This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1886 Excerpt: ...These are large and crude representations of a considerable variety of animals, the " Snake mound" of Ohio being seven hundred feet in length. The mounds contain very numerous relies of the art of their buildert, consisting of many articles of pottery, stone pipes of very skilful manufacture, in imitation of animal ...
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1886 Excerpt: ...These are large and crude representations of a considerable variety of animals, the " Snake mound" of Ohio being seven hundred feet in length. The mounds contain very numerous relies of the art of their buildert, consisting of many articles of pottery, stone pipes of very skilful manufacture, in imitation of animal forms, stone implements in great variety, articles of beaten copper, pearls, plates of mica, fragments of woven fabries, and other articles, indicative of much industry and a. considerable advance in the simpler arts. With this digest we may permit our author to resume his narrative. The question now arises, Who were the Mound-Builders? What vestiges of their history, if any, yet exist? These are questions which archaeologists are not prepared to answer definitely, though they seem approaching a settled conclusion. Much study has been given to the skulls taken from the mounds, in quest of rare characteristies. They vary considerably, but there is nothing to indicate an essential difference in race from modern Indians. And the arts of the Mound-Builders have not quite died out in the existing Indian tribes. The latter, when discovered, were to some extent agricultural, protected their villages by stockades and other defensive works, and were expert in the manufacture of stone implements and in some other industrial pursuits. But all this is insignificant as compared with the varied industries and the magnitude of the works of the Mound-Builders. These attest a population very much greater than that of the hunting tribes, and therefore necessarily in the main agricultural; and one possessed of a compact governmental organization and a developed religious system. Either the power of a despot over a large body of obedient people, or the inf...
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