134 ANCIENT MONUMENTS. 



Some of these mounds have been excavated and found to contain human remams 

 in all parts, while the excavations in others have been attended vi^ith no such 

 developments. Those examined by Prof. Locke and Mr. S. Taylor revealed no 

 deposits. Mr. R. C. Taylor mentions that twelve mounds, near Red Bank on the 

 Fox river, were opened in 1837, and found to contain human bones in a very 

 advanced stage of decomposition. One of the mounds was an animal-shaped 

 sti'ucture, one hundred and fifty feet in length. The position of the skeletons 

 indicated that the bodies had been placed upon the original surface previous to 

 being heaped over. There were no appearances of excavation beneath the surface 

 in any of the interments. It may be suggested that the human remains found in 

 these mounds were deposited by the^ existing tribes of Indians, a suggestion which 

 derives great force from the fact that both the Messrs. Taylor concur in repre- 

 senting that many of the Indians to this day bury in these structures, conceiving 

 that they were originally designed for that purpose, although they possess no tradi- 

 tion respecting their origin. Some of the Indians, on the other hand, express 

 the belief that the mounds in the form of animals were made by the " Great 

 Manitou" and are indicative of a plentiful supply of game in the world of spirits. 

 At any rate, they are regarded with reverence by all the Indians, and are never 

 disturbed by them, except for purposes of sepulture. 



Proceeding upon the assumption that they were designed as burial-places, Mr. 

 R. C. Taylor ingeniously suggests that their forms were intended to designate the 

 cemeteries^f the respective tribes or families to which they belonged : thus, the 

 tribe, clan, or family possessing as its characteristic totem, blazon, or emblem, the 

 Bear, constructed the burial-place of its members in the form of that animal ; the 

 clans having the Panther, Turtle, Eagle, or other animal or object for their totems, 

 respectively conforming to the same practice. Upon this hypothesis we can 

 readily conceive the ancient inhabitant to have possessed the same anxiety to be 

 buried in his family tomb which we see exhibited at this day, among our own 

 people, " to rest in the sepulchres of their fathers. " Mr. Taylor discreetly 

 remarks, however, that there is no evidence to show that any existing tribes of 

 Indians ever erected such monuments, but that, on the contrary, they acknowledge 

 the profoundest ignorance of their origin. He advances the suggestion only as a 

 plausible conjecture, in the absence of any satisfactory solution of the problem, 

 which still remains unsolved. 



What significance may attach to the fact that they occur mainly on the great 

 lines of traverse between the Mississippi and Lake Michigan, or to the further 

 fact that most if not all of these groups have one or more conical mounds so 

 placed as to command a view of the remainder, it is not undertaken to say.* 

 That similar works are found in the central and western portions of Michigan, as 



* " The choice, in selecting the sites of these monuments of uncient days, appears to have been 

 influenced mainly by their contitruity to the lakes and principal rivers, and to those great lines of interior 

 communication, which, from an unknown period, traversed this country. * * * These mounds are 

 almost invariably contiguous to Indian paths, whose narrow but deeply- worn tracks attest their extreme 

 antiquity and long use." — R. C. Tui/lor. 



