Rocky Pond Community Forest in Northborough MA

I parked and walked in along a gully towards the pond which was, I think south or southwest. In the snow I could easily scan a number of rocks as I went in and I did soon see a rock-on-rock, and then several more, to my right on the western side of the gully.
They are pretty in the snow. At all times I am wondering if my legs will carry me further without tiring. But they held up. My eye was led upwards several times to the right. Here is one example of rock-on-rocks leading the eye upwards:
When I got to the pond I saw this:
I turned around and came back via the other side and then the first side of the gully. Again my eyes were drawn upwards:And this time I went up to look above and found other rock-on-rocks and this:
And a last rock-on-rock:
From first to last these rock-on-rocks and minor piles are scattered over one part of the hillside stretching from the higher shoulder down into the gully. The only reason I can imagine for this particular restricted location on the western slope of the gully is that there is a particular angle of view down the gully (perhaps to the northeast?) that is available only from this angle.

More on Nipsachuck - the North Smithfield RI site threatened by development

[Click here]
This is from "The Call" in an article by staff writer Joseph P. Nadeau entitled "Sekonke Wampanoag chief visits stone site." Thanks Bruce McA. for the link.

I want to make some comments.

• Note that the Sekonke Wampanoags are not clear about what the stone piles are. Nor do they appear to be aware of the large number of sites in all parts of New England.
  
• Note that every expectation should be that archeologists dismisses the stone piles, in spite of "feelings" that they are Native American. Meli, on the other hand, can be expected to be aware of some of the work done, and being done, on rock piles.
  
• Note the hypothesis that these are graves. From the sounds of it, they are more likely memorial piles than graves. Unfortunately, who will make an alternate hypothesis?
• Note another important King Phillip's War battle site is called "King Phillip's Woods" in Sudbury - has many rock piles including large numbers of rock-on-rock which are obviously not graves.
• Note numerous statements from Indians about this probably being a burial area.

I am happy to see that rock piles are moving more to the "frontal cortex" of both European and Indian awareness about New England's historic past. I hope that pretty soon, say in five or ten years, it is going to be much more common knowledge.

Rhode Island piles from reader Tim M.

He asked me to not say where these are from. The pictures include some interesting small structures.

This is a standing stone , grown into a tree, with a small piece of quartz-like material on the ground a foot in front of it. Given how the quartz is placed with relation to the leaves, it looks like it must have been placed there not too long ago.

This looks to be two examples of short linear arrangements of rocks ending in a small triangular standing stone.Some supported piles with a small number of upper rocks:

Fish Weirs

Norman Muller writes in:

This is a fine paper on fish weirs:

http://www.lutins.org/thesis.html

Update: Tim MacSweeney writes in comments:
Here's another link to it; and it says:"Welcome to the only official homepage for a: Native American Fishing Weir in the Passaic River of Bergen and Passaic Counties, New Jersey http://www.bergen.org/AAST/Projects/Weir/

Rock piles and holly trees

The American Holly is a favorite tree, native to southern Mass.They were mixed in with the white pines at Bruce's Lakeville site.

Some outcrops with rock piles - more from Lakeville MA

Bruce pointed out that at this site there are many places where the rock piles seem to be incorporated into outcrops. This first one is at the edge of a level spot with maybe five rock piles on it.
Here are some:Here is another outcrop with structures on it. This one was right next to those short stretches of wall (click here)
The whole place was complex and structured. It seemed very broken down but also un-disturbed.

Lakeville rock-on-rock

Some more scenes from Bruce McAleer's Lakeville site

A beautiful split wedged rock.What I interpret as quarry marks: A pile in the sun:A pair of quartz fragements on a rock next to the trail. They had some debris buildup around them.In case you miss New England:

More on Peruvian Horizon Piles

I just find this story interesting. [Click here]

A roadside attraction - from Bruce McAleer

On the way back from Lakeville and Freetown with Bruce last weekend, he showed me a major "roadside attraction". This is to be seen about 1/4 mi north of the Bryant Str. overpass, on the right going north on Rt 140 in Berkley Mass. It is about 10 yards from the road, actually within the deer fence. I think this is an extremely well formed pile. Here is another view:In this detail picture, you see a fine, solitary chunk of quartz:I am very impressed with this pile. It is a bit like the roadside attraction in Harvard I documented last week [Click here].

I looked in vain behind this pile, to see if there were others in the background. But then further north a few yards, in the same relative position to the highway was evidence of at least one other pile like this:It is as if the road builders left what they could. It also seems as if any other piles of this sort making up a site, would have been where the highway went through. For what it is worth, about a mile south down the road, on the other side of the highway, you catch a glimpse of Bruce's new Freetown site [Click here]. The road you see in the background of some of those pictures is the same Rt140. It might be argued that this was all one site before the highway went through.

Possible Indian burial ground getting lots of attention statewide

[Click here]
From the Valley Breeze, by Louise Tetreault.

I was surprised to see them refer to "the prestigious New England Antiquities Research Association".

Cobble Rock - a Rhode Island historic perched boulder

Thanks to Bruce for the link [Click here]

Lakeville and Freetown - deep in rock pile territory

The post card reads: "Having a great time. Wish you were here. Please send money".

Short stretches of stone wall - Bruce McAleer's Lakeville site. Part 2

Here is a classic short stretch of stone wall. I love these things and decided to start documenting them as if they were rock piles. This one runs downhill from an outcrop and ends at a brook. Connecting outcrop with wetland is a very typical for a short stretch of wall like this.
Here is another view:Finally, in these detail we see one quartz rock. It is about 2/3 of the way down.
I never noticed that kind of thing in a short stretch of wall before.

Although it is visible in none of the photos, in the foreground of the second picture above, there is another short stretch of wall running parallel with the first. It was too broken down but I am sorry now I did not photo it. Yet, a bit further along was another short stretch running roughly parallel to the first two short stretches:
This one had a distinct kink in it and where it ended at the water, there was an adjacent rock pile:
Of course there were rock piles all about, as I will describe. The typical piles at this site are ground piles, oval, and much broken down. They look quite old.

Propped Boulders - Bruce McAleer's Lakeville site. Part 1

Bruce took me to a site he found near Rt140 in Lakeville, MA. This is well south of the "snow line" where it has been raining in the last week and the walking was easy. On March 3 this was a first spring day [later March 4 in Berlin, I was back to winter, but anyway...].

Here is a first view of a major group of boulders, several of which are propped up.
Here is a detail.Then there was another big one, shown in this video:

Peruvian Horizon Markers

Wow. Check this out. An example of modifying a horizon.
[Click here]

The wall on Fort Mountain, Georgia

"...Currently, most scholars believe that the wall originated about 1100A.D. and has a religious purpose. ...".
[Click here]

Ah! If only all archeologists were as clear-eyed as these ones from Georgia.

Propped and Wedged Boulders from Blue Hill - by Bruce McAleer

Some more photos from Bruce. These are from the Blue Hill Reservation in MA:
Bruce points out, and I agree, that the wedge here looks like a bird effigy:
For example, look at this photo from Boxborough. This is consistent with the idea that after a vision quest, a representation of the vision might be created.

Bruce McAleer's Freetown site - continued

There were some other interesting piles and structures at the Freetown Site. This elongated one is rather un-usual:Then these next two look like terracing or culverts, something suggesting more substantial structures.
And a number of heavily damaged piles suggest more complicated structures.

A new site in Freetown MA - from Bruce McAleer

Bruce found a site "at the opposite end of town from the Mavor and Dix site". From the pictures it looks like a combination of several types of piles: ground piles with quartz, boulder piles, and larger mounds that are not too familiar to me.

Bruce called my attention to pictures of a pile with a light quartzite cobble half, found near the top of a pile and next to a depression/hollow in the pile.
In this detail, you can see the rock is a cream colored quartzite with grey veins criss-crossing in it.
In this other detail (Bruce put the rock back in place after he took the photo)...
...you can see the rock has been flaked a bit. According to Bruce this half-cobble is a typical core used for tool making. I think this is the whole pile:
And here is a closeup of another piece of quartz in another pile:
And here are a couple of pictures of other piles from the site. A boulder pile, still in decent shape:
Those might be niches. If I had to guess, I would say this pile was damaged.

And here are some of the larger "mound"-like piles:
From the look of them, these are pretty old piles, very broken down. Here is one more, showing how these piles are in plain sight next to the road:
I think Bruce mentioned that this site was unusual because it was on level ground without any variation in topography.