Ohio History Journal

352        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

 

EAGLE EFFIGY.

Largest Indian mound of its type in Wisconsin.

Body 131 feet. Wing spread 624 feet.

Marked by the Wisconsin Archaeological Society,

July 30, 1910.

 

 

 

 

ADDRESS OF REV. F. A. GILMORE.

Archaeology and theology have sometimes been grouped together,

since both are said to deal with subjects of no interest to modern men.

As a theologian I should be glad to refute this idea: but though I know

you are all eager to hear me discourse on theology, you must bear with

me if I disappoint you. Suffice it to say that theology or the attempt to

answer the ultimate questions which life puts to us, can never become

obsolete.

Archaeology is by no means a useless branch of learning. It is, to

be sure, the study of things that lie far behind us, "in the dark back-

ward and abysm of time"; but these things have to do with the life.

of humanity. These mounds are the records and symbols of human

thought. Hence we think that every cultivated man should know some-

thing about them. For what is culture? It is the knowledge of what

the race has thought and done. Much is claimed in these days for prac-

tical studies such as farming, engineering and the like. But these can

never replace such subjects as language, history, philosophy, art and

archaeology for it is these that give us insight into our vast human

inheritance. By them we enter the life of the race. Archaeological

studies may not butter anyone's bread (unless it be Secretary Brown's)

they do give us the key to the evolution of man.

Effigy mounds are found in several parts of the United States-by

far the greater number are in Wisconsin. Here was an epidemic of

mound building. In the early days they were thought to have been built

by the ten "Lost Tribes of Israel"; or by a prehistoric race far superior

to the Indians in civilization; or by the Aztecs before they migrated

to Mexico. The "consensus of the competent" now pronounces them

to have been the work of the Winnebago Indians, probably a few cen-

turies before the landing of Columbus.

It is a curious fact that the French missionaries and fur traders

who were in Wisconsin as early as 1634-only fourteen years after the

settlement of Plymouth, Massachusetts- make no mention of the mounds.

The Indians of that time did not make effigy mounds and seem to have

lost all knowledge of them. They did not reverence them for they built

their villages, planted their corn fields and buried their dead in them.

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The Wisconsin Archaeological Society.            353

 

These mounds belong to a class of venerated objects called Totems.

Totem is a word of Wisconsin origin and comes from the Chippewa

language. It has now passed into general use in the terminology of sci-

ence. It means, "my protector" or "my familiar patron". Totemism is

found among primitive people as far apart as Australia and Africa,

India and aboriginal America. A Totem may be a vegetable or an animal,

a war club or other object, and even the elements like the rain or sun-

shine. These objects were tattooed or burned on the body, scratched on

the walls of caves, painted on the wigwam, the canoe or paddle, cut upon

poles and erected in front of the dwelling. With certain Indian tribes

the Totem was formed in effigy, notably by the Siouxan tribes. Some-

times they were formed of stones laid out in the outline of a gigantic

animal or bird. Among the Winnebagoes, a branch of the Siouxan stock,

it was the fashion to form them out of the earth.

There are individual Totems, sex Totems, and Clan Totems. These

mounds are of the latter class. A clan Totem was some bird, animal or

fish or weapon regarded as the dwelling place of a spirit or divinity.

This divinity was the ancestor of all the members of the clan. The clan

members were thus bound together in a common blood relationship.

They regarded each other as Brothers, and looked to the deity repre-

sented by the Totem, for protection and help. Marriage was generally

forbidden within the clan. Children in some tribes were of the father's

Totem; more often of the mother's. When a clan grew in numbers it

might divide, the new formed clan taking a Totem allied to the original

one. Thus the turtle clan among the Iroquois comprised the mud turtle

clan, the snapping turtle clan, the yellow turtle clan, etc. This group of

clans is sometimes called a phratry. A large Indian tribe would thus be

formed of several phratries and these of several clans.

The clan was the unit of the tribal life, on the march and in the

arrangement of the village. When the Omahas marched a certain clan

order was observed, and when they camped the twelve clans took pre-

scribed places in the circle like the figures on a clock dial. We might

think of the Totem as the Stem and the religious customs and the

social laws of the tribe, as the branches growing out of it. Or using

another figure we may call the Totem idea the tissue of the common

tie which made a unit of the clan or tribe. Religious customs connected

with the Totem.

The Totem figured in the ceremonies at the birth of children.

In the deer clan of the Omahas the infant was painted with spots to

imitate a fawn. Young lads had their hair cut out to imitate the horns of

a deer, the legs and tail of a turtle or other Totem. At puberity there

was an important ceremony initiating the youth into the clan membership.

Members of the clan dressed to imitate the Totem, danced and mimicked

the actions and voice of the animal. Sometimes the novice was clothed

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354        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

in the animal's skin and laid in a grave; the name of the Totem was

then shouted aloud. At this name the youth arose from     the grave,

signifying his new life as a clan member, the passing from youth to the

higher estate of manhood; or perhaps that the Totem had power to

give him life beyond the grave. In some tribes there seems to have

been a certain formula of words and gestures as a part of this ceremony.

This may have been a secret sign by means of which a person could

pass from clan to clan and find entertainment and fellowship, even where

the language was different. In Australia, by means of this Totem

formula, a man might travel for a thousand miles and find friends of the

same Totem.

Death ceremonies. The buffalo clan of the Omahas wrapped the

dying man in a buffalo robe and said, "You are now going to your

ancestors the buffaloes. Be strong." We find the burial mounds placed

close to the Totem effigies as if for protection.

The custom of taboo spring out of veneration for the Totem.

The red maize clan of the Omahas will not eat of that grain. It would

give them sore mouths they say. Members of the deer clan in the same

tribe will not use the skin of a deer for robes or moccasins nor its oil

for the hair, but may eat the meat for food. The Totem animal was

sometimes kept in captivity and carefully fed. In Java the red dog clan

had a red dog in each family and no one might strike it with impunity.

A dead Totem was properly buried. In Samoa a man of the owl clan

finding a dead owl will mourn for it as for a human being. This does

not mean that the Totem is dead; he lives in all the other owls. This

is a characteristic of Totemism, to reverence the species; whereas

reverence for a single animal or object is a characteristic or Fetichism.

When the Totem was to be killed for food apologies were made to it.

Or flattery would be used, as when the fisherman before setting his lines

to catch the Totem fish would call to them, "Ho! you fish, you are

all chiefs." The Totem helped in hunting; also in sickness. The medi-

cine man imitated the motions and voice of the Totem to drive out

the sickness.

Omens came from the Totem. An eagle flying toward a war party

was a sign to go back; if it flew with them it was a sign to go on.

A curious ceremony took place among the Omahas. A turtle was deco-

rated with strips of red cloth tied to its head, legs and tail, tobacco was

placed on its back and it was headed toward the south. This ceremony

was intended to drive away the fog! The logical connection between

cause and effect would puzzle a Whately or Jevons to discover; but it was

doubtless there to the Indian mind.

When running foot races the Indians often carried an image of the

Totem on the breast or back. In signing treaties the Totem was affixed

as a signature,

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The Wisconsin Archaeological Society.            355

 

Before drawing the conclusion from these facts I wish to say a

word about the art of these mounds and their date. The Indian builders

certainly had an artistic sense. We find that land animals such as the

bear, deer, panther, etc., are always formed with the legs on one side,

and with rare exceptions the legs are never separated. Amphibious

creatures, the turtle, lizard, etc., have the legs spread out, two on each

side. Birds have the wings wide spread or curving and the feet do

not appear. The attitudes of the animals is not the same for all. There

is artistic variety. Sometimes they are standing still, again they are

prowling. In several localities in this state two panthers are built

close together and their attitudes shows them in combat. In other

places they are guarding caches of food or the village enclosure.

We have no clear light as to the date of these works. They were

erected when the land features were about the same as now. About the

same distribution of forest and prairie, level of soil and depth of

streams and lakes. There were the same animals. Neither extinct nor

domestic animals are represented in the effigies. After the days of the

mastodon, and after the present topographical features were established,

with the same fauna and flora as found by the white men at the time

of their first contact with the Indians, but before the white men came

these mounds were built.

Sometimes we find several similar effigies in the same locality. This

may mark some favorite gathering place of the aborigines, as at Lake

Koshkonong where several clans having the same Totem gathered for

fishing. Again they are found in maple groves where the Indians came

for the sugar. Madison and the region of the four lakes, called

Tycoperah by the natives, was a favorite locality. Here are five eagle

mounds, several bears, panthers, squirrels, etc. We may imagine the

region to have been a sort of capitol in prehistoric days--giving laws

and knowledge to those who stayed at home as it does today.

The old Greek mathematician quite confounded his contemporaries

when he measured the distance from the shore to a ship in the offing

without leaving the land. In somewhat similar wise we can pretty closely

approximate the distance from us of the mound builders and get a fairly

correct idea of the folk themselves. By the help which we get from

archaeology and the study of Indian life since the advent of the whites,

and particularly the institution of Totemism, we can reconstruct that

vanished life.

This region was occupied by a homogeneous people, probably the

Winnebagoes, its various clans and clan groups spread from the Wis-

consin, river to the Illinois line, and from Lake Michigan to the Mis-

sissippi. They were not harried and driven by their enemies, but

lived in comparative peace. The clans moved about, in Spring settling

in some sugar grove, in Summer moving to a fishing place, in Winter

remaining at the regular villages. At all these places they made their

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356       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

Totems in the soil. Certain spots, as at Aztalan and Lake Horicon

were the seats of large permanent settlements with earth walls and

raised earth platforms for the council house or medicine tent. They

had corn fields and garden beds but no domestic animals. Their mode

of life, clothing, houses, implements, their religious ideas were those

of the Indian at the time of Columbus. They belonged to the stone

age but had passed out of the lowest stage of barbarism to the some-

what settled life of communities with agriculture. Quite certainly the

mounds where we now stand marked the site of a community. Secretary

Brown with Mr. August Roden and myself dug into a refuse heap a few

rods west of this spot, where we found clam shells, bones and pieces of

pottery. These effigies, the buffalo, deer, squirrel and eagle were the

clan Totems of that viilage. Here were held the clan dances and cere-

monies; here the youth were initiated into clan membership, and given

the secret words which assured him a welcome in other clans with the

same Totem. Here the young "eagle" wooed the maiden of the deer

clan, for he might not marry one of his own Totem.

This eagle mound is a clan Totem of that village. A populous clan

it must have been to erect so huge a work. The eagle has always

been admired for its strength and courage. Wheeling far aloft or

resting on motionless wing it is an impressive sight. And when, seeing

the fish hawk rise with its prey it pursues it, and falling like a thunderbolt

snatches the dropped fish ere it touches the water, it suggests the

supernatural even to a modern mind.

The eagle has been widely used as an emblem. It was perched on

the Roman standards. It is the national emblem   of Russia, Prussia,

Austria and the United States. When in 1782 Congress chose the eagle

to be our national emblem it did not realize that it had been used in the

same way in this country centuries before. Wisconsin had a celebrated

eagle carried to the front in the civil war by one of its regiments,

and known to every school child as "Old Abe, the war eagle of Wis-

consin". May we not believe that "Old Abe, captured in the forests of

Wisconsin was a lineal descendant of that majestic, pristine bird whose

image is outstretched here at our feet?

There are five eagle mounds in the vicinity of Madison; others are

found in different places in the state. One at Mauston has a wing

spread of 325 feet; one in Sauk county spreads 400 feet; one at the

southeast end of Lake Monona reaches 450 feet. This one before us is the

mammoth of them all; its wings extend 624 feet from tip to tip and is the

largest in the state, as well, I believe, as in the world.

John Fiske has reminded us that in the American Indian as he

was at the coming of the Europeans, we have the man of the stone

age. That period of human development which preceded civilization

in Europe, and which is only known by its scattered vestiges in caves

and river beds-was greatly prolonged on this continent. Indian cul-

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The Wisconsin Archaeological Society.            357

 

ture, Indian social life, religion, mythology, art, etc., reproduce and

preserve for us the features of that savage state which lies so far back

in Europe-beyond all written history. It was a culture like that of the

mound builders out of which arose the civilization of Greece and Rome.

This is the great value of archaeology and fully justifies the interest we

take in Indian remains and our efforts to preserve them. A large lizard

mound which once stood on the capital park has been destroyed. This

was an "unpardonable sin", and could only happen because of the gen-

eral ignorance. It proves how,

"Evil is wrought by want of thought

As well as want of heart."

 

It is told of a teacher from another state, that seeing the mounds

where we now stand he took them to be bunkers on a golf course!

Doubtless he imagined them to be some of the improvements to the

hospital made under the superintendency of Dr. Gorst.

We take great satisfaction in unveiling this tablet marking the

hugest mound of its type in existence. This tablet is presented by Mr.

James M. Pyott of Chicago, who has been a member of the Wisconsin

Archaeological Society for many years and has always taken a deep

interest in its work.

 

At noon a fine picnic dinner was served by a committee of

the Madison ladies upon tables placed beneath the trees upon

the lawn. After its conclusion, Mr. Stout conducted the visi-

tors to the various mounds upon the grounds and giving in-

formation as to their character and dimensions. At 1:30 P. M.,

the launches were again boarded and a trip of several miles

across the water made to Morris Park, a well-known beauty

spot upon the north shore of the lake. At this place ample time

was given to view under the guidance of the Messrs. A. B.

Stout and Prof. Albert S. Flint, a considerable number of

burial, linear and effigy mounds. The latter include a single

bird effigy and a number of large effigies of the panther type.

The conical mounds located here include some of the most

prominent and best preserved about the Madison Lakes,

A plot of Indian cornhills located at the southeast cor-

ner of the property greatly interested the pilgrims. Morris Park

has recently been laid out in summer resort lots by a Madison

real estate dealer. The Society is making a determined effort

to save the mounds.

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