Sunday, December 16, 2012

Blood Hill (2) - the main mound

Referring to part 1 [here], I went down hill from the wall corner and found a big mound filling the  head of the valley with water, now flowing as a brook, coming out from the bottom of the mound. You can hear the suppressed excitement in my voice [my size estimate is probably wrong, more like 20-30 yards].
Let me sketch this mound, like a capital "J" on its side:
Here are some panoramas. Looking at them when I got home, I noticed the buried structure within the arms of the J. It makes it seem that the whole structure was about water flow. I imagine what this would be like in the rain with water rushing out of the bottom of the mound.
and
and
 and
Here the camera is focused on the "buried" structures a few feet below the main mound:
Here is a detail of the shorter arm, with a culvert [??] below a piece of quartz. The brook seems to come out of this culvert today but it looks as if the mound collapsed and blocked the main channel of the brook:
A closeup of the quartz:
The other arms of the J also had quartz at the end:
Looking at the buried structure and the placement at the top of a brook, I feel this is about water, about water flow, about water management. [Later, this article about the Inca resonated a bit.] After spending time photo'ing the main mound, I went downhill. I'll write later about the next small cluster of rock piles and a few more features at the foot of the valley.
(Compare with Raymond Memorial Park.)

1 comment :

theseventhgeneration said...

The "wall where there was something ceremonial at the corner", big mound, and water all remind me of the Pepacton Ledges site here in NY.