64 Some Considerations on the Mound Builders. 



HOW THEY LIVED. 



In considering next how the Mound Builders lived, it 

 is not to be supposed that this race constituted one na- 

 tion, or one empire. There is no greater similarity in 

 their works, as found in different parts of the country, 

 than in the habits of the multitudinous Indian tribes 

 that subsequently inhabited the same region. Indeed, 

 it may be that several distinct tribes dwelt in this State. 

 One tolerably compact body filled the valleys of the two 

 Miamis and Mad River. Another compact body filled 

 the Scioto Valley. The country between seems not to 

 have been inhabited, but only roved over by hunters. 

 Moreover, the extensive and complex works, of geomet- 

 rical design, that abound in the Scioto Valley, are scarcely 

 found on the Miamis. The indications, therefore, are 

 that these valleys were the homes of two separate tribes. 



The race of Mound Builders must have been a nu- 

 merous people. While Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa seem 

 to have been sparsely settled by them, the rest of the 

 country must have been thickly peopled along the 

 rivers. In Ohio, for example, they had large settle- 

 ments on the Ohio at Cincinnati, Portsmouth, and 

 Marietta. On the Scioto, besides Portsmouth, at Chil- 

 locothe and Circleville. In the interior were large set- 

 tlements in the neighborhood of Athens, Worthington, 

 Xenia, Springfield, Dayton, Miamisburg, Hamilton, 

 Oxford, and Eaton. In this county, besides their chief 

 town at Cincinnati, they lived on the Little Miami at 

 Columbia, Plainville, and all along the valley from be- 

 low Newtown to above Milford; in the interior of the 

 county at Norwood and Sharon ; on the Ohio at Sedams- 



