In the eighteenth century, the European invaders began to spread westward from their coastal colonies and across the Appalachia Mountains. Here they found monumental earthworks and ancient burial mounds. Following the pattern that they had established since their initial invasion of New England, the Europeans looted the graves, taking from them the finely made grave goods which they found.
In general, today’s archaeologists describe four major moundbuilding traditions in North America: (1) Poverty Point which dates from 1500 BCE to 700 BCE; (2) Adena which dates from 500 BCE to 100 BCE; (3) Hopewell which dates from about 200 BCE (300 BCE in some sources) to about 400 CE (300 CE in some sources); and (4) Mississippian which dates from 700 CE to 1731 CE.
Near Chillicothe, Ohio, the Hopewell site attracted the attention of early archaeologists and gave its name to a much broader cultural tradition. At the Hopewell site, there were thirty-eight earthen mounds within a rectangular earthen enclosure which enclosed 110 acres. In her book America Before the European Invasions, Alice Beck Kehoe writes:
“Overall, Hopewell is the earliest civilization to impress Euroamerican archaeologists with displays of wealth objects reminiscent of European concepts of wealth and status displays.”
In his book The First North Americans: An Archaeological Journey, Brian Fagan writes:
“Hopewell is a ‘great tradition’ or an ideology in the spiritual sense, a set of understandings, as it were, shared by numerous small regional societies over much of the Midwest, accompanied by distinctive artifacts and mortuary rituals.”
In a special gallery on Moundbuilders in the Ohio History Center in Columbus, Ohio there is a display showing artifacts left as offerings in Mound 17 of the Hopewell Mound Group. According to the Museum:
"These objects were found in a clay basin near the center of Mound 17. The artifacts partially filled the clay basin.
All of the artifacts were broken and burned before they were buried. Several of the broken artifacts have been repaired by museum staff for display. The large stone axes appear to have been broken by the exposure to intense heat.”
The reconstruction of broken artifacts is often undertaken as a way to find out more about them.
Archaeologists uncovered two offering deposits, each representing a different ritual. Shown below are the offerings in Group #1.
Shown above are incised bone fragments.
Gorgets
A gorget is an ornamental plaque which is hung by a string or cord around the neck like a pendant.
Celts
Celts were used for cutting and scraping in woodwork. They were made by grinding rather than flaking. They are often chisel-shaped but with wider blades.
Pipes
Smoking tobacco and other substances in stone pipes was a part of many ceremonies.
More Ancient America
Ancient America: Fort Ancient offerings (museum tour)
Ancient America: Linking people to the cosmos in ancient Ohio
Ancient America: A very brief overview of the Adena moundbuilders
Ancient America: Effigy Mounds
Ancient America: A very brief overview of the Hopewell moundbuilders
Ancient America: Misconceptions about Moundbuilders
Ancient America: An arrowhead display (museum tour)
Ancient America: A collection of stone fishing weights (photo diary)