114 Proceedings of Indiana Academy of Sciefice 



of mounds and earthworks are evidence of the presence of a third 

 dominant feature, religious ceremony. 



A large proportion of the conical mounds show no implements in- 

 terred and no traces of burial, but the latter can be accounted for if 

 an age of construction which could easily run into the thousands of 

 years is conceded, in which time every vestige of bone even would have 

 disappeared. The immense earth embankments at Fort Ancient in Ohio 

 are conceded to belong to the earliest stage of aboriginal life which 

 left visible traces of this kind behind them. Indiana shares with Ohio 

 the landmarks so laboriously erected by this unknown race, for they 

 lie on the outskirts of the territory marked by earth embankments of 

 circular, square, elliptical and irregular outline which extends west along 

 the southerly side of the great lakes into Indiana. Smithsonian bul- 

 letins say of them : "The Mound-builders seem to have skirted tlie 

 southern border of Lake Erie and spread themselves, in diminished 

 numbers, along the territory south of Lake Ontario, and penetrated into 

 the state of New York as far as Onondaga where some slight vestiges 

 of their work were found. These seem to have been their limits to 

 the north-east. They extended in the same manner westward into Iowa 

 and Nebraska, but no record is had of their occurrence above the great 

 lakes. They are distinguished for their regularity, most of them being 

 circular or square in form, and are found isolated and also in groups. 

 They are mostly of a diameter of 250 to 300 feet and almost invariably 

 have the ditch interior to the wall, and always have a single gateway. 

 The enclosure was sacred and sot apart as 'tabooed' or sacred ground." 



In Wisconsin a wonderful profusion of earth embankments prevail 

 and are radically different from those forming the chain along the ter- 

 ritory south of the great lakes. They are mainly of two general out- 

 lines, — straight, linear embankments and those of animal and bird out- 

 lines, all of which are interspersed with conical mounds. The peculiar 

 features of linear mounds are that while on an average of two or three 

 feet in height, they begin with an increased height at one end and taper 

 in width and height to almost a point at the other end; and, furthei', 

 that in some cases they begin on a level plateau with the high portion 

 and extend down the adjoining slope decreasing in size almost to a 

 point. This latter feature is also found in some cases of irregularly 

 .shaped mounds and effigy outlines. The mounds are seldom over eight 

 feet in height and the earth embankments are frequently only about 

 two feet in height and often merely a trace. While the circular earth 

 embankments of the great lakes region, as a whole, indicate an almost 

 exclusive ceiemonial use, those in Wisconsin go farther by representing 

 living forms and probably were endowed with mythical life, and we are 

 again reminded of the fact that the Indian was an "animist", to whom 

 every animal and object in nature contained a spirit to be propitiated 

 or appeased. Another featui-e peculiar to Wisconsin is the mat- 

 ter of so-called "Garden-beds." They are located in valleys and cover 

 acres of ground in the form of ridges three to five feet apart, with a 

 furrow between. They are parallel and are mostly straight but in some 

 cases are bioken by sections having parallel curved ridges or irregulai' 



