162 CERTAIN ABORIGINAL MOUNDS, COAST OF SOUTH CAROLINA. 



altars, sacrifices, burial ceremonies, or possibly, merely the fire-hearths used at dif- 

 ferent periods of occupation — Magazine of American History (Thomas), February, 

 1884. Gerard Fowke, an assistant of the Bureau of Ethnology, also reports that 

 recently, in exploring a large mound on the Scioto river, in Ross county, Ohio, he 

 discovered the remains of wooden ' posts set in pairs around the edge ; other posts 

 at intervals within assisted [or may have assisted] in holding up the roof. The 

 interior space was nearly forty feet across. A streak an inch thick of mingled ashes, 

 charcoal, and black earth, spread over the floor, indicated the usual untidy appear- 

 ance of the aboriginal housekeeping.' The skeleton remains of an elaborate burial 

 were inclosed in the mound, and appearances indicated that the house had been torn 

 away or burned, and the mound subsequently increased in size over the remains. 

 — Gerard Fowke's Report in the Cincinnati Commercial Gazette, July 23, 1888. 



"In 1876, Professor Carr, of the Peabody Museum, in exploring a large mound 

 in Lee county, Virginia, discovered a series of decaying cedar posts,- imbedded in a 

 circle around the top of the mound, which the intelligent explorer regarded as the 

 remains of a large house structure similar to the council-house Adair saw on a 

 mound in the old Cherokee town of Cowe, Georgia, in 1773. — Tenth Annual Report 

 Peabody Museum, page 75. 



" Professor Putnam also found an upright cedar post still standing deeply 

 planted in the large ancient mound of the Lebanon group, in Tennessee." 



Smaller Mound, Little Island, Beaufort County. 



This mound, about 35 yards south-southeast from the large domiciliary mound, 

 had been about one-half washed away by the waters of Whale branch in times of 

 storm. The mound, when whole, must have had a base diameter of about 50 feet. 

 Its height, measured on the north, was 3 feet 7 inches ; measured on the south, 

 somewhat more, as the bank on which it was, had a downward slope. What 

 remained of the mound was practically dug through by us with the exception of 

 that part on the north on which a large tree was growing. We are indebted to Mr. 

 Crofut for permission to investigate, 



The mound had been composed, as nearly as we could judge, of a mass of 

 oyster-shells 3 to 4 feet in thickness at the center and sloping to the margin. This 

 mass of shell rested on a layer of disturbed clayey sand about 1 foot in thickness. 

 This mass of oyster-shells was covered with a mixture of clay and sand, the sand 

 predominating, containing oyster-shells in varying proportion. From the surface, at 

 what seemed to be the center of the summit plateau, to undisturbed sand was a ver- 

 tical distance of 8 feet 8 inches. Therefore, the base of the mound was about 5 

 feet under ground. 



Occupying the central part of the mound, apparently dug into the oyster-shells 

 to within 1 foot of the basal layer of disturbed sand, was a pit having a diameter 

 of 24 feet where it entered the shell (see diagram Fig. 8.) This pit had been filled 

 with material resembling that of the layer above the shell. With the exception of 

 a shaft of a human tibia, found loose in the sand, the central part of the mound 



