks* Artificial Mound
 22.8km NNE 14° Luthor List Mound* Artificial Mound
 24.0km SW 230° Seip Earthwork Enclosure* Misc. Earthwork
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 25.7km NNE 12° Circleville* Misc. Earthwork
 26.0km ENE 71° Karshner Mound Artificial Mound
 28.0km NE 42° Tarlton Cross* Artificial Mound
 36.0km S 182° Piketon Mounds* Artificial Mound
 45.2km SW 230° Fort Hill* Hillfort
 53.3km SW 223° Serpent Mound, Ohio* Artificial Mound
 53.5km SW 223° Serpent Mound Stone Standing Stone (Menhir)
 56.4km N 1° Indian Mound Park* Artificial Mound
 62.6km W 263° Ratcliffe Mound Artificial Mound
 63.9km S 180° Tremper* Barrow Cemetery
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"Hopewell Culture National Historic Site" | Login/Create an Account | 13 News and Comments
  
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Video: Hopewell Culture National Historic Site by stonetracker on Sunday, 29 January 2023
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https://photos.app.goo.gl/wGdCGH1QXPrkDH3Q9

Largest mounds from the central to north side.
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Video: Hopewell Culture National Historic Site by stonetracker on Sunday, 29 January 2023
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https://photos.app.goo.gl/6U2VMHi8YZHkSAJa7

Pan of entire site from north to south.
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Re: Hopewell Culture National Historic Site by stonetracker on Sunday, 29 January 2023
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Important to note that the Hopewell Mound Group referenced in some of the old map images is a geographically distinct site from "Mound City" and at a different location and river system (North Paint Creek). But both sites are under the jurisdiction of HCNHS.

The photos i will post here are strictly for Mound City.

Note that the so-called Shriver Circle (large circular earthwork a short distance outside the Mound City enclosure shown in the Squire and Davis map) is gone, as is a smaller circle. Victims of farming, road building, and a correctional center. I did manage to locate at least one mound in a wooded area on the approach road to the visitors center that is outside the enclosure, but that's it.
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    Re: Hopewell Culture National Historic Site by Andy B on Tuesday, 31 January 2023
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    Hello Stonetracker, thanks for this. Do you have the long/lat location for the Hopewell Mound Group as it sounds like we should do a separate page for that and move those photos onto that page.
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    Re: Hopewell Culture National Historic Site by richards1080 on Tuesday, 31 January 2023
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    Hello,
    I thought I'd add a slight clarifiction to your Hopewell Culture National Historic Site information. It's official name is Hopewell Culture National Historic Park. It contains The Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks and according to their nps.gov website. On their website there's information stating The Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks were selected by the U.S. Department of the Interior to be a proposed nominee from the United States to the World Heritage List. I have been to the site only once in the summer of 1990, when my husband and I visited a number of major earthworks across Ohio.
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Re: Book Review: Hopewell culture shows little evidence of warfare by Anonymous on Friday, 24 April 2020
wonderful information, thank you!
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Hopewell Culture project launches website by bat400 on Monday, 26 September 2016
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"A team of researchers, led by Carrie Heitman, has developed a website that makes a collection of artifacts of Hopewell Culture publicly accessible.

"The website at hopewell.unl.edu has the goal to "foster interest in the Hopewell Culture of the Ohio River Valley and serve as a catalyst for future work to create a larger, more comprehensive, repository." "

The website "... presents six different forms of information from The Field Museum’s Hopewell archaeology collections: Archival Documents related to original field excavations; a Catalog Report of Hopewell objects; Finding Aids for the relevant archival collections; Catalog Cards describing some individual objects; Warren K. Moorehead’s photographic Excavation Albums; and a collection of artifact Images. "

"This collaboration between the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, the University of Illinois at Chicago, Northwestern University and the Field Museum of Natural History combines museum collections, archives, and digital humanities computing."

Source: University of Nebraska - Lincoln. Anthropology.
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ROBERT L. HARNESS Summer Lecture Series - Hopewell Culture National Historic Park by bat400 on Wednesday, 19 June 2013
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Hopewell Culture National Historical Park is pleased to host the summer 2013 archeological lecture series. The following is a list of speakers and titles of topics to be presented. The programs will be held at the Mound City Group Visitor Center located at 16062 St. Rt. 104 just north of Chillicothe . Each lecture will start at 7:30 P.M.
______________

June 20: Hearth Features, Land-Use Intensification, and Archaeological Preservation Bias: A Case Study from Northwest Texas
Laura R. Murphy, Department of Anthropology, University of Kansas

Archaeologists assume a strong link between increasing hunter-gatherer populations, decreasing territories, and an increase in plant cooking facilities on the landscape. Fire-cracked rock (FCR) features such as hearths and earth-ovens used to process plant foods with lower caloric values reflect an intensified use of the land. Because the link between FCR features, population, and land-use intensification depends on locating hearth features and establishing a radiocarbon chronology, it is critical to measure erosion bias and correct population estimates based on sites lost. I present a method for calculating demographic changes where we correct for preservation bias after determining the density of hearth features from landform surfaces of known ages. I test the model in northwest Texas where surface survey yielded 385 hearths.

June 27: The Circleville Earthwork and Hopewell
Jerrel Anderson

The Circleville earthwork was one of the great Hopewell works of Ohio , but it was unfortunately lost to history by destruction in the early 19th century by the rapidly growing village of Circleville , and also by Squier's and Davis's cursory treatment of it in their 1847 book, "Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley ". Because of these factors, it has been largely ignored in discussions of the Hopewell phenomenon. This great work and its surroundings have much to teach us about the Hopewell: the work shared many features with other Ohio earthworks but it had some unique attributes too, it was geographically isolated from the concentration of works around Chillicothe and so can serve as a model for settlement and population patterns associated with a major work, and it serves as a sad reminder of how much can be lost to unwitting progress. This presentation will cover the work itself, compare it with other Ohio earthworks, present currently known Hopewell settlement patterns around Circleville, and encourage preservation of knowledge by all devotees of archeology.

July 11: Hopewell Copper in Ohio,Wisconsin and Illinois
Cindy Kocik

Hopewell material culture and ideas played a prominent role and spread widely in the Middle Woodland period of Midwest prehistory. During this time of voluminous trade in a number of materials, copper procured from the Lake Superior area was transported to the Hopewell core in Ohio , and the metal was fashioned into a variety of artifacts. This lecture focuses on research comparing copper use in Ohio , Hopewell-related sites in southwestern Wisconsin , and Havana Hopewell sites in the Illinois River Valley .

July 25: Results of a Large Scale Geophysical Survey at Hopewell Culture National Historical Park
Jarrod Burks

Over the last year large scale magnetic surveys have been underway at three of the sites in Hopewell Culture National Historical: Hopewell Mound Group, Hopeton, and High Banks. In this talk I explore some of the results from the survey. Looking at the resulting data at the end of each day was a real treat as I never knew what might have been found. From buried earthwork ditches and large pit features to lines of posts following earthwork edges, there are many interesting features in the new data that should launch decades of exciting excavations. These data are so new that you will be some of the first people on the planet to see signs of these buried features since the Hopewel

Read the rest of this post...
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Final Report and Synthesis of 50 years of study. by bat400 on Monday, 03 June 2013
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Mound City:
The Archaeology of a Renown Ohio Hopewell Mound Center
Issue 6 of Special report (Midwest Archeological Center (U.S.))
Author James Allison Brown
Contributor Midwest Archeological Center (U.S.)
Publisher U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Midwest Archeological Center, 2012

Discussed by Brad Lepper in the 7 April 2013 issue of the Ohio Archaeology Blog.
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    Mound City: the Archaeology of the Renowed Hopewell Mound Center by bat400 on Tuesday, 04 June 2013
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    When you arrive at the threshold of Mound City in Chillicothe, the view before you is, as its name suggests, reminiscent of a cityscape. The dense cluster of mounds surrounded by a low earthen wall is, however, not a place where ancient Native Americans lived. Instead, it is one of the greatest concentrations of mortuary ceremonialism in the ancient Americas.

    In my April column in the Columbus Dispatch, I summarize some of the conclusions reached by Dr. James Brown, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at Northwestern University, after 50 years of studying Mound City. Brown's final report of investigations has just been published by the Midwest Archeological Center and it was worth the wait.

    The publication is timely, because Mound City, along with several other key Hopewell culture earthworks, is on the United States' Tentative List for sites to be considered for nomination to the UNESCO World Heritage List. And Brown's analysis demonstrates overwhelmingly that Mound City belongs on that list.

    Brown writes that the new report "conveys the research on the investigations at the Mound City mound group, near Chillicothe, Ohio, conducted between 1963 to 1972, with details provided from firsthand investigation between May 1 to October 12, 1963 on Mound 10 and the Mound 13, the south and southeast embankment and the southeast corner embankment and the southeast borrow pit."

    Brown's report also synthesizes the research of previous generations of archaeologists at Mound City, including the pioneering work of Ephraim Squier and Edwin Davis in the mid-19th century. To Brown's credit, rather than criticizing their comparatively rough field methods, he acknowledges the important contributions made by these early investigators. For example, he notes that the "fieldwork in 1963 and 1966 revealed the embankment to have the same asymmetrically oblong shape that Squier and Davis (1848) mapped."

    It is now recognized that the "flat-sided ellipse" or "round-cornered square" shape of the enclosure is not haphazard, but closely corresponds to "the plan view of the better constructed sub-mound structures, such as Mound 10, complete to the positioning of the gateways roughly in the center of the short ends, precisely where the entrances to the sub-mound structures are located (Figure 4-1)." Brown writes that the embankment is "an enlarged version of the shelters it surrounds” – “a structure of structures, so to speak."

    Nor is the alignment of the earthwork hap-hazard. The four sides of the embank-ment are aligned “close to the cardinal directions” suggesting to Brown that the Hopewell builders oriented the site to the cosmos. This is certainly consistent with what we have learned about the alignment of other Hopewell earthworks, especially the Newark Earthworks.

    Brown’s book includes contributions from several other scholars, including a chapter on the environment and geographical context of Mound City by OHS's Curator Emerita, Martha Potter Otto.

    Mound City: the Archaeology of a Renown[ed] Hopewell Mound Center is an essential reference for anyone who wants to understand what happened at Mound City as well as for anyone who wants to understand the broader Hopewellian phenomenon.

    Thanks to coldrum for providing this link: http://ohio-archaeology.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/mound-city-archaeology-of-renowned.html.
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Mound City Ohio Dig is only the second in 50 years by bat400 on Sunday, 19 July 2009
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Submitted by coldrum ---

Team using modern equipment on mounds at Hopewell Culture.

A team of archeologists is hoping to learn more about the people who lived in the Scioto River Valley through an excavation at the Mound City earthworks over the next week - only the second such excavation in 50 years. James Brown, an archeologist and professor at Northwestern University, and Mark Lynott, of the National Park Service Midwest Archeology Center, began excavating a section of the outside wall of the earthworks at the Hopewell Culture National Historic Park, near Chillicothe.

"This site is so rich for archeologists. It's like the Egypt of North America for us," Lynott said.

An excavation of this type has not been conducted since 1963.

"What we're hoping to do, with newer technologies, is find out a little bit more about these mounds," Lynott said.

The mounds have been studied and reconstructed based on maps and research completed in 1840, before the initial works were flattened for farming and later became part of Camp Sherman, a military camp. In the early part of the 20th century, the area was recognized as a monument and the National Park Service now maintains the site.

By studying the soil layers, Lynott and Brown hope to learn more about how the original mounds might have been constructed. Remnants of the original mounds lay below the reconstructed mounds.

"People around here live in the center of one of the richest archeological areas, and some don't even know it," Lynott said, adding he always looks forward to research of the mounds in the Ross County area. "These sites are as interesting as Mesa Verde (in Colorado). People would come here by the thousands if they hadn't been leveled by farmlands."

In addition to the dig, the team also is studying some areas using geothermal equipment to look below the ground.
"They've been able to find where houses once stood," Perkins said. "After they took the posts out and other soil was filled in, they could see where the posts were and where the building or enclosure once stood. It's pretty amazing."


Source: Chillicothe Gazette.
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Re: Book Review: Hopewell culture shows little evidence of warfare by Andy B on Monday, 16 March 2009
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Originally Submitted by Andy B on Friday, 07 March 2003

For five years now, a University of Cincinnati team has been piecing together the fragments of three little-known, prehistoric Native American cultures that left behind immense earthworks that rival Stonehenge in their astronomical accuracy. Most of these sites ­ an extant example being Serpent Mound in Adams County, Ohio ­ survived close to two millennia before they were gouged out or cultivated in the 19th century or paved over for development in the 20th century.

And that's where the extensive, national team, led by architect John Hancock of the Center for the Reconstruction of Historic Sites at UC, comes in.

Using archaeological data gleaned from such modern technology as sensing devices and infrared photography as well as frontier maps and other aids provided by archaeologists, they've re-established the location and appearance of many of the region's earthworks constructed by the Adena, Hopewell and Fort Ancient cultures from as early as 600 BC. Now, using architectural software and high-resolution computer modeling and animation, this team is "virtually" rebuilding these massive earthworks that stretched over miles and rose to heights of about 15 feet. They call their computer/museum project, EarthWorks.

A portion of EarthWorks will officially opened as a permanent display at the Hopewell Culture National Historic Park in Chillicothe, Ohio, on March 6. Another portion will open for permanent display this summer at The Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal on June 21. That opening is part of Ohio Archaeology Week events. As the project nears completion, later exhibits are being planned across the country.

Thus far, EarthWorks has received about $1.5 million in funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Ohio Board of Regents, the Ohio Humanities Council, the Ohio Arts Council, the George Gund Foundation, and in-kind donations from the University of Cincinnati.

Learn more about the project with:

- A detailed explanation of EarthWorks and the Native American cultural achievements it targets

- An inventory of rebuilt sites as well as other Adena, Hopewell and Fort Ancient cultural sites pictured in EarthWorks

- An inventory of the individual components that comprise EarthWorks

- Previous recognition awarded to EarthWorks

- A few comments from EarthWorks' team members from across the country

Source: University of Cincinnati
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Book Review: Hopewell culture shows little evidence of warfare by Andy B on Sunday, 23 December 2007
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War, in one form or another, has been a part of the human experience for centuries.

Archaeologist Lawrence Keeley, in his book War Before Civilization, argues that it has been with us for millennia, but that historians and archaeologists have downplayed its importance because we like to think our ancestors were smarter than us and lived in more or less perfect harmony.

The evidence against that, however, is growing stronger with each discovery. Otzi, the 5,000-year-old Italian "Ice Man," died with an arrow in his back. Washington state's 9,000-year-old Kennewick Man had a spear point lodged in his hip.

In ancient Ohio, the earliest evidence for large-scale warfare is from the Late Prehistoric era, from about A.D. 1000 to 1550. Many villages of this era were built in defensible locations and often were surrounded by walls or ditches. Many of the bodies buried in the cemeteries have arrowheads embedded in them, or their bones show signs of other trauma.

What about earlier periods? Kent State University archaeologist Mark Seeman thinks warfare was important to the Hopewell culture, between about A.D. 1 and 400.

In his contribution to the new book The Taking and Displaying of Human Body Parts as Trophies by Amerindians, Seeman writes that the Hopewell practice of using certain human bones, such as jaws, as ornaments suggests that these objects were trophies of war.

Yet, Hopewell village sites were not built for defense, few Hopewell skeletons show evidence of violent death, and the so-called war "trophies" might be ritual objects related to ancestor worship.

Seeman concedes that "Hopewell wars must have been different than those of later times," but he argues that these differences are telling us about the evolving cultural contexts of warfare.

The gigantic earthworks of the Hopewell required unprecedented cooperation among communities. If they had been at war with one another, I don't think they could have created such architectural marvels.

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/science/stories/2007/12/18/sci_lepper18_ART_12-18-07_B5_0D8OUB9.html?sid=101
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<<< What is five plus one as a number? (Please type the answer to this question in the little box on the left)
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We would like to know more about this location. Please feel free to add a brief description and any relevant information in your own language.
Wir möchten mehr über diese Stätte erfahren. Bitte zögern Sie nicht, eine kurze Beschreibung und relevante Informationen in Deutsch hinzuzufügen.
Nous aimerions en savoir encore un peu sur les lieux. S'il vous plaît n'hesitez pas à ajouter une courte description et tous les renseignements pertinents dans votre propre langue.
Quisieramos informarnos un poco más de las lugares. No dude en añadir una breve descripción y otros datos relevantes en su propio idioma.