CHAPTER II. ANCIENT REMAINS IN THE UNITED STATES. THE next, and perhaps the only legitimate class of American antiquities, affords unquestionable proofs of an origin from nations of great cultivation. Though all of them are assimilated by many striking general resemblances, still their local position and some characteristic differences suggest a ternary division, into such as have been discovered, 1st, within the territory of the United States; 2d, in Central America, Mexico and the adjoining provinces; and 3d, in Peru and other parts of South America. 1. The ancient remains of the United States bear evident marks of being the production of a people, elevated far above the savage state. Many of them indicate great elegance of taste, and a high degree of dexterous workmanship and mechanical skill, in their construction; others betoken the existence of a decided form of religious worship; while the size and extent of the earthen fortifications and mounds demonstrate the former existence of populous nations, capable of executing works of enormous dimensions, requiring perseverance, time and combination of labor for their erection. A detail of these vestiges of that vast population, which once occupied the richest agricultural portion of our country, though minute and circumstantial, cannot be devoid of interest; and in any event these relics demand attention, as the monuments of an ancient and perhaps enlightened species of the human race, whence, in the absence of clearer testimony, we must endeavor to gather materials for their history. The first class of these antiquities is composed of articles of mechanical workmanship, which have most frequently been discovered within the graves, mounds, and mural remains; and of other objects, of a miscellaneous character. The art of pottery is one of very early invention, as fragments of earthenware are found among the oldest ruins of the world. Its productions, though fragile, have withstood the effects of time more durably than the most massive structures, and specimens still exist entire, coeval in date with the remotest periods of civilization. Those found in the United States, of ancient construction, are of different qualities and dimensions-some, by estimate from fragments, having been of large capacity.* The chalk banks below the mouth of the Ohio river have contained several of great merit in execution, and a pitcher, which has been discovered there, is said to resemble the Scyphus of the ancients. Its model was the bottle-gourd; the neck is moulded in imitation of that of a woman with clubbed hair; the outlet resembles a distorted human mouth; and the whole vessel, though formed by the hand, is modelled with great nicety and precision.‡ An earthen vessel found at Nashville, Tennessee, twenty feet below the surface, is described as being circular, with a flat bottom rounding upwards, and terminating at the summit in the figure of a female head. The features of the face are * Flint's Recollections, p. 166. ↑ Archæologia Americana, vol. i. p. 214. † Ibid, pp. 173, 174. Asiatic, the head is covered by a conical cap, and the ears are large, extending as low as the chin. The most curious specimen of pottery is that denominated the Triune-vessel, which was disinterred from the earth, near an ancient work upon the Cumberland river.* It consists of three heads, joined together at the back, near the top, by a hollow stem or bottle. The heads are of the same dimensions, and represent very accurately three different countenances, two appearing young and the other old. The faces are partly painted, with red and yellow, the colors still preserving great brilliancy. The features are distinguished by thick lips, high cheek-bones, the absence of a beard, and the pointed shape of the head. An idolf discovered in a tumulus at Nashville presents the figure of a man without arms, and the nose and chin mutilated. The head is covered with a fillet and cake, and the hair is plaited :-The composition is of fine clay mixed with gypsum. Colored medals‡ representing the sun with its rays, other idols of various forms, and urns containing calcined human bones, some modelled after the most elegant and graceful patterns, have been found in the mounds. The fragments of earthenware, discovered at great depths near the western salt-works, are often of immense size. A large vessel, of coarse description, has been found there, eighty feet below the surface, of capacity to hold ten gallons; while others have been excavated at greater depths, and of larger dimensions. Within a mound lately opened at Lancaster, in Ohio, upon a furnace disposed at the level of the earth, there rested the largest ancient vessel yet discovered. It was eighteen feet long, six *Archæologia Americana, vol. i. p. 238. † Ibid. vol. i. p. 211. Ibid. vol. i. p. 243. broad, composed of clay and broken shells, and moulded on both sides with much smoothness." These articles of pottery vary much in their structure. The material is either simply clay-that substance united with pulverized sandstone or calcareous matter-or a composition, as well calculated, as our chemical vessels, to encounter a high degree of heat, and formed upon scientific principles.† Some of them appear to have been painted before burning, are skilfully wrought and polished, well glazed and burned, and are inferior to our own manufactures in no respect. There exist other specimens, of ancient origin, corroborating this view of the chemical knowledge of their authors. At Hamburg, in the state of New York, within an urn in the interior of a mound, curious beads have been found deposited, consisting of transparent green glass, covered with an opaque red enamel, beneath which and in the tube of the bead was a beautiful white enamel, indicative of great art in its formation. On opening an old grave at Big River, in the state of Missouri, whose antiquity was sufficiently attested by a heavy growth of forest trees over the spot, beads of similar shape, appearance and composition have also been brought to light.§ The bricks discovered in the mounds appear to have been formed after the modern method, and are well burnt; those found in the ancient fortifications are of similar construction and appearance, with the exception of possessing a lighter color. *Trans. Fairfield Co. Med. Soc. † Schoolcraft's Mississippi, p. 202. Schoolcraft's View of the Mines and Minerals of the West, &c. p. 280. § Ibid. pp. 169, 283.-Beck's Gazetteer, p. 261. The art of working in stone, and other hard substances, was carried to a considerable degree of perfection by this people; and beads of bone and shell, carved bones, and hewn and sculptured stones are by no means rare. Their weapons and implements were often formed from the oldest and hardest of rocks; and arrow-heads, axes and hatchets of granite, and hornblende, nicely cut and polished, are of frequent occurrence. The covers of some of the urns are composed of calcareous breccia, skilfully wrought;* the pieces of stone worn as ornaments, and found interred with the dead, have been drilled and worked into precise shapes, and the pipe-bowls are adorned with beautifully carved reliefs.† An idol of stone, representing the human features, has been found at Natchez, the sculptured head and beak of a rapacious bird in a mound at Cincinnati, and an owl carved in stone at Columbus, Ohio. The most singular of these sculptures has been discovered on the banks of the Mississippi, near St. Louis. This is a tabular mass of limestone bearing the impression of two human feet. The rock is a compact limestone of grayish-blue color, containing the encrinite, echinite, and other fossils. The feet are quite flattened, but the muscular marks are delineated with great precision. Immediately before the feet lies a scroll, sculptured in a similar style.‡ The opinion sometimes entertained, that these are actual impressions of the human feet, made upon a soft substance subsequently indurated, is incorrect; on the contrary, they are undoubtedly the result of art, and exhibit an extraordi * Archæologia Americana, vol. i. † Ibid. vol. i. p. 230. p. 227. Schoolcraft. |