1919] BARRETT AND HAWKES,. KRATZ CREEK MOUNDS. 41 



considerably used, probably for burnt offerings. However, no 

 fragments of bone or other materials were present to indicate just 

 what had been sacrificed here. The limestone pebbles, above men- 

 tioned, showed especially the evidences of fire. They were of a 

 buff color, were very chalky and crumbled easily when exposed 

 to the air. These are shown in the above mentioned plate. 



Perhaps the most important of the altars in this mound was 

 No. 5. This was a large crematory altar located just on the edge 

 of the northeastern limit of the fire strata. Its form and its struc- 

 ture are shown in text fig. 4, and fig. 1 of plate X shows the top 

 of this altar as it was exposed in the course of the excavations. 

 This altar was quite unusual in that it had four successive layers 

 of fire remains interspersed with layers of sand. The relative 

 thicknesses of these strata are shown in the text figure above re- 

 ferred to. Only the top layer, which was itself about ten inches 

 in thickness, showed any stones or other remains. Here were 

 eleven hard stones of various kinds and about fifty fire-slacked, lime- 

 stone pieces, of various sizes and of many forms, as shown in the 

 plate above mentioned. All were imbedded in the blackest of fire 

 remains. In fact, there were still here on the top a number of pieces 

 of well preserved oak charcoal and also a number of pieces of half 

 burned human bone 14 . 



The fact that the lower three fire layers contained no stones 

 may be explained by the assumption that as the mound was built 

 up and its general level raised this altar, stones and all, was raised 

 correspondingly, thus leaving only the ashes and charcoal as a 

 layer to mark where the altar had formerly been. That this altar 

 was a highly important one in the construction of the mound is 

 shown not only by the presence of human bones upon it but also 

 by the fact that it extended down to the natural dark yellow sand 

 which formed the saucer-shaped base of the mound at this point. 

 It reached up to a point even a little above the level of the highest 

 over-spreading layer of fire remains, or a total thickness of 2.75 

 feet. 



Altar No. 6 was a relatively small one, about 3 by 1.5 feet and 

 about 0.5 feet in thickness. It was located near the top of the 

 mound and was about two feet outside the limit of the fire strata. 

 It consisted of a bed of ashes and charcoal underlying a consid- 



14 Certain of these bone fragments were clearly recognizable, as parts of the human foot, 

 coccyx and other bones. 



