BURIAL MOUNDS OF THE WISCONSIN DISTRICT. 
Following the order of the geographical districts heretofore given, we 
commence with the Wisconsin section, or region of the effigy mounds. 
As a general rule the burial mounds in this area are comparatively 
small, seldom exceeding 10 feet in height and generally ranging from 3 
to 6 feet. In all cases these belong to that class of works usually de- 
nominated ‘simple conical tumuli.” 
Of the methods of construction and modes of burial there appear to 
be some two or three types, though not so different as necessarily to in- 
dicate different tribes or peoples. One of these is well represented in 
the following extract from Dr. I. A. Lapham’s work describing some 
mounds opened by Dr. Hoy, near Racine: 
We excavated fourteen of the mounds, some with the greatest possible care. They 
are all sepulchral, of a uniform construction as represented in Fig. 1 [our Fig. 1.] 





























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eee 

Fic. 1.—Section of mound near Racine, Wisconsin. 
Most of them contained more than one skeleton ; in one instance we found no less than 
seven. We could detect no appearance of stratification, each mound haying been 
built at one time and not by successive additions. During the investigations we 
obtained sufficient evidence to warrant me in the following conclusions. The bodies 
were regularly buried in a sitting or partly kneeling posture facing the east, with 
the legs placed under them. They were covered with a bark or log roofing over which 
the mound was built. ! 
In these a basin-shaped excavation some 2 or 3 feet deep was first 
made in the soil in which the bodies were deposited, as shown in Fig. 1. 
Mr. Middleton, one of the Bureau assistants, in 1883, opened quite a 
number of small burial mounds in Crawford and Vernon counties, be- 

‘Antiquities of Wisconsin, p. 9. 
14 
