With the first we have nothing to do: they are similar to those erected everywhere and in all ages of the world. They consist of a ditch, the earth taken in forming which is thrown up on its inner side, so as to form an obstacle to the advance of an enemy, and to become a shelter to the defenders. Some of these in America are of great extent, and show not only considerable proficiency in the art of defence, but indicate the presence of an extensive and settled population. The so-called "sacred enclosures" are not only numerous and extensive, but are unlike anything met with elsewhere. In Ross county alone our authors state that there are 100 at least of various sizes, and in the State of Ohio 1000 to 1500, some of them enclosing areas from 100 to 200 acres in extent.
227. Enclosure in Newark Works.
Their typical form will be understood from the annexed woodcut. All seem to have a forecourt either square or octagonal in form, with 4 or 8 entrances to it, and beyond this is a circle generally quite complete, and entered only by a passage or opening from the forecourt. These are enclosed by earthen mounds varying from 5 to 30 feet in height, with the ditch almost invariably on the inside.
The last peculiarity is in itself, as in the case of the English circles, quite sufficient to preclude the idea of their being fortifications or meant for defence, and they certainly are not sepulchral in any sense in which we understand the term. In the first place, because we know perfectly what the sepulchres of these people were, from the thousands and tens of thousands of tumuli which dot the plains everywhere; but also because, unlike the English circles, which are as a rule found in the most remote and barren spots, these American enclosures as generally occupy the flattest and richest spots in the country. They are most frequently situated near the rivers, and on the natural lines of communication; so much so indeed that many of the cities of the present occupants of the country stand on the same spots and within the enclosures of the earlier races who raised these mounds.
We are thus left to the choice between two hypotheses. Either they are sacred enclosures, as suggested by our authors, or they are royal residences—temples or palaces.
All the arguments, derived from its excessive size, that were urged against Avebury being a temple, apply with redoubled force to these American enclosures. Temples occupying 50 to 100 acres are certainly singular anomalies when we try to realise what these admeasurements imply. Our largest square, Lincoln's Inn Fields, occupies only 12 acres; the Green Park is 53; and all our parks together do not occupy the same space as the Newark enclosures, which, according to Messrs. Squier and Davis, cover more than four square miles.[595] Yet all these are circles and squares with connecting lines, and all with inside ditches. Temples of these dimensions, without divisions, or enclosures, or mounds, or permanent works of any kind, are anomalies difficult to understand, and must belong to some religion of which I, at least, have no knowledge; and no one, so far as I know, has yet suggested what that religion was, nor how these vast spaces could be utilized for any religious purpose.
If we adopt the idea that they were the residences of the chiefs of the people, the mystery does not seem so great. If the circular wigwam of the chief was erected in the centre of the circles, and the wigwams of his subordinates and retainers in concentric circles around him, it would account for their dimensions, and also for the disappearance of all traces of habitation. The forecourt would thus be the place of assembly of the tribe, the exercise ground or gymnasium, and for such purposes it is admirably adapted, and both the size and the situation of these enclosures seem easily explicable.