Description: D. Wyrick's 1860 map of the Newark Earthworks. Built by the prehistoric Hopewell Culture between 100 B.C. and A.D. 500, this architectural wonder of ancient America was part cathedral, part cemetery, and part astronomical observatory. The entire Newark Earthworks originally encompassed more than four square miles. Over the years, the growth of the city of Newark destroyed many of the Newark Earthworks, but three major segments survived because of the efforts of interested local citizens. In 2006, Governor Bob Taft formally declared the Newark Earthworks to be Ohio's state prehistoric monument, honoring the early American Indian builders of this site. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL02913
Subjects: American Indians--Archaeology; Earthworks (Archaeology); Hopewell culture--Ohio; Ohio History--Natural and Native Ohio; Ohio state symbols
Places: Newark (Ohio); Licking County (Ohio)
 

Description: Lithograph titled "Ancient Works, Marietta, Ohio," based on an earlier painting by Charles Sullivan. This lithograph dates to 1848, and was published in Squier and Davis's "Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley." It shows Native Americans against a backdrop of the Hopewell Culture's ceremonial earthworks, located at the confluence of the Muskingum and Ohio Rivers in Washington County. The Marietta Earthworks are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Caption states that the painting is in the "...posession of A. Nye Esq. Marietta." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL08597
Subjects: Ohio History--Natural and Native Ohio; Earthworks (Archaeology); Earthworks (Art)--United States; Marietta (Ohio)
Places: Marietta (Ohio); Washington County (Ohio)
 

Description: Lithograph showing the group of prehistoric earthworks in Marietta, Ohio, after a painting by Charles Sullivan. This lithograph dates to 1848, and was published in Squier and Davis's "Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL05765
Subjects: Ohio History--Natural and Native Ohio; Earthworks (Archaeology); Earthworks (Art)--United States; Marietta (Ohio)
Places: Marietta (Ohio); Washington County (Ohio)
 

Description: Four small maps showing American Indian earthworks and ancient monuments in Pickaway, Fairfield and Licking Counties. Pictured are "the Alligater," "the Cross," the Rock Mill Work and the Newark Valley earthworks. Archaeologists E.G. Squier and E.H. Davis, with the help of surveyor and geologist Charles Whittlesey, systematically documented the Indian works and compiled them into an 1847 book called "Ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley: Comprising the results of extensive original surveys and explorations." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SquierDavisPlateXXXVI
Subjects: Mounds--Ohio River Valley; American Indians--Archaeology; Ohio River Valley--Antiquities; Earthworks (Archaeology)
Places: Pickaway County (Ohio); Fairfield County (Ohio); Granville (Ohio); Licking County (Ohio); Newark (Ohio)
 

Description: What is now Chillicothe in Ross County, Ohio, was once home to the Adena and Hopewell prehistoric Native American cultures. This map shows an earthwork known as the Hopeton Work, about four miles north of Chillicothe. The Adena culture (800 B.C. to 100 A.D.) built most of the earthworks and some of the circular enclosures in the Chillicothe area, including the Adena Mound. The Hopewell culture (100 B.C. to 400 A.D.) built monumental earthworks and burial mounds in geometric shapes, primarily in the Paint Creek Valley, a few miles from Chillicothe. Archaeologists E.G. Squier and E.H. Davis, with the help of surveyor and geologist Charles Whittlesey, systematically documented the Indian works and compiled them into an 1847 book called "Ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley: Comprising the results of extensive original surveys and explorations." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL08598
Subjects: Mounds--Ohio River Valley; American Indians--Archaeology; Ohio River Valley--Antiquities; Earthworks (Archaeology)
Places: Chillicothe (Ohio); Ross County (Ohio)
 

Description: Serpent Mound is a spectacular effigy earthwork of a serpent uncoiling along a prominent ridgetop in northern Adams County, Ohio. Excavations between 1887 and 1889 by Frederic Putnam, of Harvard University's Peabody Museum, revealed the structure of the earthwork, but Putnam did not find any artifacts that revealed the age or cultural affiliation of the mound. Until recently, archaeologists assumed that Serpent Mound was built by the Adena culture (800 B.C. to 100 A.D.) since two Adena burial mounds are located nearby. Yet Putnam also discovered traces of a village of the Fort Ancient culture (1000 A.D. to 1650 A.D.) near the Serpent. Excavations conducted in 1991 recovered charcoal that returned radiocarbon dates suggesting that the Fort Ancient people built the mound between about 1025 A.D. and 1215 A.D.. Frederic Putnam saved Serpent Mound from destruction. On his urging, funds were raised for Harvard University to purchase the site. Later, the ownership was transferred to the Ohio Historical Society, and Serpent Mound is now recognized as a National Historic Landmark. Archaeologists E.G. Squier and E.H. Davis, with the help of surveyor and geologist Charles Whittlesey, systematically documented the Indian works and compiled them into an 1847 book called "Ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley: Comprising the results of extensive original surveys and explorations." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL08639
Subjects: Mounds--Ohio River Valley; American Indians--Archaeology; Ohio River Valley--Antiquities; Earthworks (Archaeology)
Places: Peebles (Ohio); Adams County (Ohio)
 

Description: Aerial photograph showing the Octagon Earthworks of the Newark Mound Group. The Newark Earthworks complex was located on a wide glacial terrace southwest of the original confluence of Raccoon Creek and the Licking River in Newark, Licking County, Ohio. It was constructed by people of the Hopewell Culture between approximately 100 BC and AD 400. When first surveyed in the 1840s, the earthworks covered an area of four square miles, making it perhaps the world’s single largest archaeological landscape outside Egypt’s Giza Plateau. Overall the complex seems to be a lexicon of Hopewell earthwork design with counterparts found elsewhere within the Hopewell sphere, particularly in the lower Scioto Valley. These forms include large and small circles, parallel walls, ovals, squares and octagons. Unfortunately as Newark’s city limits expanded in the late 19th century, much of the earthwork complex fell victim to development. Only the Great Circle, a 1200-foot circular embankment with an interior ditch, and the Octagon Earthworks, a conjoined circle and segmented octagon that functions as a precise lunar observatory, have managed to survive to present times. To note, neither of these earthworks survived out of a pure sense of preservation but rather as notable oddities on the landscape; the Great Circle as a 19th century fairgrounds/amusement park and the Octagon as a military training camp and presently as a golf course. Both sites are owned by the Ohio History Connection and are among seven Ohio Hopewell Ceremonial Earthwork sites under consideration by the United States Department of the Interior for nomination as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AV17_B04F02_E06_003
Subjects: Hopewell culture--Ohio; Mounds -- Ohio -- Licking County; Earthworks (Archaeology);
Places: Newark (Ohio); Licking County (Ohio)
 

Description: Drawing depicting the astronomy of the Great Circle Earthworks in Newark, Ohio, as seen in "Ancient Astronomers of the Ohio Valley," by Bradley T. Lepper, TIMELINE (Vol. 15, No. 1), January-February 1998. Built by the prehistoric Hopewell Culture between 100 B.C. and A.D. 500, this architectural wonder of ancient America was part cathedral, part cemetery, and part astronomical observatory. Great Circle Earthworks is nearly 1,200 feet in diameter and was likely used as a vast ceremonial center by its builders. The 8 feet (2.4 m) high walls surround a 5 feet (1.5 m) deep moat, except at the entrance where the dimensions are even greater and more impressive. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL02910
Subjects: Astronomy; Ohio History--Natural and Native Ohio; Earthworks (Archaeology)
Places: Newark (Ohio); Licking County (Ohio)
 

Description: Aerial view showing the Cedarville Earthworks, likely referring to the Williamson Mound and the Pollock Works that are now found within the property of Indian Mound Reserve, managed by Greene County Parks & Trails, near the village of Cedarville, Ohio. Williamson Mound is attributed to people of the Adena culture, and in 1881, it was described as 40 feet high and 150 feet in circumference, located near the banks of Massie's Creek. Pollock Works, constructed by the Hopewell culture on a promontory to the south of the creek, consisted of small crescent-shaped earthworks and a walled structure featuring three gateways. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AV17_B01F04_E9_01
Subjects: American Indian history; Ohio History--Natural and Native Ohio; Hopewell culture; Earthworks (Archaeology);
Places: Cedarville (Ohio); Greene County (Ohio)
 

Description: What is now Chillicothe in Ross County, Ohio, was once home to the Adena and Hopewell prehistoric American Indian cultures. This map shows the most densely-concentrated area of ancient earthworks in North America. The Adena culture (800 B.C. to 100 A.D.) built most of the earthworks and some of the circular enclosures in the Chillicothe area, including the Adena Mound. The Hopewell culture (100 B.C. to 400 A.D.) built monumental earthworks and burial mounds in geometric shapes, primarily in the Paint Creek Valley, a few miles from Chillicothe. Archaeologists E.G. Squier and E.H. Davis, with the help of surveyor and geologist Charles Whittlesey, systematically documented the Indian works and compiled them into an 1847 book called "Ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley: Comprising the results of extensive original surveys and explorations." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SquierDavisPlateII
Subjects: Mounds--Ohio River Valley; American Indians--Archaeology; Ohio River Valley--Antiquities; Earthworks (Archaeology)
Places: Chillicothe (Ohio); Ross County (Ohio)
 

Description: Map of the Marietta Works by surveyor Charles Whittlesey, 1837. The Marietta Earthworks site is a large Hopewell culture ceremonial center located at the confluence of the Muskingum and Ohio Rivers in Washington County. Originally, it included a large square enclosure surrounding four flat-topped pyramidal mounds, another smaller square, and a circular enclosure with a large burial mound at its center. In 1788, the directors of the Ohio Company of Associates, the founders of Marietta, agreed to preserve important parts of the earthworks as parks. Three segments of the Marietta Earthworks are maintained as public parks today. The large burial mound surrounded by a circular enclosure is called Conus, the largest of the flat-topped earthen pyramids is called Quadranaou, and the next largest pyramidal mound is called Capitolium. The Washington County Public Library was built atop Capitolium Mound. The Marietta Earthworks are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Archaeologists E.G. Squier and E.H. Davis, with the help of surveyor and geologist Charles Whittlesey, systematically documented the Indian works and compiled them into an 1847 book called "Ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley: Comprising the results of extensive original surveys and explorations." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SquierDavisPlateXXVI
Subjects: Mounds--Ohio River Valley; American Indians--Archaeology; Ohio River Valley--Antiquities; Earthworks (Archaeology); Hopewell culture--Ohio
Places: Marietta (Ohio); Washington County (Ohio)
 

Description: What is now Chillicothe in Ross County, Ohio, was once home to the Adena and Hopewell prehistoric American Indian cultures. This map shows an ancient earthwork located in Liberty Township, about 8 miles southeast of Chillicothe. The Adena culture (800 B.C. to 100 A.D.) built most of the earthworks and some of the circular enclosures in the Chillicothe area, including the Adena Mound. The Hopewell culture (100 B.C. to 400 A.D.) built monumental earthworks and burial mounds in geometric shapes, primarily in the Paint Creek Valley, a few miles from Chillicothe. Archaeologists E.G. Squier and E.H. Davis, with the help of surveyor and geologist Charles Whittlesey, systematically documented the Indian works and compiled them into an 1847 book called "Ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley: Comprising the results of extensive original surveys and explorations." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SquierDavisPlateXX
Subjects: Mounds--Ohio River Valley; American Indians--Archaeology; Ohio River Valley--Antiquities; Earthworks (Archaeology)
Places: Liberty Township (Ohio); Ross County (Ohio)