OF THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY. 23
tural people, considerably advanced in the arts, and pos- sessing great uniformity, throughout the whole territory which they occupied, in manners, habits, and religion—a uniformity sufficiently marked to identify them as a single people, having a common origin, common modes of life, and as a consequence, common sympathies, if not a common and consolidated government.
Sacrep Worxs.—The structure, no less than the form and position, of a large number of the earth-works of the West, and more particularly of the Scioto valley, render it clear that they were erected for other than defensive purposes.* The small dimensions of most of the circles, the occurrence of the ditch interior to the embankment, and the fact that many of them are completely commanded by adjacent heights, may be mentioned as sustaining this conclusion. We must seek, therefore, in the connection in which these works are found, and in the character and contents of the mounds, if such there be, within their walls for the secret of their origin. And it may be observed, that it is here we find evidence still more satisfactory and con- clusive than furnished by the small dimensions of these works, or the position of the ditch, that they were not in- tended for defence. Thus, when we find enclosures con- taining a number of mounds, all of which it is capable of demonstration were religious in their purposes, or in some way connected with the superstitions of the people who built them, the conclusion is irresistible that the enclosure
- It seems incredible that many well-informed men, who have examined
some of the small circular and elliptical works of the West, should have fallen into the palpable error of supposing them defensive in their origin. Major Long (Secondi Exp. Vol. i., p. 54) describes some petty works in the vicinity of Piqua, Ohio, consisting of a number of small circles, as of undoubted war- like origin, applying to them the terms of military technology. One of these circles, which he regards as a “redoubt,” is 43 feet in diameter, and has its ditch interior to the wall! A famous defence, truly, contrasted with the forti- fied hills already described !
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