Received this photograph in an email, from a reader named Colleen Jarrel, with this message: I stumbled across your blog page and thought maybe you could take a quick look at these photos and give any thoughts as to what they might be.
Attached are photos of the rock structures which are located in the vicinity of Milepost 255 on the Blue Ridge Parkway
Any thoughts would be helpful. My first thought was that they were part of a fence between properties, although they don't seem to run in a straight line. . . . I'm just looking into this as a favor to a friend who isn't internet savvy at all.
I told her it's impossible to say without knowing more. There's a lot you can't see unless you're there yourself, including how old the rock piles look and whether there are other features, old or new, associated with them, such as old walls or new trails. Even then it may be difficult to say what a rock pile was built for and who built it. She agreed to have me post it on the blog in order to get opinions and thoughts. It is a nice rock pile, and two more are discernable in the picture. I know I would be pleased to come across them.
I told her it's impossible to say without knowing more. There's a lot you can't see unless you're there yourself, including how old the rock piles look and whether there are other features, old or new, associated with them, such as old walls or new trails. Even then it may be difficult to say what a rock pile was built for and who built it. She agreed to have me post it on the blog in order to get opinions and thoughts. It is a nice rock pile, and two more are discernable in the picture. I know I would be pleased to come across them.
7 comments :
On the face of it these would be ceremonial piles. But there is something suspicious about the rectangular shape. These remind me of some very similar piles from Hardwick MA (see the NEARA photos section) which looked to have once supported a wooden structure. As you say, more information is needed.
There are numerous examples of mostly barrel-shaped, but even some square or rectangular, cairns found along the Appalachian Mountain chain, from NY to GA. Many of these are now being reported by archaeologists from the Mid-Atlantic states to the Deep South, who are gradually coming around to the view that these are not colonial piles. But before we get carried away, the cairns along the Blue Ridge Parkway need to be examined more carefully before any definite opinion is drawn, as Peter notes.
Norman
It's hard to see in that photo, but is that a single piece of white stone in the middle of that cairn? If so, it would be an almost unmistakable signature common to ceremonial cairns all over the Eastern Woodlands.
My first reaction was that it was not ceremonial, but now I remember that I have a photograph of a squarish rock pile like that from a cairn field in the Poconos.
The other thing I find suspicious is that these piles appear to be located along the same topo line - meaning if they were all the same height their tops would be level with one another. I just do not think of that as a ceremonial feature although I would be happy to learn if I am wrong.
In particular if there are other rock piles at the site which are not along this height level, or other shaped piles, or more use of quartz (I see what Jim means), or water springing out of the ground...
I didn't notice it until just now, but I see another of the same type of cairn underneath that gentleman's arm. Now I have to agree with Peter in that it definitely looks like support columns for some sort of structure. But, as with any of these, it would be easier to make an assessment in person.
But still that piece of of quartz is compelling.
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