Burial Mounds in the North (Illustrated). Cyrus Thomas
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chiefly by the presence of the box-shaped stone cists or coffins, by the small circular house-sites or hut-rings, and by the character of the pottery. This is pre-eminently the pottery region, the typical forms being the long-necked, gourd-shaped vase and the image-vessels. In this district the carved stone pipes are much less common than in the Illinois, Ohio, and Appalachian districts.
(7) The Lower Mississippi district, including the southern half of Arkansas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. There are no marked characteristics by which to distinguish it from the Middle district; in fact as we move southward along the Mississippi from the mouth of the Illinois river, the works and their contents indicate a succession of tribes differing but slightly in habits, customs, and modes of life, the river generally forming one natural boundary between them, but the other boundaries being arbitrary. For example, the Cahokia region appears to have been the home of a tribe from which at one time a colony pushed northward and settled for a while in Brown and Pike Counties, Illinois. The extreme southeastern counties of Missouri were probably the seat of another populous tribe which extended its borders into the western part of southern Illinois and slightly into northeast Arkansas, and closely resembled in customs and art the ancient people who occupied that part of the Cumberland valley in middle Tennessee. This subsection is principally distinguished by the presence of the small circular house-sites, which are slightly basin-shaped, with a low ring of earth around them. As we move farther southward into Arkansas the house-sites change into low circular mounds, usually from 1 to 3 feet in height, and in nearly every instance containing a layer of clay (often burned) and ashes.
These small mounds, which are clearly shown to have been house-sites, were also burial places. It appears to have been a very common custom in this section to bury the dead in the floor, burn the dwelling over them, and cover the whole with dirt, the last operation often taking place while the embers were yet smouldering. Burial in graves was also practiced to a considerable extent. As we approach the Arkansas River, moving southward and from thence into Louisiana, the pottery shows a decided improvement in character and ornamentation.
(8) The Gulf district, including the Gulf States east of the Mississippi. The works of this section appear to be closely allied to those of the Lower Mississippi district, as here we also find the large flat-topped pyramidal mounds, enclosing walls, and surrounding ditches and canals.
The chief differences are to be found in the forms and ornamentation of the pottery and modes of burial.
As we approach the Mississippi River the distinguishing features gradually disappear, although there appears to be a distinct subdistrict in the northern part of Mississippi, and as we enter the Florida peninsula a change is observed which appears to indicate a different people, but the data so far obtained are not sufficient to enable us to outline the subdistricts.
This districting is to be regarded as a working hypothesis rather than as a settled conclusion which will stand the test of future investigations. It is more than likely that other subdivisions will be found necessary, and that the boundaries of some of the districts given will have to be more or less modified; still, I believe the arrangement will be found substantially correct.
As a very general and almost universal rule, mounds of the class under consideration are more or less conical in form, and are common to all sections where earthworks are known to exist, in fact they form almost the only ancient remains of some localities. Often they are isolated, with no other monuments near them, but more frequently they occur in groups or are associated with other works. Squier and Davis say "they are generally of considerable size, varying from 6 to 80 feet in height, but having an average of from 15 to 25 feet."1
This is probably true in regard to the mounds explored by these archaeologists in Ohio, but is erroneous if applied generally; as very many, evidently used and intended as burying places only, are but two or three feet high, and so far as the more recent examinations made in other sections—especially the explorations carried on under the Bureau of Ethnology—have shown, tumuli of this character are usually from 3 to 10 feet high, though some, it is true, are of much larger dimensions; but these are the exceptions and not the rule.2
As the authors just alluded to are so frequently referred to by writers, and their statements in reference to the works explored by them are taken as of general application, I will venture to correct another statement made by them in regard to mounds of this character. They assert that "these mounds invariably cover a single skeleton (in very rare instances more than one, as in the case of the Grave Creek mound), which, at the time of its interment, was enveloped in bark or coarse matting or enclosed in a rude sarcophagus of timber, the traces, in some instances the very casts, of which remain. Occasionally the chamber of the dead is built of stone rudely laid up, without cement of any kind."3
I have investigated but few of the ancient works of Ohio personally, or through the assistants of the Bureau, hence I can only speak in regard to them from what has been published and from communications received, but judging from these, Messrs. Squier and Davis, while no doubt correctly describing the mounds explored by them, have been too hasty in drawing general conclusions.
That burial mounds in the northern sections very frequently cover but a single skeleton is true, but that this, even in this section, is universally true or that it is the general rule is a mistake, as will appear from what is shown hereafter. Nor will it apply as a rule to those of the southern sections.
To illustrate the character and construction of these mounds, and modes of burial in them, I will introduce here brief descriptions of the leading types found in the different northern districts heretofore mentioned, confining myself chiefly to the explorations made by the Bureau assistants.
Burial Mounds of the Wisconsin District
Following the order of the geographical districts heretofore given, we commence with the Wisconsin section, or region of the effigy mounds.
As a general rule the burial mounds in this area are comparatively small, seldom exceeding 10 feet in height and generally ranging from 3 to 6 feet. In all cases these belong to that class of works usually denominated "simple conical tumuli."
Of the methods of construction and modes of burial there appear to be some two or three types, though not so different as necessarily to indicate different tribes or peoples. One of these is well represented in the following extract from Dr. I. A. Lapham's work describing some mounds opened by Dr. Hoy, near Racine:
We excavated fourteen of the mounds, some with the greatest possible care. They are all sepulchral, of a uniform construction as represented in Fig. 1 [our Fig. 1.] Most of them contained more than one skeleton; in one instance we found no less than seven. We could detect no appearance of stratification, each mound having been built at one time and not by successive additions. During the investigations we obtained sufficient evidence to warrant me in the following conclusions. The bodies were regularly buried in a sitting or partly kneeling posture facing the east, with the legs placed under them. They were covered with a bark or log roofing over which the mound was built.4
Fig. 1. —Section of mound near Racine, Wisconsin.
In these a basin-shaped excavation some 2 or 3 feet deep was first made in the soil in which the bodies were deposited, as shown in Fig. 1.
Mr. Middleton, one of the Bureau assistants, in 1883, opened quite a number of small burial mounds in Crawford and Vernon counties, belonging to the same type as those just described; some with the excavation in the original soil in which the skeletons were deposited, though in others there were no such excavations,