Ohio ’s Serpent Mound might just be one of the most entrancing prehistorical sites in North America . Located in Adams County , it ’s the big know surviving deterrent example of a prehistoric effigy hillock in the world . Its line of descent remain ill-defined . Who build up this awesome repository and why ? fortuitously , modern science is helping to shed light on the mystery .
It almost await as if a elephantine ophidian is lying beneath a shallow sprinkling of ground and grass , consisting of a lightly raised mound that snakes around for 411 m ( over 1,300 invertebrate foot ) , accord toUNESCO . At one destruction of the swirling mound is a large oval shape , which has been interpreted as a snake ’s question , oculus , or perhaps an nut clench in the reptile ’s mouth .
The repository is an exercise of an effigy mound , earthworks formed in the shape of animals that were built by Native American cultures in parts of present - day Wisconsin , Minnesota , Illinois , Iowa , and Ohio . Similar monumentshave been foundas far in the south as Peru , suggest at a unattackable ethnic bond that runs through the Americas .
Who built the Great Serpent Mound? It still isn’t certain.Image credit: Oh London Tom/Shutterstock.com
The origin of the Serpent Mound werehotly debatedby archaeologist and anthropologist throughout the 20thcentury . Some effigy mounds feature human burials and physical artifacts that help to sort out the mass who retrace them . No such find have been made at Serpent Mound , though .
In more recent years , archeological advances have been getting to the bottom of the mystery – although many head stay . One load of radiocarbon date resultant has suggest that the Serpent Mound issue around 1120 CE , which would indicate it was construct by the Fort Ancient Culture , a Native American culture that flourish in and around the Ohio River vale between 1000 to 1500 CE .
However , another team of archaeologist published unexampled carbon 14 dates in 2014 , suggest that it was built around 300 BCE by the Adena culture , according to theOhio History Connection .
Whoever built this monument , the mound most likely held a Brobdingnagian ethnic significance . It ’s been noted that the head of the serpent aligns with the summer solstice sundown and the hindquarters head to the wintertime solstice sunup , leading to suggestionsthat it had some astronomical subroutine .
lamentably , the site fell into ruin by the 19thcentury as a result of rearing farming and looting . By 1887 , however , it started to undergo restoration and has since been designated as a National Historic Landmark by the United States Department of the Interior .
