Variations in design of rectangular burial mounds

Variations in design of rectangular mounds with hollows. Styles A-D may be tall and up to 40 feet across; styles E-H are usually low to the ground and less than ~15 feet across. Style I is a crescent shape, usually ~20 feet across.

This is a shape classification not a rock pile classification - because large or small examples of the same shape may be different types of rock pile.

Examples:

Type A Blood Hill

 Type A Franklin

Type A Northborough

Type B Hopping Brook

Type C Hopping Brook:

 Type D Callahan State Park

 Type D Blood Rd

 Type E Ashby West

Type F Woodbridge Rd

 Type F Apron Hill

Type G Falulah

 Type G Hobbs Brook, Lincoln

 Type I Nod Brook:

 Type I Scott Rd

A split in the Rock Pile community

I had an article rejected by NEARA journal editors. It was about the hypothesis that the larger mounds with central 'hollow' are burial mounds - a simple New England expression of a nationwide mound culture. The article included a typology that I find useful (see next post).

The reason NEARA editors gave for refusing to publish this hypothesis is that it is too sensitive a topic. The NEARA organization would not want to be an accomplice to vandalism or violations of the NAGPRA laws. In fact, this policy does protect the organization from an existential threat (i.e. burial mounds vandalized because of scientific reporting, here in New England) but there is a genuine scientific downside:

• It excludes comparison of New England stone mounds with earthen and stone mounds outside New England. For example, mounds in Ohio, central America, and Egypt are all thought of in terms of burial. To deny this role for New England stone mounds implies they are outside that spectrum.
• It obliges limited or superficial explanation of features: for example alignments and proximity to water. What is left after excluding basic assumptions, like death and the underworld, may not be worth much.
• Ultimately it leads to ignoring what may be the most important piles at a particular site. Lacking any coherent interpretation the burial mounds remain invisible, all the more likely to be abused by passersby. 

In the end, I cannot see how burial mounds or sites that are funerary can possibly be protected without divulging their function. How can they be properly "protected" if the sites are lied about? Also how will it work if "secret" topics are to be discussed on field trips and in conferences but not in publication? How is that going to work?

I heard something about climate change denial that seems to apply to rock piles: you cannot suppress the truth just because it is uncomfortable to you. Yet NEARA is implementing a policy of censorship. It is ironic, since many of the recent directions and priorities of organization derive from an open sharing of information, including from this blog. I think it is inappropriate for a "research" society to muzzle its researchers, especially for fear of condemnation.

And I would be glad to hear what readers think, both about the particulars of allowing mention of burial into discussions of rock piles; and about the more general topic of NEARA endorsing a politics of secrecy in its role as a research organization. At a minimum, the organization should stop pretending to be about public "education".

Seen on YouTube

Ceremonial Stone Landscape Presentation (Orange MA)

Presentation to New Salem (MA) Historical Commission
Hosted by Sarah Kohler
Thursday, May 2nd @ 4:30PM
Stage on Main
17 South Main Street, Orange, MA 01364

     Sarah Kohler will be giving a presentation to the New Salem Historical Commission (of which she is a member) of her ongoing research. This is a posted, open public meeting & anyone is welcome to attend.
    The presentation will focus on the artistic, pragmatic, mathematical & astronomical components, contained within the precolonial stone constructs and stone landscapes that are extant in our region.
    A series of large, framed photographs, showing details of her subject will be on view in the gallery during the presentation.

 http://www.wikistones.org/

https://vimeo.com/153282149

https://www.flickr.com/photos/139719088@N07/

Good stuff on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5dU3H2s0zE (if you ignore the sasquatch)

More Colorado Ceremonial Stones - from Sasquatch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNZIXTqh5qs

Some Lines from a Hammonasset Story (Madison CT)

Sebaquanash “The Man Who Weeps” by Dale Carson (Abenaki)

(Dale Carlson Illustration)

      "Long, long ago, when the world was still new, there was a family of people who called themselves “The Hammonassetts.” In their language this meant “The People.” They lived on the shores of a river, which later came to be named for them..."

    At Hammonassett, the beach was flat with occasional rock outcroppings for children and wildlife to discover. The salt marsh area where they lived in the summers was the most beautiful place one could imagine. Their wigwam was high enough to be safe from flooding and from every direction there was nothing but the glory that Creator had made. The morning sun to the east, the setting sun to the west and the moon rose and set over the land giving spectacular vistas all around. Indeed, a sacred place to live..."

  "High enough to be safe from flooding," along the Indigenous Shoreline Path.

      In this surviving Hammonasset story, Mahomac says to his favorite grandson Sebaquanash: “Grandson, when I was not much older than you are now, I went to the caves north of here, our winter camp, and stayed alone without food for four days and nights. On the third night, I dreamt a strange and wondrous thing. The Great Spirit came to me and said that one day I would have a daughter who would give birth to a great leader of our people. He would be called “The Man Who Weeps”. On the fourth day I went outside and climbed to the top of the caves, to the highest point of land I could find. The dream was for me to study and contemplate its meaning so it was there and then that I saw my purpose and my personal life path.”
       Part of a vision quest sometimes included sweating first to purify a person's body. If I could pick out a couple interesting Hammonasset Lines (so to speak), the "lines of stones" along what has become a modern road on a certain hill, you'd find this stone structure, a possible Pesuponk or Stone Sweat Lodge, where a person would "purify" their body before a vision quest - or await a vision:

(Karen Lucibello Daigle photo)

Further along is this one:

(Karen Lucibello Daigle photo)

Higher up, farther north, just a little west of this old trail:

Toward the the higher ground, behind these stones on a boulder:

A serpentine row (line?) of stones, crowns the outcrop, at "the top of the caves, to the (or one of the) highest point of land I could find," just like Grandpa says he did:

Other stonework on the Hill:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/34580529@N04/albums/72157665915629962/with/25891882615/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/34580529@N04/albums/72157665814497872/with/25712528852/

Hammonasset related: 

https://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/search?q=diamondback

https://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/search?q=Hammonasset

2019 arrowheads

In January I spent a weekend day searching a little rise in the landscape within sight of a large pond. In the past I had found some quartz flakes in a fairly well-defined area on one slope. I searched the slope very carefully and found some broken tools.

Walking back to the car, in a large flat area mostly devoid of chipping debris, I spotted this.

I think this is an interesting item. It is made of quartz (as usual), asymmetrical, with a single shoulder. It is large. I imagine this was probably used as a knife. The tip is missing, as usual.

I spotted this argillite stemmed point on the same day in a different place. It was a good day. I love the defined appearance of the flaking scars on argillite tools. This one has tip damage, too.

Hours of searching in a different place earlier this month yielded this tiny triangular point. Most of the "arrowheads" I find were probably dart points or knives. It's possible that this little quartz point might be a true arrowhead, that once tipped an arrow fired from a bow. Making a tiny point like this would have taken some skill.

It stormed pretty hard here in Massachusetts on Monday. But the end of the day was really pleasant, breezy, with a dramatic sky as the sun began to move toward the horizon.

I searched a favorite place where I used to find a lot of stuff but after hours of searching I hadn't found a single thing. I spotted this at dusk, just as it was getting too dark to see, in an area that is mostly void and that I usually don't spend a lot of time in.

It is (again) missing the tip but for me this Squibnocket Triangle is still a decent find, representative in many ways of what it is that I am searching for out there. I remind myself that I am very lucky to be able to find anything at all. This is probably from the late Archaic, 3,000-4,500 years old.

Proposed Solar Farm Site (Killingworth CT)

(Karen Lucibello Daigle photo)

...not all that far from Buell Hill:

More:

https://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2019/04/proposed-solar-farm-killingworth-ct.html

Rock on Rocks - Quissett Woods Mendon

This would throw a nice shadow.

Here, look beyond the gap in the wall. I get the impression this is a line of sight.

Very "Fitchburgy" (Fitchburg MA)

- houses behind almost any stone structure.

Westminster Hill Road in Fitchburg MA

4/09/2019

A bit of stone wall at the edge of Development,

Is it atypical of the area

To find something like this,

Along some present day property line?

I mean both the Development 

And that stone wall that "ends in" 

A flat top triangular boulder,

On some smaller supporting cobbles,

Something about it suggestive

Of a rattlesnakes head,

The curve that resembles an supraocular scale

And perhaps an eye below that:

"I swear," he writes to me, 

"That one on top of the flat one has eyes too!"

And at this point I know where he means,

Because he's been showing me example after example

Of stones chosen and placed "just so"

As if these stones were meant to be seen as having eyes,

As if the "Strong Looker," the Uktena were looking at you

At the beginning of a row of stones:

Nearby are other serpentine walls

And sometimes short segments

 - could that be a Manitou stone

Almost touching that short row?

Closer:

Step back out,

Observe the water feature

And ponder a bit about

How the stones might relate to it,

How a Snake row of stones

Fits in better with Indigenous land use

Rather than something to do with cows or sheep and all...

Paul Tbo‎Celebrating the Ceremonial Stone Landscapes of Eastern North America

A "road-side attraction" I'll throw in, photo'd by Paul:

A stroll under the power lines in Bellingham

Actually, I walked in along a power line, seeing a mound at 'A', an interesting split wedged rock at 'B' and a number of brook-side piles of various sorts, around 'C'.

I wanted to get to that beautiful landform between the swamp, left of center, and the river, not shown to the left of the map fragment. I guess my legs are getting weak, or the day was getting late, cuz the featureless lowlands discouraged me.

The mound at 'A' was a reasonably typical rectangular mound with inner structure. It is built into a wall. Walking southwest from the road, under the power lines I find:

I see a white rock on top.  

Looking for details, I do not see much, just that there was some structure, now, degenerate.

[Update: Look again, it is clear someone drove a heavy piece of tread equipment up on top of the pile.]
Looking back:

I did not find a lot later, so took other pictures at the end of the walk. For instance, of this smaller one a few yards away:

And some details on the back side, showing the sense of "corner" on the rectangle:

 Showing small "chambers" near another corner:

Quite a beautiful example. Should be relatively safe, there under the power lines.

Other things worth showing from my walk include this interesting example of a wedges inserted in a split boulder. I never saw an example like this:

Some of these inserts look modern. Also, some real effort went into getting those small rock jammed in there. Increasingly I get a sense that there are some modern people, Indians, who know something about the uses of ceremonial features.

For the record, these are called split-wedged rocks or split-filled rocks and not "split-wedged cairns". I discovered them and I get to name them. I assume the users know other names.

Also saw this wall bulge:

And this pretty little pile by itself near 'C':