The Problem of Ohio Mounds | Page 7

Clinton County, Mich., are the burying places of
those killed in a battle between the Chippewas and Pottawatomies,
which occurred not many generations ago. [Footnote: Smithsonian
Report, part 1, 1884, p. 848.]
CHAPTER II.
SIMILARITY OF THE ARTS AND CUSTOMS OF THE MOUND
BUILDERS TO THOSE OF INDIANS.
The historical evidence is, as we have seen, conclusive that some of the
tribes of Indians were mound builders.
The explorations by the Bureau of Ethnology in the South and West
have also brought to light so many corroborative facts that the question
may be considered settled. These will shortly be given to the public;
only a few can be noticed here, and that in a very brief and general
way.
As the country was inhabited only by Indians at the time of its
discovery, and as we have no evidence, unless derived from the
mounds, of its having ever been occupied by any other people, every
fact indicating a similarity between the arts, customs, and social life of
the mound-builders and those of the red Indians, is an evidence of the
identity of the two peoples. The greater the number of these
resemblances, the greater the probability of the correctness of the
theory, so long as we find nothing irreconcilable with it.
Architecture.--One of the first circumstances which strike the mind of

the archaeologist who carefully studies these works as being very
significant, is the entire absence of any evidence in them of
architectural knowledge and skill approaching that exhibited by the
ruins of Mexico and Central America, or even equaling that exhibited
by the Pueblo Indians.
It is true that truncated pyramidal mounds of large size and somewhat
regular proportions are found in certain sections, and that some of these
have ramps or roadways leading up to them. Yet when compared with
the pyramids or teocalli of Mexico and Yucatan the differences in the
manifestations of architectural skill are so great, and the resemblances
are so faint and few, as to furnish no grounds whatever for attributing
the two classes of works to the same people. The facts that the works of
the one people consist chiefly of wrought and sculptured stone, and that
such materials are wholly unknown to the other, forbid the idea of any
relationship between the two. The difference between the two classes of
monuments indicates a wide divergence--a complete step --in the
culture status.
Mexico, Central America, and Peru are dotted with the ruins of stone
edifices, but in all the mound-building area of the United States not the
slightest vestige of one attributable to the people who erected the
earthen structures is to be found. The utmost they attained in this
direction was the construction of stone cairus, rude stone--walls, and
vaults of cobble-stones and undressed blocks. This fact is too
significant to be overlooked in this comparison, and should have its
weight in forming a conclusion, especially when it is backed by
numerous other important differences.
Though hundreds of groups of mounds marking the sites of ancient
villages are to be seen scattered over the Mississippi Valley and Gulf
States yet nowhere can there be found an ancient house. The inference
is therefore irresistible that the houses of the mound- builders were
constructed of perishable materials; consequently that the builders were
not sufficiently advanced in art to use stone or brick in building, or else
that they lived a roving, restless life that would not justify the time and
trouble necessary to erect such permanent structures. As the last

inference is irreconcilable with the magnitude and extent of many
groups of these remains we are forced to the conclusion that the first is
true.
One chief objection to the Indian origin of these works is, as already
stated, that their builders must have been sedentary, depending largely
upon agriculture for subsistence. It is evident, therefore, that they had
dwellings of some sort, and as remains of neither stone nor brick
structures are found which could have been used for this purpose, we
must assume that their dwellings were constructed of perishable
material, such as was supplied in abundance by the forest region in
which they dwelt. It is therefore apparent that in this respect at least the
dwellings of mound-builders were similar to those of Indians. But this
is not all that can be said in reference to the houses of the former, for
there still remain indications of their shape and character, although no
complete examples are left for inspection. In various places, especially
in Tennessee, Illinois, and southeast Missouri, the sites of thousands of
them are yet distinctly marked by little circular depressions with rings
of earth around them. These remains give the form and size of one class
of dwellings that was common in the regions named. Excavations in the
center usually