Primer of Ohio Archaeology: The Mound Builders and the Indians

by H. C. Shetrone

Fig. 10—Statue of a Mound-builder, in the Ohio State Museum.

Having learned something of what the Mound-builders did and how they lived, we naturally are curious to know what they looked like. Formerly it was believed that the mysterious builders of the mounds were a race of giants and that they were altogether different in appearance from any other people. Careful study of their skeletons however proves that this is not true. Scientists are able to determine almost exactly how persons looked, no matter to what race or age they belonged, through a study of their skeletons, and by making use of these methods we now know that the Mound-builders were quite similar in appearance to the Indians. In the Ohio State Museum there are life-size statues of a Mound-builder man and woman, constructed after these methods and clothed with the garments, implements and ornaments which they actually used in life. A picture of the male figure is shown on [page 21].

ANCIENT NON-MOUND-BUILDING TRIBES

And now that we have had a look at the Mound-builders, it only remains to be said that still another people, closely related but somewhat different, lived in the Ohio country before the coming of white men. Archæologists, in exploring the ancient Mounds, have learned just what kinds of implements, ornaments and utensils the Mound-builders used. But this is not all. In plowing and cultivating the fields, and in shallow graves found here and there, great numbers of relics of kinds not used by the Mound-builders have been found. Numerous collections of such relics, including arrow and spear points, grooved stone hatchets or tomahawks, stone pestles or corn grinders, ornaments of slate and stone, rude pottery vessels and other things somewhat different from what the Mound-builders used; are to be seen in these private collections. Some of them have been found on almost every farm in Ohio and almost every family has a few of these “Indian relics.” And the name “Indian relics” exactly describes them, because the archæologist has found that they were made and used by ancient tribes of Indians who lived in Ohio, in prehistoric times, but who did not build Mounds. It is probable that some of them were here at the same time as were the Mound-builders, but it is also likely that some of them were earlier, and perhaps they continued to live here after the passing of the Mound-builders, and up pretty close to the coming of white men. Doubtless they were the ancestors—the grandparents and the great-grandparents—of the Indians of later times. They seem to have belonged to the two great families of Indians—the Algonquins and the Iroquois—who were here when the Ohio country was first visited by white men.

Just who these ancient Indian tribes were—that is, just what they may have called themselves or what others may have called them—is not known. Although the Shawnee, Miami, Delaware, Wyandot, Mingo and other Indian tribes were living in Ohio at the time of settlement, these tribes all were newcomers in a sense; that is, they had come into the country only a century or two earlier, mostly from the east and south. The earlier tribes, which we might call the native tribes, had been driven out of the country along about 1650 by a great raid or invasion carried on by the Iroquois Indians of New York state and the St. Lawrence Valley. This was about a century before the coming of white men, and it is believed that it left the Ohio country almost without Indian residents, a sort of no-man’s land, until the Wyandots, Miamis and others arrived.

And now as to the interesting questions concerning the Mound-builders: Who were they? Where did they come from and when? Why did they build Mounds? What became of them?

QUESTIONS CONCERNING THE MOUND-BUILDERS

Time and space will not permit us to discuss these queries very fully, but perhaps we can tell enough about them in a few lines for the present purpose. Archæologists are now pretty well agreed that the Mound-builders, the Indians and all other peoples who lived in the Americas before the coming of Christopher Columbus, belonged to a single great race, which we may call the American Indian race. They believe that the Western Hemisphere was first peopled directly from Asia, by way of Bering Straits, by bands of savages or barbarians belonging to the Mongolian or Yellow race. These simple folk appear to have migrated to America soon after the disappearance of the great ice glaciers which once covered all of our northern country, reaching as far south as central Ohio. Geologists tell us that this happened some 12,000 to 15,000 years ago.

And so, from the Arctic regions on the north, to the southern tip of South America, these yellow-skinned immigrants spread until they peopled both continents. In Mexico, Central America and Peru, they came to have great civilizations, and to be known as the Aztecs, Incas, and others. Just why some of them became so highly civilized while others, like some of our Indians, remained the lowly barbarians that they were, is explained partly by what the archæologists call environment; that is, by weather, rainfall, soil, natural food supplies as game, fish, wild fruits—in a word, environment means the things we find around and about us. In the end we find that while all these peoples belonged to the same race they had formed different habits and customs and were really very different from one another in what is termed culture.