Our Hidden Landscapes: Indigenous Stone Ceremonial Sites in Southern New England

 

Our Hidden Landscapes: Indigenous Stone Ceremonial Sites in Southern New England

by Dr. Lucianne Lavin

Thursday, October 26, 2023

Harwinton Town Hall

100 Bentley Dr.

Harwinton, CT

Doors open at 6:30 pm

Presentation begins at 7:00 pm

Pre registration requested at this link.

Directions at this link.

Sponsored by the Harwinton and Burlington Land Trusts

​“A hike in the woods often reveals a variety of built stone cultural features. Many of these are the remains of abandoned farmsteads and industrial mill sites. Others, however, represent Native American ceremonial sites. The idea of Native Americans designing stone structures that represent sacred landscapes is fairly new to some Northeastern researchers, as it was historically – and erroneously -- thought that local Indigenous peoples did not build in stone and all such structures were the result of European-American farming activities. Some of it is, but some of it is not. 

​This PowerPoint presentation (and the recently published book on which it is based) introduces people to Southern New England’s Indigenous Ceremonial Stone Landscapes (CSLs) – sacred spaces whose principal identifying characteristics are stacked stone structures that cluster within specific physical landscapes. They are often unrecognized as the significant cultural landscapes they are, in dire need of protection and preservation.

​State regulations (in Connecticut, at least) support preservation of sacred Native American sites (that is, those sites of ritual significance), and so it is important for members of land trusts and conservation organizations, as well as private property owners, to be able to recognize these sites within their properties and work to preserve them.”