Location | West Portsmouth, Ohio, Scioto County, Ohio, USA |
---|---|
Region | Scioto County, Ohio |
Coordinates | 38°48′05″N83°00′35″W / 38.80139°N 83.00972°W |
History | |
Founded | 100 BCE |
Abandoned | 500 CE |
Cultures | Hopewell tradition |
Site notes | |
Excavation dates | 1915 |
Archaeologists | William C. Mills Ohio Historical Society |
Architecture | |
Architectural styles | earthworks |
Architectural details | Number of monuments: 1 |
Tremper Mound and Works | |
NRHP reference No. | 72001041 [1] |
Added to NRHP | December 6, 1972 [1] |
Responsible body: private |
The Tremper Mound and Works are a Hopewell (100 BCE to 500 CE) earthen enclosure and large, irregularly shaped mound. The site is located in Scioto County, Ohio, about five miles northwest of Portsmouth, Ohio, on the second terrace floodplain overlooking the Scioto River. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
The Tremper Works include a large earthen enclosure in the shape of a flattened oval. Measuring 480 feet (150 m) by 407 feet (124 m), the oval was entered through an opening in the southwestern part of the enclosure. At the center of the oval is a large, irregularly shaped mound. Believed by some to be an effigy mound built in the shape of an animal, although there has never been any conclusive proof of this. [2]
The site was surveyed in the 1840s by Charles Whittlesey for E. G. Squier and E. H. Davis, and an engraving was included in their book Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley. [3] The site was excavated by William C. Mills of the Ohio Historical Society in 1915. He discovered numerous postmolds at the base of the mound, revealing the outline of a wooden structure 200 feet (61 m) long by 100 feet (30 m) wide. The pattern showed that there had been a large building with several smaller chambers at its eastern end. [2]
The site is privately owned and was once a working farm. [4]
Another significant discovery made at Tremper were more than 500 objects that had been deliberately broken and left in one of the eastern chambers. The objects included 136 smoking pipes made of catlinite or pipestone. Ninety were effigy pipes sculpted in the shapes of animals, notably bears, wolves, dogs, beavers, cougars, otters, turtles, cranes, owls, herons, and hawks. [2]
It had been thought that the material used to make the pipes had been quarried from Ohio pipestone outcrops across the Scioto River from Tremper, but new tests have shown that the majority of the pipes were made from Sterling pipestone from northwestern Illinois. Many of the Tremper pipes are on display at the Ohio Historical Center in Columbus, Ohio. [2]
The Hopewell tradition, also called the Hopewell culture and Hopewellian exchange, describes a network of precontact Native American cultures that flourished in settlements along rivers in the northeastern and midwestern Eastern Woodlands from 100 BCE to 500 CE, in the Middle Woodland period. The Hopewell tradition was not a single culture or society but a widely dispersed set of populations connected by a common network of trade routes.
The Great Serpent Mound is a 1,348-foot-long (411 m), three-foot-high prehistoric effigy mound located in Peebles, Ohio. It was built on what is known as the Serpent Mound crater plateau, running along the Ohio Brush Creek in Adams County, Ohio. The mound is the largest serpent effigy in the world.
Hopewell Culture National Historical Park is a United States national historical park with earthworks and burial mounds from the Hopewell culture, indigenous peoples who flourished from about 200 BC to AD 500. The park is composed of six separate sites in Ross County, Ohio, including the former Mound City Group National Monument. The park includes archaeological resources of the Hopewell culture. It is administered by the United States Department of the Interior's National Park Service.
Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley (1848) by the Americans Ephraim George Squier and Edwin Hamilton Davis is a landmark in American scientific research, the study of the prehistoric indigenous mound builders of North America, and the early development of archaeology as a scientific discipline. Published in 1848, it was the Smithsonian Institution's first publication and the first volume in its Contributions to Knowledge series. The book had 306 pages, 48 lithographed maps and plates, and 207 wood engravings. The book was reissued in 1998 in paperback, with an introduction by David J. Meltzer, professor of anthropology at Southern Methodist University.
The Alligator Effigy Mound is an effigy mound in Granville, Ohio, United States. The mound is believed to have been built between AD 800 and 1200 by people of the Fort Ancient culture. The mound was likely a ceremonial site, as it was not used for burials.
The Newark Earthworks in Newark and Heath, Ohio, consist of three sections of preserved earthworks: the Great Circle Earthworks, the Octagon Earthworks, and the Wright Earthworks. This complex, built by the Hopewell culture between 100 BCE and 400 CE, contains the largest earthen enclosures in the world, and was about 3,000 acres in total extent. Less than 10 percent of the total site has been preserved since European-American settlement; this area contains a total of 206 acres (83 ha). Newark's Octagon and Great Circle Earthworks are managed by the Ohio History Connection. A designated National Historic Landmark, in 2006 the Newark Earthworks was also designated as the "official prehistoric monument of the State of Ohio."
The Hopeton Earthworks are an Ohio Hopewell culture archaeological site consisting of mounds and earthwork enclosures. It is located on the eastern bank of the Scioto River just north of Chillicothe in Ross County, Ohio, about 1 mile (1.6 km) east of the Mound City Group and Shriver Circle on a terrace of the Scioto River. The site is a detached portion of the Hopewell Culture National Historic Park, along with the Mound City Group, Hopewell Mound Group, Seip Earthworks, Spruce Hill Earthworks and the High Bank Works. The site is open to the public.
The Portsmouth Earthworks are a large prehistoric mound complex constructed by the Native American Adena and Ohio Hopewell cultures of eastern North America. The site was one of the largest earthwork ceremonial centers constructed by the Hopewell and is located at the confluence of the Scioto and Ohio Rivers, in present-day Ohio.
Prehistory of Ohio provides an overview of the activities that occurred prior to Ohio's recorded history. The ancient hunters, Paleo-Indians, descended from humans that crossed the Bering Strait. There is evidence of Paleo-Indians in Ohio, who were hunter-gatherers that ranged widely over land to hunt large game. For instance, mastodon bones were found at the Burning Tree Mastodon site that showed that it had been butchered. Clovis points have been found that indicate interaction with other groups and hunted large game. The Paleo Crossing site and Nobles Pond site provide evidence that groups interacted with one another. The Paleo-Indian's diet included fish, small game, and nuts and berries that gathered. They lived in simple shelters made of wood and bark or hides. Canoes were created by digging out trees with granite axes.
The Havana Hopewell culture were a Hopewellian people who lived in the Illinois River and Mississippi River valleys in Iowa, Illinois, and Missouri from 200 BCE to 400 CE.
The Mount Horeb Earthworks Complex is an Adena culture group of earthworks in Lexington, Kentucky. It consists of two major components, the Mount Horeb Site 1 and the Peter Village enclosure, and several smaller features including the Grimes Village site, Tarleton Mound, and Fisher Mound. The Peter Village and Grimes Village enclosures were mapped by Rafinesque and featured in Squier and Davis's landmark publication Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley in 1848 as Plate XIV Figures 3 and 4.
The Biggs site (15Gp8), also known as the Portsmouth Earthworks Group D, is an Adena culture archaeological site located near South Shore in Greenup County, Kentucky. Biggs was originally a concentric circular embankment and ditch surrounding a central conical burial mound with a causeway crossing the ring and ditch. It was part of a larger complex, the Portsmouth Earthworks located across the Ohio River, now mostly obliterated by agriculture and the developing city of Portsmouth, Ohio.
The Marietta Earthworks is an archaeological site located at the confluence of the Muskingum and Ohio Rivers in Washington County, Ohio, United States. Most of this Hopewellian complex of earthworks is now covered by the modern city of Marietta. Archaeologists have dated the ceremonial site's construction to approximately 100 BCE to 500 CE.
Indian Mound Reserve is a public country park near the village of Cedarville, Ohio, United States. Named for two different earthworks within its bounds — the Williamson Mound and the Pollock Works — the park straddles Massies Creek as it flows through a small canyon.
Cedar-Bank Works is group of Adena culture earthworks located in Ross County, Ohio in the United States. It is located approximately five miles north of the town of Chillicothe, Ohio.
The Piketon Mounds are a group of earthworks located in Piketon, Ohio in the United States. The site is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The specific age of the site is unknown. Some mounds were created by the Adena culture, while other mounds were built by the Hopewell culture.
Cross Mound is an earthwork located near Tarlton, Ohio in the United States. The culture who built it and the time it was built remains unknown. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Contemporary archaeologists have described it as "one of the many enigmatic effigy mounds in Southern Ohio."
The Stubbs Earthworks was a massive Ohio Hopewell culture archaeological site located in Morrow in Warren County, Ohio.
The Shriver Circle Earthworks are an Ohio Hopewell culture archaeological site located in Chillicothe in Ross County, Ohio. At 1,200 feet (370 m) in diameter the site is one of the largest Hopewell circular enclosures in the state of Ohio.