Thursday, September 18, 2008

Mound City Group

The Mound City Group is the headquarters of the Hopewell Culture National Historic Park. It’s right next door to the Chillicothe Correctional Institution. The sirens wail now and then... but it’s nothing to worry about. Right?


The group includes at least 23 mounds enclosed by a 3-to-4-foot earthen wall. Most of the mounds are small cones... except one, large mound near the center... it is an elongated oval. The main, oval mound was probably for ceremonies and cremation rites. Most of the other mounds were likely for burial of the cremated remains.

During World War I, the army built Camp Sherman on top of the site. Once it was dismantled in the 1920’s the Ohio Historical Society’s archaeologists excavated what was left and rebuilt the mounds and earthworks to their original, pre-Army-destruction conditions.


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