Stone Altar for Human Sacrifice Discovered at the Portsmouth Ancient Ceremonial Earthen Temple

Stone Altar for Human Sacrifice Discovered at the Portsmouth Ancient Ceremonial Earthen Temple

Photo shows the Children's home in the background with the horseshoe-shaped work in the foreground.

Prehistoric America, 1905
Mr. T. W.Kinney says the mound, which was a natural elevation, was selected as the site for a children's house. In excavating the cellar there was discovered a circular altar composed of stones which were standing close together, and showed evidence of heat.  This altar was four feet below the surface. leading from the altar was a channel about eighteen inches wide, composed of clay, which was designed to "Carry off the blood,' giving the idea that human sacrifices were offered here, as upon the altars of Avebury, England.

The Children's home and the site of the altar for human sacrifice was within the circular earthwork to the north of the horseshoe-shaped earthworks.

The Sacred Number 3 and the Mound Builders in Ohio and the British Isles

The Sacred Number 3 and the Mound Builders

The Ohio Serpent faces the confluence of  3 creeks, it has 3 bends in the body and the tail coils 3 times. Upstream on Brush Creek is Fort Hill that is also a serpentine shaped work that has 33 gateways. 

The most common cluster of Adena (Beaker People) mounds is in groups of three, many times in the form of a triangle. 

    The mound itself is built as all other serpent mounds are, no matter in what country. The head of the serpent, containing the altar, is on a high bluff overlooking Brush Creek. The first rays of the Sun God fell first upon this altar, and from it, far below, the priests of the ancient faith could see the ♦three forks of the river. This trinity, whether it be three rivers or three mountains, is always to be seen from an altar of the serpent worshippers and is always unmistakable. The altar is invariably placed in the one spot from which the Trinity may be seen. It is always placed where the first rays of the rising sun may fall upon it. From the neighboring lands, the awe-struck worshippers of old might see the priests 

perform their fearsome rites and watch the victim of the stone knives gasp out his last breath as the first tongue of flame licked at his still quivering flesh. Just what these rites were will never be known, in all probability. But that fire and knife played a part in them can hardly be doubted 
from the mute witnesses found by modern searchers.

Located north of the Serpent mound is Fort Hill in Highland County, Ohio.  There are 33 gateways

in the stone walls. The northern entrance represents two serpent heads.

The stone walls of Fort Hill undulate like a giant serpent between the 33 gateways. T

here is little doubt that the Serpent Mound and Fort Hill were contsructed to be numerically harmonic.

The Serpent Mound in Oban, Scotland, also constructed by the Beaker People, 

also has 3 bends of the body, 2 bends of the tail and faces 3 mountain peaks. 

The head of the serpent also had a  stone alter. 

Mysteries of the Serpent Mound

Ohio Hopewell Mound Builders Earthwork Found In South Carolina

Ohio Hopewell Mound Builders Earthwork Found In South Carolina  

Evidence Links the Cherokee with the Ohio Mound Builders

Henge complex at Camden South Carolina.   The position of this site offers more evidence that the Cherokee Indians were part of the Hopewell Mound Builders Confederacy.

American Antiquarian, 1891

     We are ready to acknowledge the resemblance between these circles in the Kanawha Valley and those on the Wateree River in South Carolina, and especially the similar significance of the circle with the mound in its center, which seems always to be a sign of sun-worship. Squire and Davis have called attention to the general similarity between the southern mounds and the Ohio mounds, especially to the fact that there were spiral paths around the outside of them. They speak of the council or oblong mound in the circle on the Wateree River, with a circumference of 550 feet at the base and 225 feet at the top, and 30 feet high. They say, however, that while this region was occupied by the Cherokee at one time and by the Ocmulgee at another, still the country was, many ages preceding the Cherokees, inhabited by one nation, who were ruled by the same system of laws, customs, and language, but so ancient that the Cherokees or the Creeks could give no account of them or the purposes for which they erected the monuments. High pyramidal mounds, with spacious avenues leading to artificial lakes, and cubical yards, with sunken area and rotundas, are the characteristic works of the south-works which the Cherokee adopted and used, but which, it is said, they did not build. The contrast between the two classes is marked, as the water cult is plain in one and the sun-worship in the other, and yet, the connecting link may be found in the circles we are describing.

Mound Builder's "Watchers" in Indiana, Ohio and West Virginia

Mound Builder's  Spirit Facades in Indiana, Ohio and West Virginia

Natural sculpturing has created these stone facial profiles. They were considered "spirit stones" to the mound builders. In Wabash County, Indiana, stone works of the Iroquois Hopewell were more prolific than anywhere else in Indiana or Ohio. This site is known as "Hanging Rock" to the locals.

Another stone profile is found near Bainbridge, Ohio off of Paint Creek.  Paint Creek, located west of Chillicothe Ohio has more prehistoric ceremonial earthworks than anywhere else in the Ohio.  These earthworks were constructed by the Sioux Hopewell.

Called "The Old man of the Canyon" on Boone County, West Virginia

Strange Alien Looking Skull Unearthed at Milwaukee Effigy Mounds

Strange Alien Looking Skull Unearthed at Milwaukee Effigy Mounds

Pit burial discovered among the effigy mounds at Kletzch Park outside of Milwaukee.

This elongated skull was found in the copper mines at Isle Royal

70 Miles of Ancient Canals are Described in Missouri

70 Miles of Ancient Canals are Described in Missouri

Illustrated History of Missouri, 1879
    The pre-historic people of Missouri were not only great in populous towns, in their agriculture, in their huge piles of earth and embankments and buildings of stone, but they, too, were canal-builders. With surprising skill they developed a system of internal navigation, so connecting the lakes and bayous of the southern interior of the State, that the products of the soil found a ready outlet to the great river. The remains of these artificial water-courses have been frequently alluded to by travelers who have seen them but never thoroughly explored. Dr. G. C. Swallow, while at the head of the Geological Survey, called attention to them, and described one which was " fifty feet wide and twelve feet deep." For the fullest description of this class of works, I am indebted to Geo. W. Carleton, Esq., of Gayoso ; who, in response to a note of enquiry, — in addition to many interesting facts concerning a great number of ancient structures in Pemiscot County, — kindly furnished the following account, which I give in his own words: "Besides our Mounds, we can boast of ancient canals. Col. John H. Walker informed me that before the earthquakes, these canals — we call them bayous now — showed very plainly their artificial origin. Since the country has become settled, the land cleared up, the embankments along those watercourses have been considerably leveled down. One of these canals is just east of the town of Gayoso. It now connects the flats of Big Lake with the Mississippi river. Before the bank crumbled off, taking in Pemiscot Bayou, it connected this bayou with the waters of Big Lake. Another stream, that Col. Walker contended was artificial, is what we now call Cypress Bend Bayou. He said that it was cut so as to connect the waters of Cushion Lake with a bayou running into Big Lake. Cushion Lake lies in the northern part of Pemiscot county. The canal was cut from the flats of the lake on the south side, about three miles into Big Lake Bayou. By this chain of canals, lakes, and bayous, these ancient mound-builders and canal-diggers could have an inland navigation from the Mississippi River at Gayoso, into and through Big Lake bayou and the canal into Cushion Lake, through Cushion Lake and a bayou into Collins Lake or the open bay, thence north through a lake and bayou some eight miles, where another canal tapped this watercourse and run east into the Mississippi river again, some five miles below the town of New Madrid. Col. Walker, in referring to these water-courses, spoke of them only as canals. They show even now a huge bank of earth, such as would be made by an excavation, on the side opposite to the river, so that in case of overflow the water from the river would not wash the excavated dirt back into the canal."  Although in the foregoing account the present depth and width are not given, from it and from the reports of others, there can be no doubt that the ancient inhabitants had constructed with a skill which would do no discredit to our own engineers, a system of connecting canals which must have been necessitated by an extended internal trade, and which required boats of respectable dimensions. The evidences of work of such magnitude as canals, widen the "broad chasm" which is to be spanned before we can link the Mound-builders to the North American Indians until it becomes an impassable gulf.

1 In reply to a subsequent note of inquiry as to the length of this water-course, including canal and bayou, Mr. Carlton estimates it to be about seventy miles.

Ancient Navigable Canal Discovered on the Rock River in Illinois

Ancient Navigable Canal Discovered on the Rock River in Illinois

The ancient canal is discernable from the bed of the old channel of the Green River. This is almost exactly three miles from the natural junction of the Green and Rock Rivers as the article described.


History of Mifflin County Illinois, 1885

     On the banks of Green River, in Henry County in Illinois, are traces of an ancient city, which was once the abode of a commercial people, and points to a time when the Rock River was a navigable stream of some commercial importance. A canal connected these two rivers some three miles above the junction. This canal is about a mile and a half long and is perfectly straight for about one-fourth of a mile from the Green River end; it is then relieved by a perfectly easy curve, reaching the Rock River at a bend, and showing that the engineering was done in a masterly manner. The soil is of a very fine texture, mixed with a ferruginous mineral deposit; hence its firmness, and the reason of it withstanding the washings of rains, for this great lapse of time. About twelve miles back and above this canal is another partly natural and partly artificial connecting Rock and Mississippi Rivers. This is so well preserved that about twelve years ago the "Serling" a small Rock River steamer, passed through it into the Mississippi River. These works are as old as the mountains of Egypt and were in all probability built by a contemporaneous people.

Ancient Prayers for the Mound Builder's Ancient Dead

Ancient Prayers for the Ancient Mound Builder's Dead

Burial mound in Greene County, Indiana that has been spiked with a cross.