432 



MOUND EXPLOKATIONS. 



Tlie mdst important mouuds remaining of this group are iipon the 

 Kanawha county poor farm. 



Mound 31 measured 318 feet in circumference, 25 feet high, and 40 

 feet across its flat top. (See Fig. 302.) A 10-foot circular shaft was 

 sunk from the top and trenches run in from the side. The top layer 

 consisted of 2 feet of soil, immediately below which was 1 foot of mixed 

 clay and ashes. Below this, to the bottom, the mound was composed 

 of earth apparently largely mixed with ashes, placed in small deposits 

 during a long period of time. Three feet below the top were two skel- 

 etons, one above the other, extended at full length, facing each other 

 and in close contact. Above but near the heads were a pipe, celt, and 

 some arrow or spear heads. Ten feet below these were two very large 

 skeletons in a sitting position, facing each other, with their extended 

 legs interlocking to the knees. Their hands, outstretched and slightly 

 elevated, were placed in a sustaining position to a hemispherical, hol- 

 lowed, coarse-grained sandstone, burned until red and brittle. This 

 was about 2 feet across the top, and the cavity or depression was filled 

 with white ashes containing fragments of bones burned almost to 

 coals. Over it was placed a somewhat wider slab of limestone 3 inches 



^^.JL 



Flu. :iU2.— Scftiuii of mound No. 31, Kanawha county, West Virizinia. 



thick, which had a hemisphei'ical or cup-shaped depression of 2 inches 

 in diameter near the center of the under side, but this bore no trace of 

 heat. Two copper bracelets were on the left wrist of one skeleton, a 

 hematite celt and lancehead with the other. At a depth of 25 feet 

 from the top the natural surface was reached, on which lay a clay bed 

 or so-called "altar," from 6 to 18 inches thick, and covering a larger 

 space than the 16 feet to which the shaft was here enlarged, though the 

 altar proper was about 12 feet long by 8 feet wide. The upper portion 

 was burned to a brick red, which gradually faded toward the bottom, 

 which was the natural dark color of the material. The upper side had 

 a concavity more than a foot deep. On it rested a compact layer of 

 very fine white ashes a little less than a foot thick at the center, grad- 

 ually increasing outward until fully 2 feet thick at the edges of the 

 shaft. Scattered through it were waterworn stones from 3 to 5 inches 

 in diameter, all bearing indications of exposure to intense heat, and 

 fragments of bones, some of which were nearly destroyed by heat and 

 had patches of what seemed to be melted sand adhering to them. 



Mound 32 measured 50 feet in diameter and 4 feet high. At the cen- 

 ter were two badly decayed skeletons on the natural surface, heads 

 north; hematite celts and flint arrowheads were found with them. 



