In North America, the Mounds, fortified enclosures or tumuli of the most varied appearance, round, conical, and in the shape of animals, have also for long attracted the attention of archæologists. But if the discoveries and excavations made in these monuments have been many, an exact explanation of their meaning was lacking till recent times. The groups of mounds are scattered over an immense tract of country, from the great lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, from the Rocky Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean; but they abound particularly in the valley of the Mississippi, along its left tributaries, in Arkansas, Kansas, etc., as well as in the basin of the Ohio. Farther west, towards the Rocky Mountains, as well as towards the Atlantic coast, they become less frequent. Till recently, the construction of these hillocks was attributed to one and the same people, called by the not very compromising name of “Mound-Builders.” This people, tillers of the soil and relatively civilised, must have lived from the most remote antiquity in the region planted with these mounds, and must have been destroyed by the nomadic and wild hordes represented by the present Indians. Such, at least, was the prevailing hypothesis. However, an attentive study of these mounds and the objects they covered has led little by little the most competent authorities (Cyrus Thomas, Carr, H. Hale, Shepherd, and the numerous members of the “Mound Exploring Division”) to distinguish several “types” of mounds, the geographical distribution of which would serve to indicate the settlements of diverse tribes. E. Schmidt, in a comprehensive work, has brought together all these investigations, and, by the light of linguistic data furnished by Hale, Brinton and others, has been able to state precisely who these various tribes were.[589]
It may be said at once that these investigations have by no means confirmed the great antiquity of the mounds; on the contrary, objects of European origin (iron swords, etc.), found in certain mounds, the tales of the early explorers which tell us that the Indians raised these mounds, and the traditions of the natives themselves, all force us to the conclusion that the builders of these funereal monuments or fortified enclosures were no other than the various Indian tribes whose remaining descendants exist to-day in the reservations. These tribes were tillers of the soil at the period of the discovery of America, as indeed the tales of contemporary explorers bear witness, as do also the traces of irrigation canals and other agricultural operations around these mounds. But the invasion of the country by Europeans from the seventeenth century onward, and the introduction of the horse, hitherto unknown, brought so much confusion into the existence of these tribes, that such of the Indians as survived the wars of extermination changed their mode of life and became hunters or nomadic shepherds. If the distribution of the mounds be studied, three parallel archæological zones may be distinguished, extending from west to east, between the Mississippi and the Atlantic Ocean, each such zone presenting great differences in regard to the type of mound it circumscribes.[590] On comparing this distribution with the ancient settlements of the tribes the following result is arrived at: the mounds of the north have been built by the Iroquois and Algonquians, except the mounds of animal shape, which are due to Dakota-Siouan tribes; the mounds of the south may be attributed to tribes of the Muskoki or Muskhogi family; and, as regards the numerous monuments of the basin of the Ohio, there is a strong presumption in favour of their having been raised by the Shawnies and the Leni-Lenaps in the south, and by the Cherokis in the north. The study of these mounds, in connection with historic data, suffices to determine very satisfactorily the migrations of all these tribes, to which I shall refer later.
West of the Rocky Mountains no more mounds are met with. Their place is taken by other monuments, structures of stone erected among the rocks and along the cañons. A large number of these are found in the valley of San Juan, in that of Rio Grande do Norte, of the Colorado Chiquito, etc. These monuments are still more modern than the mounds. The peoples who erected these structures, the “Cliff-Dwellers,” are still represented by the Moqui, Zuñi, and other tribes who inhabit the high table-lands of Arizona and New Mexico.
Tribes probably related to the Cliff-Dwellers erected in Central America those immense phalansteries in stone or adobe of several storeys, constructed to shelter the whole clan, which the conquering Spaniards called pueblos.[591] Adobe pueblos are still occupied by Zuñi people, descendants of the Cliff-Dwellers.
While in North America among the Mound-Builders only rude attempts at civilisation are found, in Central America and Mexico there flourished up to the period of the conquest a relatively advanced civilisation. Various peoples, whom many authors have sought to identify with the Mound-Builders, formed more or less well-organised states in Mexico. Such were the Mayas in the Yukatan peninsula; the Olmecs, and, later, the Aztecs, on the high table-land. And on the west of South America there developed a corresponding civilisation, that of the Incas of Peru. The Incas were none other than one of the tribes of the Quechua people, who, after having brought into subjection the Aymara aborigines founded in Peru a sort of communist-autocratic state. To the north, in present Columbia, lived the Chibchas, who have equally attained a certain degree of civilisation. Lastly, to the south flourished the civilisation of the Calchaquis.
Existing American Races.—The natives of America, cut off from the rest of the world probably since the end of the quaternary period, form, as we have already seen, a group of races which may be considered by themselves, in the same way as the Xanthochroid or Melanochroid groups of races (see [Chap. VIII.]). It must be borne in mind that there exists but a single character common to these American races, that is the colour of the skin, the ground of which is yellow. This appears to conflict with the current opinion that the Americans are a red race, and yet it is the statement of a fact. None of the tribes of the New World have a red-coloured skin, unless they are painted, which often is the case. Even the reddish complexion of the skin, similar, for example, to that of the Ethiopians, is met with only among half-breeds. All the populations of America exhibit various shades of yellow colouring; these shades may vary from dark-brownish yellow to olive pale yellow.[592] By the yellow colour of the skin, as well as the straight hair common to most, but not to all, Americans, they have affinities with the Ugrian and Mongol races; but other characters, such as the prominent, frequently convex nose, and the straight eyes, separate them widely from these races.
As to the characters peculiar to the five races which I adopt provisionally for the New World: Eskimo, North American, Central American, South American, and Patagonian, with their sub-races, they have been given in [Chapter VIII.], to which I refer the reader.
FIG. 157.—West Greenland Eskimo.
(Phot. Sören Hansen.)