The problem of the Ohio mounds / by Cyrus Thomas.

  • Thomas, Cyrus, 1825-1910.
Date:
1889
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The problem of the Ohio mounds / by Cyrus Thomas. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    tram/ Dumont/ Romans/ and others, but most fully by Jean de Brebeuf.4 It is a well-attested fact that northern as well as southern Indians were accustomed to erect palisades around their villages for defense against attack. Some evidences of mound building by northern Indians may be found in the works of comparatively modern writers. Lewis C. Beck5 affirms that “ one of the largest mounds in this country has been thrown up on this stream [the Osage] within the last thirty or forty years by the Osages, near the great Osage village, in honor of one of their deceased chiefs.7’ It is probable this is the mound referred to by Major Sibley,6 who says an Osage Indian informed him that a chief of his tribe having died while all the men were off on a hunt, he was buried in the usual man¬ ner, with his weapons, etc., and a small mound was raised over him. When the hunters returned this mound was enlarged at intervals, every man carrying materials, and so the work went on for a long time, and the mound, when finished, was dressed off to a conical form at the top. The old Indian further said he had been informed, and believed, that all the mounds had a similar origin. Lewis and Clarke mention not only the erection of a mound over a modern chief, but also numerous earthworks, including mounds, which were known to be the work of contemporaneous Indians.7 L. Y. Bierce8 states that when Nicksaw, an old Wyandotte Indian of Summit County, was killed, “the Indians buried him on the ground where he fell, and according to their custom raised a mound over him to commemorate the place and circumstances of his death. His grave is yet to be seen.” Another writer says: “ It is related by intelligent Indian traders that a custom once prevailed among certain tribes, on the burial of a chief or brave of distinction, to consider his grave as entitled to the tribute of a portion of earth from each passer-by, which the traveler sedulously car¬ ried with him on his journey. Hence the first grave formed a nucleus around which* in the accumulation of the accustomed tributes thus paid, a mound was soon formed.”9 The same author says 10 the tumulus at the Great Butte des Morts 1 Travels (1791), p. 51G. 2 Memoires Hist. La., vol. 1, p. 246. 3 Nat. and Civil Hist. Fla., pp. 88-90. 4 In his account “Des c6r6monies qu’ils [les Hnrons] gardent en lenr sepulture et de lenr deuil,” and “ De la Feste soletnnelle des morts.”—Jesuit Relations for 1636, pp. 129-139. See translation iu Thomas’s “Burial Mounds of the Northern Section of the United States,” Fifth Annual Kept. Bur. Ethnol., p. 110. See also Lafitau, “Moeurs des Sauvages,” vol. 2, pp. 447-455. 5 Gazetteer of the States of Ill. and Mo., p. 308. 6 Featherstonhaugh, Excur. through Slave States, p. 70. * 7 Travels, Dublin ed., 1817, pp. 30, 31, 55,67,115,117,122-125, etc. 8 Historical Reminiscences of Summit County, Ohio,p. 128. 9 Smith’s History of Wisconsin, vol. 3, 1854, p. 245. 10 Ibid., p. 262. '