FOWKE] MOUNDS IN PIKE COUNTY, OHIO 497 
fires at the same time. From here, a layer of decayed wood and 
bark, 4 inches thick in some parts, reached west and north beyond 
the limit of the excavation. In places it showed a thin layer of bone, 
entirely decayed and as soft as ashes, undoubtedly all that was left 
of a body or bodies. 
At varying levels around the central part of the mound, reaching 
to 6 feet above the bottom, were similar but much smaller deposits of 
wood and bark, some of them containing fragments of bones denot- 
ing burials. ‘ 
On the west side of the trench was a bed of ashes and charcoal, ap- 
parently scraped away from a fire bed to the north. The latter was 
3 feet across and 3 inches thick; it was full of broken bones, some of 
them burned, others not. Among the latter were pieces as hard, 
white, and solid as if quite lately put in; with these was part of a 
human femur which had been partially cut, then broken off, as one 
would cut a hard stick until able to break it in two. The break was 
an old one, that is, it had been made long enough to show marks 
of wear before being placed here. It was the only human bone 
recognizable. 
The most interesting discovery in these ashes, aside from the cut 
femur, were three little packages of spherical copper beads. These 
had been thrown into the ashes after the fire had died down. They 
were wrapped in successive layers of cloth, bark, and skin, which 
showed no marks of fire; the string was still in them. Entirely 
covering this ash bed was a thin coating of some bright red sub- 
stance, probably ochre or hematite. 
Below the 6-foot level were more than a dozen small logs from 5 
to 15 feet long. 
Mownp 2.—This, composed of yellow clay, was 28 feet across and 
2 feet high, after many years of cultivation. Near the apparent 
center was a small hole filled with black earth, as if a pole had been 
placed there and allowed to decay. 
In the construction a pit had been dug through the soil and sub- 
soil, into the underlying gravel. In this had been placed a body, 
the skeleton measuring 6 feet 4 inches in length. The bones were 
very large, even for a person of this height, and the processes for 
muscle attachment were rugged and prominent. It was extended, 
on the back, head northeast, the right hand resting on the neck, the 
left hand across the pelvis. By the right elbow was one valve of a 
very large mussel shell; at the side of the left foot were two valves 
of a much smaller shell, both perforated. On the breast were two 
bear’s tusks with the roots ground off at an acute angle. Among 
the lumbar vertebrae were four perforated pearls; a number of 
molars of some carnivore, with the roots more or less ground off; 
and the teeth of some small mammal. At the left side of the skeleton 
