SHETRONE] CULTURE PROBLEM IN OHIO ARCHAEOLOGY l6l
In the dearth of culture horizons, stratigraphic and other evolu- tionary evidences in the Ohio area, it would be gratifying to find that the Adena type of mounds represents an earlier phase of the Hopewell culture; but if this should prove to be the case, we must suppose a very considerable period of time necessary for the Adena people so completely to change their distinctive traits, and to evolve into the typical Hopewell culture variety. Evidences of long-con- tinued habitation in the area, necessary to such a change, naturally would be expected to manifest themselves as examination of the tumuli proceeds. Aside from their apparent affinity with the Hopewell, the Adena mounds do not suggest relationship to any outside archaeological area or historic tribes.
Aside from the Adena mound, taken as the type, and the Westenhaver mound, a number of others, very similar in character, have been examined within the past half-century. They occur principally in Ross and adjoining counties, and mainly in the Scioto valley. From what is known of the great Miamisburg mound, in Montgomery county, the largest mound in Ohio, it appears to be of the Adena type. Explorations of the Grave Creek mound, 1 the Great Smith mound, 2 and others of the Kanawha valley of West Virginia, strongly indicate that the Adena culture was not confined to the Scioto and Miami valleys of Ohio, but that it extended well across the Ohio river to the southeast.
THE STONE GRAVE AREA
In the so-called Stone Grave area of southern Ohio is to be found evidence of a culture variety apparently distinct from any other of the state, but hardly of sufficient importance or extent to merit more than passing reference. The area extends for approxi- mately twenty-five miles along the Ohio river in the Ohio counties of Brown and Adams, and correspondingly across the river in Kentucky. The tumuli of the section, located upon the high hills and ridges overlooking the valley, are in the nature of cairns, or mounds of stone and earth, containing graves, which usually are
1 Tomlinson.
2 Thomas: p. 425.
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