A rude article in the shape of an axe, composed of pure lead, weighing about half a pound, was found in sinking a well within the trench of the ancient works at Circleville. There can be no doubt it was the production of the Mound Builders, as galena has often been found on the altars in the mounds.
It has been generally thought, by Mr. Squier and others, that there were no evidences that the Mound Builders were acquainted with the use of iron, or that their plating was more than a simple overlaying of one metal on another, or on some foreign substance.
Some years since, however, a mound was opened at Marietta, Ohio, which seems to have refuted these opinions. Dr. S. P. Hildreth, in a letter to the American Antiquarian Society, thus speaks of it:
"Lying immediately over or on the forehead of the body were found three large circular bosses, or ornaments for a sword-belt or buckler; they are composed of copper overlaid with a thick plate of silver. The fronts are slightly convex, with a depression like a cup in the centre, and they measure two inches and a quarter across the face of each. On the back side, opposite the depressed portion, is a copper rivet or nail, around which are two separate plates by which they were fastened to the leather. Two small pieces of leather were found lying between the plates of one of the bosses; they resemble the skin of a mummy, and seem to have been preserved by the salts of copper. Near the side of the body was found a plate of silver, which appears to have been the upper part of a sword scabbard; it is six inches in length, two in breadth, and weighs one ounce. It seems to have been fastened to the scabbard by three or four rivets, the holes of which remain in the silver.
Two or three pieces of copper tube were also found, filled with iron rust. These pieces, from their appearance, composed the lower end of the scabbard, near the point of the sword. No signs of the sword itself were discovered, except the rust above mentioned.
The mound had every appearance of being as old as any in the neighborhood, and was at the first settlement of Marietta covered with large trees. It seems to have been made for this
