95 
Tumuli of the Central District of North America. 
From Florida to Canada, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific 
Ocean, the American soil is strewn with tumuli, entrenched 
camps, and other earthworks. These monuments are particu- 
larly numerous in the valleys of the Mississippi and the Ohio. 
Tumuli, however, exist in Oregon, on the banks of the Gila, of 
the Colorado, and their tributaries. The plan and construction 
of these monuments differ according to the place where they 
were erected, and they are, probably, the work of various 
peoples. In the vicinity of the Great Lakes, and in the States 
of Wisconsin, Iowa, Michigan, and Missouri, the tumuli are 
sometimes of conical form, but they are frequently in the shape 
of quadrupeds, birds, reptiles, and even of man. 
MOUNDS OF OHIO. 
A systematic examination of a considerable number of tumuli 
in the Scioto Valley, Ohio, was undertaken some years since by 
Messrs. Squier and Davis, who class the mounds examined by 
them as — 
1. Altar mounds. 
2. Mounds of sepulture. 
3. Temple mounds. 
4. Anomalous mounds. 
Altar or Sacrificial Mounds. 
These mounds are said to occur only within, or in the imme- 
diate vicinity of, ancient earthworks forming enclosures. They 
contain symmetrical "altars" of burnt clay or stone, on which 
are deposited various remains, which in all cases have been more 
or less subjected to the action of fire. These altars" are not 
of uniform size and shape. Some are round ; others elliptical ; 
others square, or parallelograms ; some are small, measuring 
barely two feet across, while others are fifty feet long by twelve 
or fifteen feet wide. The usual dimensions are from five to 
eight feet. The " altars" are in the form of basins, made of a 
fine clay brought to the spot from a distance. They have 
