Thursday, August 01, 2013

Mound on Holston River, Sullivan County, Tennessee

I'm not sure if this work has appeared here before; I found this an interesting drawing:

 (Fig. 37.—Mound on Holston River, Sullivan County, Tennessee) 

"Mound No. 2 was on the south side of the river, opposite No. 1 and about the same distance from the river. It was 38 feet in diameter and 5 feet high, and on the top was a pine stump 14 inches in diameter.
Mr. Emmert, in opening it, commenced at the edge to cut a ditch 4 feet wide through it, but soon reached a wall 3 feet high, built of "river rock." He then worked around this, finding it to be an almost perfect circle, 14 feet in diameter, inside of which were found, on throwing out[Pg 76] the dirt, twelve stone graves or vaults, built of the same kind of stones, each containing a sitting skeleton, as shown in Fig. 37. One of these graves or vaults was exactly in the center, the other eleven being placed in a circle around it, and about equally spaced, as shown in the diagram.
In the center grave he found shell beads around the neck of the skeleton, and near the mouth the pipe shown in Fig. 38.
The bottom of the area within the circular wall was covered to the depth of about 3 inches with charcoal, and the graves were built on this layer. Both of these mounds were on the bench or upper bottom, and about three-fourths of a mile from the river.
Mr. Emmert says he learned that there was a tradition of the neighborhood that the Indians once fought a great battle at this place, and that one party buried some of their dead in mound No. 2, and the other party buried their dead on the opposite side of the river, where there is a large pile or mound of "river rock..."

2 comments :

  1. Anonymous9:58 AM

    FTA: "The skeleton found lying in the middle of the floor of the vault was of unusually large size, "measuring 7 feet 6 inches in length and 19 inches between the shoulder sockets."

    Wow. Interesting. dc.

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  2. Probably was asked if he played alot of basket ball when he was alive. Me, I lie about my height and say I'm 5 foot 6. People ask me if I play alot of miniature golf...

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