Great Serpent Mound


Fort Ancient Culture(?), Great Serpent Mound, c. 1070, Adams County, Ohio (photo: Eric Ewing, CC BY-SA 3.0)
The Great Serpent Mound; Adams County

 The Mound is found in ancient culture in Adams County Ohio. It also is the largest serpent figure in the world. There were lots of mountains made by ancient Native American cultures. They were made in the valleys of Mississippi, Ohio, Illinois, and the Missouri rivers thousands of years ago.It ranges from one to three feet in height depending on where you're standing and the mound is 1300 feet long. The mound is both architectural and sculptural and was erected by settled peoples who grew maize, beans, and squash. The shape of the serpent is unique, it is slightly Crescent shaped. The head is set in the East and tail set in the West with seven curves within the body of the snake. Within the body of the snake, it has Oval shaped large eyes. The native cultures in North and Central America believe that supernatural powers to snakes and reptiles are represented by spiritual practices. The native people of Ohio Valley frequently created snake shapes out of copper sheets. The mounds our topography of the site they are high plateau looking over Ohio brush Creek. The head of the creature approaches a steep Cliff above the Creek this is a unique geological formation that suggests a meteor struck the site approximately 250 did 300 million years ago. It has formed bedrock underneath the mound, which is why it is higher above the Creek. 

Ephraim George Squier and E. H. Davis, "The Serpent;" entry 1014, Adams County Ohio. Pl. XXXV, Ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley: comprising the results of extensive original surveys and explorations, Washington: Smithsonian institution, 1848
The Serpent


Dr. Katherine T. Brown, "Fort Ancient Culture: Great Serpent Mound," in Smarthistory, August 9, 2015, accessed December 7, 2020, https://smarthistory.org/fort-ancient-culture-great-serpent-mound/.

Comments

  1. Audrey DeStefanoDecember 13, 2020 at 7:17 PM

    The Great Serpent Mound has always a fascinating historical and artistic site to me, and this blog was very informative. It’s clear you did a lot of research on the topic and made yourself very aware of the historical context.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Lily EdgingtonDecember 13, 2020 at 7:40 PM

    I actually had never heard of this before reading your post. I found it very informing and I liked that you included information about the natives to the land.

    ReplyDelete

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