Alligator Effigy Mound
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Alligator Effigy Mound
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| Nearest city: | Granville, Ohio |
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| Coordinates: | 40°4′11.76″N 82°30′3.71″W / 40.0699333°N 82.5010306°WCoordinates: 40°4′11.76″N 82°30′3.71″W / 40.0699333°N 82.5010306°W |
| Governing body: | Licking County Historical Society |
| NRHP Reference#: |
71000643 [1] |
| Added to NRHP: | November 5, 1971 |
The Alligator Effigy Mound is a nationally recognized historic site in Granville, Ohio, United States. A prehistoric earthwork, the mound was likely built between AD 800 and 1200 by people of the Fort Ancient culture.[2] The mound was likely a ceremonial site, as it was not used for burials.
Alligator Mound is one of two extant effigy mounds known in the present-day state of Ohio, along with Serpent Mound in Adams County, Ohio.[2][3] It has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1971.[1] Effigy mounds were built more often by ancient indigenous peoples located in the areas of the present-day states of Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin, and many have survived there.[2][3]
Early American settlers thought the mound represented an alligator. Since alligators are not found in Ohio, some researchers believe the figure represents a local animal, such as an opossum, salamander, or panther.
In 1999 Brad Lepper and Tod A. Frolking conducted an archaeological investigation of the mound. By radiometric dating of a piece of charcoal recovered from the base of the mound, they estimate its construction to have been 1,000 years BP (about AD 950).[2] Lepper suggests that the Alligator Mound is an effigy of an underwater panther, a powerful figure in Native American myth. He thinks that early European settlers misinterpreted what Native Americans told them about the effigy. They were told that it was a fierce creature that lived in the water and ate people, which they assumed to be an alligator.[4] The mound is located on privately owned land at the end of Bryn Du Drive, within the village limits of Granville.
References [edit]
- ^ a b "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. 2008-04-15.
- ^ a b c d "Alligator Mound". Ohio Historical Society. Retrieved 2008-10-26.
- ^ a b "The Licking County Historical Society - Alligator Mound". The Licking County Historical Society. Archived from the original on 2008-08-04. Retrieved 2008-10-26.
- ^ Lepper, Brad; Frolking, Tod A. (2003). "Alligator Mound: Geoarchaeological and Iconographical Interpretations of a Late Prehistoric Effigy Mound in Central Ohio, USA". Cambridge Archaeological Journal 13 (2): 147–167. doi:10.1017/S0959774303000106.
External links [edit]
- Ohio Exploration Society - Alligator Mound
- - The Project Gutenberg EBook of Animal Carvings from Mounds of the Mississippi Valley, by Henry W. Henshaw
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