NORTH AMERICAN ARCHiEOLOGY. 327 



havn, in tlie year 1830, a grave of this kind was opened, and numerous skeletons 

 were fonnd sitting on low seats around the walls, each with their weapons and 

 ornaments. The description given by Captain Graah of the Eskimo "winter- 

 house," and Scoresby's account of those belonging to the Greenlanders, agree 

 closely with these graves, even to the fact that the passage points generally to 

 the south or east, but never to the north. In a few cases tumuli have been 

 examined which contained weapons, implements, ornaments, pottery, &c., but 

 no human bones; in short, every indication of life, but no trace of death. Ernan 

 also tells us that the graves of Tartars resemble their dwellings, a statement 

 Avhich Nillson apparently considers to be true of all primitive nations. In the 

 Sulu islands it is the custom to desert any house in which a great man has died,* 

 and Captain Cook mentions his having seen at Mooa certain houses raised on 

 mounds, in which he was told "the dead had been buried." 



Certain small tumuli found in America have already been regarded as the 

 remains of mud villages. Mr. Dille t has examined and described some small 

 tumuli observed by him in Missouri. He dug into several, but never succeeded 

 in finding anything except coals and a few pieces of rude pottery, whence he 

 concluded that they were the remains of mud houses. | The Maudans, Mina- 

 tarees, and some other tribes, also built their huts of earth, resting on a frame- 

 work of wood. 



On the other hand, there are some tumuli to which it wottld seem that this 

 explanation is quite inapplicable, and which are full of human remains. This 

 was long supposed to be the case with the great Grave Creek Mound, which, 

 indeed, was positively described by Atwater§ to be full of human remains. This 

 has turned out to be an error, but the statement is not the less true as regards 

 other mounds. In conjunction with them may be mentioned the "bone pits," 

 many of which are described by Mr. Squier.|| "One of these pits, discovered 

 some years ago in the town of Cambria, Niagara county, was estimated to con- 

 tain the bones of several thousand individuals. Another which I visited in the 

 town of Clarence, Erie county, contained not less than four hundred skeletons." 

 A tumulus described by Mr. Jefferson in his "Notes on Virginia" was estimated 

 to contain the skeletons of a thousand individuals, but in this case the number 

 was perhaps exaggerated. 



The description given by various old writers of the solemn "Festival of the 

 Dead" satisfactorily explains these large collections of bones. It seems that 

 every eight or ten years the Indians met at some place previously chosen ; that 

 they dug up their dead, collected the bones together, and laid them in one com- 

 mon burial place, depositing with them tine skins and other valuable articles. 



Sacrificial mounds. — "The name of sacrificial mounds," says Dr. Wilson, 

 "has been conferred on a class of ancient monuments, altogether peculiar to the 

 New World, and highly illustrative of the rites and customs of the ancient races 

 of the mounds. This remarkable class of mounds has been very carefully 

 explored, and their most noticeable characteristics are, their almost invariable 

 occurrence within enclosures; their regular construction in uniform layers of 

 gravel, earth, and sand, disposed alternately in strata conformable to the shape 

 of the mound ; and their covering a symmetrical altar of burnt clay or stone, on 

 which are deposited numerous relics, in all instances exhibiting traces, more or 

 less abundant, of their having been exposed to the action of fire." The so-called 

 "altar" is a basin, or table, of burnt clay, carefully formed into a symmetrical 

 form, but varying much both in shape and size. Some are round, some elliptical, 

 and others, squares or parallelograms, while in size they vary from two feet to 



«St. John's Life in the Forests of the Far East, Vol. ii,p. 217. 



t Smithsonian Contributions, Vol. i, p. 1.36. 



t Archa3ologia Americana, Vol. i, p. 223. 



§ See also Lapham, 1. c, p. 8U. 



II L. c, p. 25, 56, 57, 63, 71, 73, 106, 107, Squier and Davis, 1. c, p. 118, &c. 



