Secret Landscapes

Return of the Beaver

2012-02-29T00:00:00.000-08:00

Last weekend I went to a state park in the northwest corner of Rhode Island. As I walked around the pond, I saw many recently gnawed trees surrounded by large wood chips.

And here is the beaver lodge.

This is the first time I have ever seen a lodge and freshly gnawed trees. Once practically every pond and lake in New England had beaver, and they changed the landscape by creating ponds with their dam building. Nearby are subtle reminders of the natives who once co-existed with the beaver.

Here on the east shore of the pond is either an eight-foot stone row or an elongated cairn. A few other cairns are barely visible through the heavy brush.

A stone peeps out of a split boulder a few feet from picnic tables. I have seen slabs propped this way near old quarries. The stone made it easier to lift the top slab.

Deep in the woods stands a strangely grooved boulder. The groove does not extend to the other side of the boulder.

Close examination of the edges shows what looks like chipping. Perhaps this boulder was being split like the one shown above. Or maybe this is a natural process involving water freezing and thawing repeatedly in a crack in the rock.

Nearby is this massive boulder which is completely surrounded by a deep groove.

The groove between the top and bottom halves is smooth and straight, without tool marks. The groove extends at least a foot inward, as shown by the faintly visible daylight in the middle photo. There are no smaller stones between the two parts. Maybe this boulder was also being quarried, which must have been an arduous job with hand tools.

Here is a reminder from nature that it is still winter: a surprise snow storm!

Follow the Pointer

2012-02-22T00:30:00.000-08:00

In a wildlife refuge in northern Rhode Island is this large outcrop with a projecting slab. It is hard to tell if it was meant to point at anything, since the view is now blocked by trees.

I took a compass bearing, 137 degrees, and then drew a line with this bearing on my topo map. The next time I visited the refuge, I took the coordinates of prominent structures and plotted them on the map. This one was right on the line, about 1300 feet away.

It consists of an oblong boulder about 8 feet long, propped at both ends, and a large split boulder. This structure stands on a hill overlooking a brook and swampy area. The bearing of the boulder's long axis is163 degrees. If it was meant to align to another structure, it is probably lost to development.

Underneath the oblong boulder are some stones that might be donations.

The pointer and this structure may be related to each other as fertility symbols, the pointer being male and the split boulder female. Here is my imagining of the boulders on a late spring evening.

A Large Cairn Field

2012-02-15T00:30:00.000-08:00

Somewhere in northern Rhode Island, on a gentle south slope, is this large cairn field enclosed by low stone rows (blue lines). The area inside the walls is about 835 feet long.

Inside are many low cairns.

Rocks are also piled up around a large boulder.

The ground between the cairns is level and free of rocks. As I suggested in the last post, cairns may have been constructed during field clearing, since it would be far less work to move rocks into small piles than to carry them out of the field. None of the cairns in this field have quartz, and there aren't any manitous or propped boulders nearby. Perhaps this was a native farm field. Much of the landscape of southern New England may have been farm fields with cairns, which were then cleared and plowed by settlers.
About 500 feet north of this field is a small hill with a commanding view of the area. At the west face is an outcrop surmounted by two rocks and a bent tree. The two rocks look neatly placed on the hill, like two seats.

This level hill would have been a good camping site. There is a small pond at the downhill end of the field, and a lake beyond it. Here is the top of the hill, facing east.

Here is how the site may have looked in the spring, with corn planted in small hills among the cairns. The view is uphill, through the growing corn, to the camp on the small hill. Of course, this is all from my imagination.

I liked this site so much, I did the view downhill from the camp site. It is late afternoon in summer and a rain storm has just passed.

The Mystery of Cairns

2012-02-08T00:00:00.000-08:00

Recently I visited a wildlife refuge in Rhode Island. This refuge is a well-known site with many cairns, especially a large group of tall, beehive-shaped structures. Many of them are topped with chunks of quartz.

These cairns seem placed on lines radiating downhill from a large opening in an outcrop. The smooth sides suggest this was once a quarry, but there are no obvious tool marks.

The nonprofit conservation group that owns the refuge recently placed an interpretive sign in the middle of the cairn field.

If you can't read this, the gist is that the cairns were probably built by farmers in the 18th and 19th centuries for field clearing and storage of rocks for later use in construction or for sale. It does raise the point that there is no written record of cairn building by farmers. One would think that such a laborious chore would have been mentioned in diaries or farm ledgers, and that cairns would have been depicted in American Primitive paintings of farm landscapes. This cairn field also has a large platform cairn.

Why would a farmer go to the trouble of lifting the rocks onto a boulder instead of piling them on the ground? I am skeptical for the following reasons. If this site was a farm quarry, it would have been a great deal of labor to carry the rocks downhill to build cairns. Every other quarry I've seen had large piles of rock close by. The interpretive sign suggests that the cairns were built as part of field-clearing. If the farmer was going to plow the field, he would not have left cairns in the way, and since he owned horses, he could have removed the rocks in a stone boat. Finally, cairns are often found in swamps and on hill tops, odd locations for field clearing.

I might suggest two origins for cairns. Since they are often near propped boulders or openings in the earth, they may have had some Native American ceremonial function. Addition of quartz to cairns also suggests spiritual significance.

Cairn building may also have been a Native American field clearing practice. For workers using only hand tools, the easiest way to get the rocks out of the way would be to put them in small, regular piles. This also may be why platform cairns are so common, as an effort to get the rocks off the soil. Then the native women could have planted their crops between the cairns. Use of cairns as native field clearing may also explain why cairns are often found at abandoned farms. The farmers obtained cleared fields from the Native Americans, and left the cairns in place if they did not interfere with farming. At small farms such as the "Hidden Walls" farm (10/20/11), the native farmer may have built cairns to clear his rocky fields. That would explain why this small farm is surrounded by cairn fields (red dots)

Tahquitz Canyon.

2012-02-01T01:00:00.000-08:00

This canyon is on the Cahuilla reservation in Palm Springs, CA. It was home to an ancient Cahuilla village, and is now open to the public. There is more historical information at www.tahquitzcanyon.com. Some of these photos were shown on Larry Harrop's blog two years ago. Here is the entrance to the canyon.

The Cahuilla claim to be descendents of Fox Indians who migrated to the area over a thousand years ago. This is a sacred rock where the village was sited.

The area in front of this boulder is paved with rocks. Donations?
The boulder to the right in the photo below is called the Fox Dress boulder, after a legend about a maiden who turned herself into a boulder. It looks like an erratic on bedrock.

This does resemble the boulder in Manitou (p. 218), but I think the location is a different canyon on the reservation. Maybe next time...
Further along the trail, some striking boulders.

A small shelter, with a flat rock inside. Was this some sort of work surface?

Maybe it was a metate, a grinding stone. The oval stone to the right may have been the mano (hand-held grinder). I've seen other metates in rock shelters. Maybe the Indian women preferred to grind the corn out of the sun and wind.
Looking back towards Palm Springs.

Finally, the waterfall at the top of the canyon.

And just below the waterfall on the other side of the canyon, a bird head effigy with donations underneath.

Further down the trail is some sort of platform or niche.

At the site of the Cahuilla village, some propped rocks cross a large boulder. They remind me of ants.

The photo didn't come out because of glare, but high in the cliffs were some crevices sealed with carefully stacked rocks. These might have been granaries, or food caches in case of raids.
This local resident also thinks the noonday sun is too strong!

Lost Palms Oasis

2012-01-26T00:30:00.000-08:00

Are you tired of cold and snow? Can't find any interesting structures?

Then come along on a hike to Lost Palms Oasis in Joshua Tree National Park. This area was once the homeland of the Cahuilla Indians. They had no contact with whites until 1840, and by 1850 were on reservations. Since this desert area has never been farmed, many structures remain. These structures are still visible along trails leading to water. The starting point is Cottonwood Springs, which was dry when I was there in May 2010.

Signs of long term human habitation remain here. I have heard that it takes 20 years of use to wear these mortars down an inch. These are about a foot deep.

Continuing along the trail, I enter a lovely landscape of rocks, yucca, and thorny ocotillo bushes. The rock here is monzogranite, which erodes into large block and boulders. This produces a fantasy landscape of jumbled boulders.

Whether this is a deliberately perched boulder or a natural formation is nearly impossible to determine. However, I see smaller stones placed on boulders along the trail. Trail markers?

As I approach the oasis, after three miles of easy hiking, I start seeing more likely structures.

Finally, the oasis, and a fabulous view before I descend.

The trail is loose, so this is a slow descent. When I reach the oasis, this carving surprises me.

It looks like the same fertility symbol that I find around ponds in Rhode Island.

This place is such a jumble of boulders, it is hard to tell what is propped and what is just a fallen rock.

The Cahuilla did not live in the oasis, because the California palms here are very flammable. Instead, they lived in small thatched huts in the area outside the oasis.

This is a ruggedly beautiful spot, but the sun is blazing and it is a long walk back to Cottonwood Springs.

Off in the distance, the Salton Sea. Although the sea is man-made, it rests in the bed of prehistoric Lake Cahuilla.

Structures South of the Snake Wall

2012-01-19T07:50:00.000-08:00

This is the same site as in the last post, "Two Walls". On the shore of a small pond south of the snake wall stands this strange structure.

The oblong stone points to the southwest and there is a small space under it. The bearing of the propped stone, 212 degrees, does not correspond to any astronomical events. The entire structure is about four feet tall, and the oblong stone is about four feet long. I have seen other "pointers", but they are always wedged into an outcrop, like the following.

This is the only ground level "pointer" I have seen. The view from this structure is blocked by trees, but the stone points towards this outcrop about 220 feet away.

Whether the structure was built to point to this outcrop, or for some other purpose, is unknown. It could have had a spiritual use, such as a way station for spirits traveling to the afterlife in the southwest sky. Or it could have been a fertility symbol, which is suggested by some of the other structures close by.
About 50 feet from the structure is this split boulder.

About 300 feet away and on the shore of the pond is this structure.

And these two smaller ones.

Looking at a map, I notice that if a straight line is extended south from the snake wall, it would pass through the pointer structure. Further south along this line is the small cairn field with a circular structure described in "The Sweat Lodge". Granted, this alignment may be coincidence and any other structures have been lost. However, I wonder if there was a progression from the snake wall to these structures, as if walking through this landscape tells a story of creation.

Two Walls

2012-01-12T09:30:00.000-08:00

Somewhere in northern Rhode Island is a large patch of preservation land with some small ponds and wetland. On a warm Saturday afternoon in January, I was walking there and I noticed these two manitous to the west of the trail.

These turned out to be the end of a stone row that ran about 170 feet to the south.

This standing slab style is common in stone rows in northern Rhode Island. Most of the wall was loose stones with an occasional manitou. It did not connect with any other walls.

Further north in the same site is another wall, which starts at a large boulder with a strong resemblance to a snake head.

This well built wall runs about 207 feet nearly north, and has interspersed quartz stones.

It ends in loose piles of rocks on a small hill.

On top of the hill is this natural structure. Some veins of quartz are visible on the other side.

The wall seems to connect this natural structure to the snake head boulder. The snake head faces a nearby pond.
I have seen single stone rows incorporating remarkable boulders at other sites in RI. They are often at the edges of slopes and meadow areas that could have been cultivated by the Indians. The walls could have been boundary markers, and incorporated the symbols of the clan using the fields. Snakes could also have been fertility symbols.

A Quarry

2012-01-05T12:00:00.000-08:00

Previously, I have posted pictures of outcrops in which the underlying rock was quarried away, creating a large manitou-like slab (9/3/11). In one case (10/7/11), the quarried rock was used to create a standing slab wall. Here is another, in which the underlying stone was removed almost completely. Nearby are many walls, and some of the stone was probably used to construct them.

Directly beyond this structure is a pile of smaller stones, presumably rocks too small for use in walls.

Maybe some settlers used this quarry. However, about 100 feet from this pile is this well-formed cairn, now resting in a swamp.

Near the quarry is this rock stack. The top rock is propped into place.

This is the same stack in "The Bent Tree" (11/3/11), and this is the view of the bent tree from the base of the cliff. The presence of the cairn and rock stack suggest that this quarry was once used by Native Americans.

The rock stack and quarry have striking shapes that I always wanted to paint. Here they are in oil with lots of palette knife technique.

The Lookout

2011-12-29T15:12:00.000-08:00

Somewhere in northern Rhode Island is this steep hill with a south-facing slope covered with boulders.

Just below the crest of this hill stands this strange enclosure.

There is enough room to stand between the smooth bedrock wall and the stacked slabs in the center of the photograph. Once inside the little enclosure, one can look out between two standing slabs and see a wonderful view to the southwest.

Directly in front of the enclosure is a supported slab. There are only a few rocks underneath it.

Here is the view from directly above this structure, showing the slabs. The top edges of the enclosure slabs leaning against bedrock are visible in the center of the photo.

Bent trees indicate the importance of this structure.

Since there is no good vantage point for a photograph, I have drawn an exploded view of the enclosure. The bedrock wall is pushed back.

The top of the horizontal stack of slabs is about four feet from the floor. The end of the supported slab is visible on top of this stack.
Perhaps this enclosure had some spiritual purpose, suggested by its facing southwest. Unfortunatly, there are few structures left on top of this hill. Industrious vandals have converted a a cairn into a fire ring with benches.

Some rocks remain on top of the outcrop behind the ruined cairn.

Winter Solstice

2011-12-22T15:20:00.000-08:00

Two years ago, I was crossing a hilltop on a December afternoon, and I noticed that this line of boulders was aligned with the shadows.

Some of these photos were shown on Larry Harrop's blog at the time. Further exploration of the site revealed that this line of boulders intersected another line of boulders, one of which was propped.

Here is the second line of boulders, with the propped boulder in the foreground. Below is the strangely shaped top edge of the stone in the center of the photo.

The angle of the first line of boulders is consistent with winter solstice. There is no chamber or enclosure up here, so I don't know the observation point. Piecing together the site from photographs, I made this painting of winter solstice.

King Philip's Rock

2011-12-19T16:48:00.000-08:00

This site in Sharon, MA is believed have been a rendevous point for King Philip (Metacom) and his chiefs during King Philip's War. It is a jumble of huge glacial erratics with some impressive propped boulders.

Here is the most impressive boulder, an erratic propped on two others.

Here is a propped boulder that seems off-balance.

Here's another propped boulder. The surface to the right does not contact any supporting boulders.

The plaque at the site says that King Philip's War led to the extinction of the Indians. This bent tree pointing the way to the site indicates otherwise.

King Philip's Cave

2011-12-14T16:20:00.000-08:00

King Philip's Cave in Sharon, MA, is a structure of massive boulders that has astronomical alignments. It is thought to have been used by Native Americans for determining solstices. Some of the stones show chipped edges, suggesting they were adjusted for correct alignment. This site was the subject of an intensive study by Ballard and Mavor (2006) here. I recently visited this site and took many photographs.
Here is an overview of the structure, approaching from the south.

This is the view from the north.

Here is the opening for summer solstice, with the bisecting boulder in the center. Note how the edges are chipped.

There is enough room for an adult to squeeze past this boulder. At the back of the chamber is a large slab that has been chipped to make a triangular opening where it touches the ceiling. The back of the next chamber is visible through this opening.

A nice view of the bisecting boulder on the way out.

Here is the opening for winter solstice.

This is the same slab which appears in the article, but the picture angle is slightly different. There is more graffiti, and someone touched up the swastika.

There are other interesting structures in the area, such as this huge propped boulder. This may be the one that the Sharon Conservancy trail guide calls "Moon Rock" because of lunar standstill alignments. What is most impressive about this site is the level of mathematical skill required to create aligned structures to mark fleeting yearly occurrences.

A nearby hill has more structures with alignments, but too many for one afternoon!

Landmarks

2011-12-08T16:51:00.000-08:00

A few years ago, I was wandering through Snake Den looking for art subjects. I started noticing that large boulders and outcrops with striking shapes often were surrounded by piles or rows of stones. An online search of "stone structures" led me to Larry Harrop's blog, and to the realization that the mysterious structures had some aesthetic or spiritual significance to the Native Americans who built them.
Here is an example. A few weeks ago, I noticed this large outcrop, which looks like granite boulders joined eons ago by the lava which flowed between them. The lava cooled into layers, which resemble flowing drapery.

Investigation of this site revealed a loose stone row running about 140 feet from the top of the outcrop to a large boulder at the edge of the hill. There is a standing stone in the middle of the stone row.

The end of the stone row, at a large boulder.

The photograph of the outcrop, with heavy shadows, was disappointing. Perhaps the significance of this site is how the lava vein seems to rise from the earth and permeate the boulders. Here is my interpretation, in oil with lots of palette knife work. I used a little artistic license and added red and gold to the lava flow.

I have always noted that trails go past prominent stone structures and stone rows. These might have been waypoints or boundaries along a native trail system. They may have had spiritual significance, and been the equivalent of roadside shrines. Looking at the layout of stone structures and stone rows in an area, one can imagine a network of trails, but development and disruption make it impossible to be certain.
Here are a couple of landmarks from an old native trail, now Route 44 through Rhode Island. The first is a large boulder on bedrock in Smithfield. The second is a pedestal boulder on a small hill on private property next to 44 in Harmony. Our roads are built on a secret landscape.

Praying Indian Village Site

2011-12-01T16:20:00.000-08:00

Somewhere in Massachusetts is a site that may have been one of the Praying Indian villages that John Eliot organized. After over 300 years, all that is left of the Indian presence is a few stone structures. The most impressive site is marked by a boulder on an outcrop.

The boulder is not propped, but has a very small footprint. Perhaps it was intended to rock.

Uphill from the outcrop stands a stack of flat stones.

Behind some young pines, I notice a strange boulder. Part of the top half of the boulder has broken and shifted forward, creating two openings. The shifted slab is visible in the middle of the photograph of the southwest-facing side of this structure. There is a manitou in front of the opening on this side.

Someone has placed a small manitou below the junction between the slab and boulder. Also, rocks have been jammed into the junction, presumably to stabilize the slab.

On the northwest-facing side, the shifted slab and a small opening are clearly visible.

Since this structure is surrounded by young pines, it is impossible to get a good photo of the entire structure. Piecing together the photos, I came up with this drawing.

The shifted section at the upper left is wedged against the rest of the boulder with smaller stones. Directly below this section is a large, roughly heart-shaped slab of stone leaning against a boulder. The manitou is directly behind the propped rock in the foreground.
Downhill and near the outcrop are a few low cairns. One is topped with a manitou.

Here is the entire site on an early spring day.

Enclosure and Bird Effigies

2011-11-23T18:44:00.000-08:00

Somewhere in northern Rhode Island is a beautiful hill composed of jumbled boulders. On the shoulder of the hill is this boulder carved to resemble a bird.

This photo was shown previously on Larry Harrop's blog. The bird faces SSW towards a small, square enclosure built against a large boulder. One wall of the enclosure continues about 100 feet away from the enclosure, until it ends at a hay field.

The enclosure is too small to be a building foundation. Here is the whole enclosure, showing a small opening to the right.

What is the purpose of this enclosure? The wall and nearby structures give a clue. The wall is at a 253 degree bearing, suggesting a winter solstice alignment. The enclosure may be a vantage point for observing astronomical events. Unfortunately, if there were any other alignment markers, they were cleared from the field. However, beyond the field and along the line corresponding to summer solstice is a large cairn field,

an outcrop,

and finally this huge bird head effigy.

The presence of cairns and effigies at locations corresponding to alignments suggests annual ceremonies linked to these events. I suspect that the use of small enclosures as vantage points in solstice observations was once widespread. The reconstructed Pequot 1720 homestead at the Pequot Museum at Foxwoods shows a small, square enclosure that was found at Indian farm sites on the Mashantucket reservation. The accompanying sign said its use was unknown.
There are two hill top sites with astronomical alignments marked by large boulders in this northern RI area. Perhaps these were used by the Indians before the arrival of Europeans. After the Indians lost most of their land and moved to small farms, they may have built small enclosures and walls with alignments to continue their customs. These inconspicuous structures would help keep these practices secret from their white neighbors.

Moon Hill Revisited

2011-11-19T13:37:00.000-08:00

Recently I visited Moon Hill to find more markers suggesting astronomical alignments. While I didn't find any more alignments, I did find more evidence the site has been used in the distant and recent past.
Here is a young bent tree pointing the way.

There were several cairns I never noticed before, including this one with a brick on top.

Here is the other side of the propped boulders on top of the hill. That rotted tree was not there previously.

Donation or prank? There was also a rusty bucket nearby. Finally, near the old building foundation I noticed this rock with a round cavity about 8 inches across.

A grinding stone from pre-contact times? This suggests hundreds, if not thousands, of years of history in less than one acre.

Beyond the Picnic Tables

2011-11-12T16:26:00.001-08:00

Here we are at the same site in the previous (11/7/2011) post. More leaves have fallen, and the stronger light and shadow bring out more detail. After some wandering, we have returned to the wall.

The wall runs downhill, crossing a boulder.

Near the wall we notice a large propped boulder.

Close examination shows many donation stones under the propped boulder.

On the other side of the wall is a large boulder leaning against an outcrop and forming a cave. The cave faces east. There is some stone work outside the cave.

The donations under the propped boulder suggest this site has spiritual or historic significance.

Hidden in Plain Sight

2011-11-07T15:18:00.000-08:00

Believe it or not, these pictures were taken at one of Rhode Island's most popular picnic locations. Away from the roads and picnic tables is a wonderful landscape of massive outcrops, propped boulders, and stone rows. Let's go for a walk through this mysterious landscape.
On top of a hill overlooking a lake, two massive boulders stand on bedrock, nearly touching each other. They were once a huge boulder that split in half. Careful examination of the faces shows they would fit together. Unfortunately, today they are desecrated with graffiti, so I have substituted a white-on-black chalk drawing.

Here are the supporting stones of the boulder to the left.

Near this site is a cluster of huge boulders, some of them propped.

Heading down the hill to a peninsula in the lake, we find a large manitou,

and a massive split boulder that dominates the site. Despite the snack wrappers and discarded fishing gear, an air of serenity pervades the peninsula

Heading uphill and past the twin boulders, we climb up a steep hill and find this perched boulder.

There are some strange, gouged-out areas at one end of this boulder.
Beyond this boulder is a huge propped boulder with a smaller one in front.

Crossing the top of the hill, we find outcrops and stone rows, and decide we must return later to trace their routes.

Time to go home...

Hipses Rock Revealed

2011-11-06T16:27:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, November 5, the Neutaconkanut Hill Conservancy had a walk to Hipses Rock. The rock is on private property, and the owner generously cleared a trail to the rock and joined in the walk. Ranger John McNiff gave an informative and entertaining talk on the history of Hipses Rock.

The east facing side of Hipses Rock, with the "caves" visible. Originally, there was one large cave, until the large piece to the left broke off about 100 years ago. Could the cave have been a chamber for viewing astronomical alignments on Neutaconkanut Hill? Perhaps. Little stonework is left at the site, but I did note these donations in front of the cave.

Helen commented that there is a memorial pile on the site. I did photograph this stone pile behind a wall, but was not sure if this is a donation pile or a rock pile created by land clearing.

Hipsis Rock is composed of sedimentary rock with this rough texture. The other rocks around it are granite.

It was dropped here by a glacier, and was a prominent landmark for time immemorial.

The Bent Tree

2011-11-03T15:41:00.000-07:00

Stone structures in Rhode Island often are marked with bent trees. Most of these bent trees are large and over 100 years old, but many are much younger. This continuing custom of tree-bending was mentioned by Mavor & Dix. I always note and photograph bent trees, and have found that they fall into two general categories.
1. Bent trees formed with rocks.
The rocks are placed on a sapling, and it grows to form an L-shape. Here is a young tree on an outcrop with a propped boulder. The stones are still in place.

Here is an adult bent tree, pointing towards a stream.

Granted, some of these trees may have been formed naturally when another tree fell on them. However, the presence of these trees at structures or along trails suggests they were formed deliberately.
2. Bent trees formed with thongs.
This type is common in former Cherokee lands, where they are called "trail trees" or "thong trees". The sapling is bent over and tethered to the ground with a thong or wire. Here are a couple of examples.

Some of these trees may be bent with a cross bar as well as a thong.

One important point in this photo is that the bent tree is near a road. Generally, I find that the smaller, younger bent trees are near well-worn trails and prominent structures such as large propped boulders. Structures in remote areas often have only large, older trees. This suggests that the people who are bending the trees have some understanding of the significance of the structures, but do not remember the locations of all of them.
One of my favorite bent trees is this one, at the edge of a cliff overlooking a swamp.

It appears to point to this magnificent stone stack at the base of the cliff.

About 1000 feet west of this cliff is a small hill surmounted by a large boulder.

This boulder also has a bent tree. Glimpses of this boulder may be seen from the cliff in the winter. This area used to be a farm, and the swamp was once a marshy meadow. It may have looked like this on a September afternoon.

Moon Hill

2011-10-27T17:08:00.000-07:00

Somewhere in northern Rhode Island is a small hill with a cliff face on its south side.

This hill is topped with three boulders on bedrock. The boulder to the left is propped.

Heading downhill and west, I see two small propped boulders. Part of the cliff face is visible to the right in the first photo below.

Further downhill is this strange, small and square enclosure. The propped boulder above is visible in the background, and the larger propped arrangement is in shadow.

What could be the purpose of this enclosure? It is too small to be a building foundation.
At the base of the hill is a 200-foot long wall with a wider leg about 60 feet long. The wider section makes almost a 90 degree angle with the long wall. At the other end of the long wall is a large pile of rocks, as if someone was building and stopped.

Near the corner of the wide wall is a faintly visible circular structure. Further away to the west is a cairn with a bent tree.

The oddest structure is this crescent-shaped planter.

I suspect is is a planter, because on the next spring weekend I visited, the woods were blazing with forsythia.

There is another wall on the north side of the hill, and the layout of the site is shown below. The dark red dot to the left is a small building foundation. Boulders are yellow, cairns red. The small, square enclosure is the dark red dot in the center. The two sets of walls do not form any enclosures.

I realized a possible purpose of the square enclosure when I remembered what I have never found in northern Rhode Island: a chamber. Despite plenty of wandering, I have never found a subterranean chamber like those Larry Harrop shows in his blog. Maybe the square enclosure is a vantage point for observing astronomical alignments. It seems to be true.

The square enclosure has a 253 degree bearing with the large cairn shown above, suggesting a winter solstice alignment. It also has a 318 degree alignment with the end of the wall on the north side. Both sets of walls have alignments suggesting lunar standstill.

Perhaps the astronomical alignments of the walls and cairn are the important aspects of the site, even if it was not used as an observatory. Maybe someone memorialized this lunar significance by building the crescent moon-shaped planter.
Here is how the site may have looked at winter solstice long ago. The shadow in front of the cairn is that of the viewer. When painting this site, I realized that one disadvantage of a small enclosure is that it would have been covered with snow. A simple solution would have been to leave a pole standing at the enclosure.

I hope to revisit this site once the leaves are down, and see if there are any other astronomical markers, or tool marks on the stones in the wall and cairn.

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Hidden Walls

2011-10-20T13:36:00.000-07:00

Somewhere in northern Rhode Island, at the edge of a farm field, is a pavement of rocks about 8 feet wide. Two bent trees are visible in the photo background. This pavement continues 435 feet to an outcrop with a boulder on top.

By the outcrop is a long wall running downhill.

Further on is a marshy area with many well-constructed cairns.

Heading uphill from the marsh, I find an old well at the foot of a large pile of rocks.

A wall starts near the large pile, makes two 90 degree turns, and runs uphill. These two turns follow the edge of a rocky slope.

Uphill and 230 feet from the well is a small house foundation.

Here is the topo map of the area, turned so that west is at the top. Red is for areas with cairns, blue for walls, and yellow for large boulders. The well and house foundation are dark red, marked 926 and 724. The pavement is denoted by the rock wall line to the right.

There are actually two sets of walls here, a 1150- foot wall running east-west, with two shorter segments running north-south. This complex has an "F" shape. I don't know if this has any significance, but there are two other "F"-shaped sets of walls in this area. Beside the long wall is a walled enclosure with an upside-down "U" shape. The part of the wall marked 729 and 729 makes two short turns to follow the edge of a steep, rocky slope.
This might have been a ceremonial site that was later used as a small farm. The farm layout resembles that of the reconstructed 1720 Pequot homestead at the Pequot Museum at Foxwoods. These Indian homesteads had a small house foundation and no barn foundation. Maybe the ceremonial sites were the last lands the Indians were willing to leave, preferring to eke out a living on the sites. There is a similar small foundation at the site described in the 9/3/2011 post, and at other sites I have seen.
Here is my interpretation of the site, using the map as a reference. The viewer is looking west and uphill at the farm from the cairns at way point 723 on a cold afternoon in late winter. The well is at lower left edge of the large pile of rocks.

Nearby is a silent witness.

Hipses Rock

2011-10-14T13:41:00.000-07:00

Hidden behind trees, fences, and ranch houses in Johnston stands Hipses Rock, a large glacial erratic boulder with a long history. Hipses Rock was mentioned, along with Neutaconkanut Hill, as one of the boundaries in the land transfer from the Narragansetts to Roger Williams. It used to be surrounded by farmland, and local children would play in the "caves" in its base. Powwows were held at the rock in the 1930s.
Unfortunately, now Hipses Rock may be seen only in glimpses in the winter. A grainy old photograph was the source for this ink painting.

Up on a ledge west of Atwood Avenue stands a huge, squarish boulder. It is quite prominent against the sky in the winter.

Due to its location on private property, it is hard to photograph. There really is a small "peak" on top.

When I was looking at my topo map of the area, I realized that this boulder was on a 285 degree bearing from Hipses Rock, suggesting it was a marker for spring and fall equinox sunset.

There is also a 73 degree alignment between Hipses Rock and a stone row on Neutaconkanut Hill. This may correspond to summer solstice sunrise.

And here is the stone row which runs across Neutaconkanut Hill at a 73 degree bearing. That's a satellite dish in the distance.

If there were any other alignment markers, they are long gone. Perhaps Roger Williams knew the significance of Hipses Rock to the Narragansetts in marking astronomical events when he wrote the following. "The Sunne and Moone, and Starres, and seasons of the yeere doe preach a God to all sonnes of Men, that they which know no letters, doe yet read an eternall Power and Godhead in these."

Neutaconkanut Hill

2011-10-12T16:25:00.000-07:00

Neutaconkanut Hill was mentioned as a boundary in the land transfer from the Narragansetts to Roger Williams. In the 1800s, the hill was the site of the King farm, and an old cemetery and building foundations remain. Although today the hill is topped with TV antennas and surrounded by urban Providence and Johnston, it retains many traces of its past. The top of the hill is a woodland decorated with stone rows, manitous, bent trees and propped boulders. If not for the roar of traffic from Plainfield Street, one would think it was a remote forest.

Here is a stone row with a young bent tree. The stone rows pass over an outcrop, with these propped rocks.

A sign nearby reads "monument", but there is no further explanation. Probably the most impressive sight is the outcrop resembling huge natural manitous. It faces east and has an unobstructed view of Providence.

Unfortunately, trees have fallen across the front of this outcrop. The lower picture from April 2010 gives an impression of the size of these natural structures. Here is the outcrop from further away, photographed in May 2010. A stone row, visible to the right, heads north following the contour of the hill.

Here is the view from the top and behind the manitous.

In front of the outcrop is a terrace with this view.

I have seen outcrops forming natural manitous at other locations in northern RI, and these often have stone rows and other structures nearby. Perhaps the Indians saw these sites as the earth's expression of spirit or energy. In any case, this was a wonderful walk on a beautiful afternoon.

The Standing Slab Wall

2011-10-07T13:38:00.000-07:00

Near the outcrop in the previous (9/30/2011) post runs a wall composed of standing slabs quarried from the same outcrop. Walls made of stacked stones may have been added to it later. The standing slab part is shown in solid blue lines, and the stacked part with dashed lines, in the map below. The entire wall complex has two legs, giving it a backwards "F" shape. In this part of northern RI, there are two other wall complexes with an F shape.

Red indicates manitous, and green is for bent trees. The outcrop with the sweat lodge base is at the yellow way point 277. The wall starts at blue way point 274, with this structure.

It runs about 600 feet uphill to the junction on a small outcrop described in the previous post, and shown in the photo directly below.

One leg of this wall starts at the junction, runs 300 feet northeast and downhill, and ends in a cleared area. The main part of the wall continues northwest about 350 feet from the junction until it changes into a stacked rock wall. This transition is in front of a cliff surmounted by a boulder. I once found a rusty bucket in this area. While one would expect to find old farm tools around overgrown farms, it's odd how often old buckets turn up near stone structures.

The piled rock wall continues about 250 feet, and then turns northeast, climbs and descends a small hill, and ends at a swamp.
Standing stone slabs face to face is the most inefficient use of material. Why would anyone build such an impractical and costly wall, unless it had some spiritual significance? What strikes me about this stone row is the sense of energy in the tilted slabs, like dominoes falling.

The wall crosses outcrops and ties together the landscape. In this imaginary composition, the wall seems to race past all the elements in the photos.

These are ink brush paintings containing real structures arranged to best show their features. I like black and white graphic style for smaller landscapes and subjects in which form and pattern are most important.

A Sweat Lodge Site

2011-09-30T06:03:00.000-07:00

On the shoulder of an outcrop in the woods, I see this unusual structure. It appears to be the end of a loose stone row composed of small standing stones oriented edge to edge.

The stone row leads to this round structure.

This looks like a sweat lodge base. There is no water nearby, so I presume this structure had ceremonial instead of merely hygienic use.
The outcrop this lodge rests on is this one, which I used as an example in the 9/3 posting. The slab on top looks like a manitou from the sweat lodge base. At the site in 9/3 posting, the rock was quarried away until only a large slab resembling a manitou was standing. This same process might have been going on here, but was interrupted.

The rock in this area is layered and breaks off into slabs. This site is next to this outcrop, which is the junction for a very long wall composed of standing slabs.

I will describe this wall in greater detail in the next post. Standing the stones face-to-face is the most inefficient use of material. The cost of building this wall in time, labor, and materials suggests its importance. Perhaps there was some great significance to the outcrop the stone came from.
Here is the site on an early summer morning:

I have to confess to using some artistic license to place the structure in the first photo in the painting. The stone row is about twice as long. After I finished the painting, I realized the skins on the sweat lodge were blocking the viewer's path through the painting, so I revised it.

Equinox Alignment Site

2011-09-23T15:41:00.000-07:00

Since it is Fall equinox today, I am posting a site in northern RI that appears to have an equinox alignment. Last year Larry Harrop told me that a tribal member had told him that there is a sacred site in these woods. This is one possibility.
Near the top of a hill is a 300 foot long wall. There are no other walls nearby that may have been joined to it once.

Close to the wall is a strange, flat topped boulder with three smooth grooves running along the boulder's long axis. There is a prominent one to the left in the top photo, and two shallower ones to the right.

The boulder seems to have some sort of gutter carved into the left side, and a stain visible on the right side at the end of the deeper groove. The grooves feel smooth, as if they were ground into the stone. The long axis of the boulder is aligned N-S.
Here is the area plotted in topo software:

The longer section of the wall has about a 285 degree bearing, suggesting Spring and Fall equinox sunsets. The grooved boulder is the yellow waypoint near the slight bend in the wall.
         I have read of grooved stones with gutters described as "sacrificial stones", especially one at America's Stonehenge in NH. There's no evidence that these stones were used for Aztec-style sacrifices. It is more likely that this boulder was used for some domestic purpose, such as food production, since the grooves are ground smooth. It may have been easier to collect ground corn, acorns, or even paint powder by pushing it along a groove instead of scooping it out of a round mortar.
      One thing that always impresses me when viewing plotted waypoints of walls and boulders is the number of astronomical alignments. Some may be pure coincidence, some may be real observation points, and some may reflect a native desire to organize the landscape in respect to the changes of the seasons.
   Maybe this wall and boulder were the sacred site, or maybe this other boulder is it:

This oblong boulder is propped at both ends, and has a "face" picked into the larger end. It is a long walk north from the alignment site. Or maybe the whole wood is sacred.
In any case, the aligned wall and boulder were interesting subject matter for this painting. The best composition was facing away from the sunset.

Here it is spring equinox, and the shadows in the melting snow are parallel to the wall.

The Sweat Lodge

2011-09-16T12:20:00.000-07:00

On the west shore of a pond in northern Rhode Island is a site with about 20 cairns. Some of them have shapes suggesting effigies.

By the water's edge is a circle of stones about 5 feet in diameter.

The shape and location of this circle suggest it was a sweat lodge. I once found an article in an online copy of The Narragansett Dawn describing how Indians would build a lodge of bent saplings and cover it with skins. They would then place heated stones in the center and pour water on them to create steam. After a steam bath, they would bathe in the pond. The Pilgrims believed bathing was unhealthy, and rarely washed their clothes. One can only imagine what the Wampanoags thought.
I have seen other structures like this near water, as well as some far from water. They may have had ritual as well as hygienic use, and I'll show some in later posts. Here's my interpretation of the site on an early September morning.

You never know what you'll find in your own neighborhood!

2011-09-12T15:55:00.000-07:00

Saturday afternoon I was out for a walk and passed an overgrown lot. Previously I had only glimpses of an outcrop with a small stone building built against it, and an old chicken coop. The landowner has recently cleared out some of the weeds to make a driveway, revealing this scene:

The small stone building is to the left, and what looks like a niche decorated with quartz is to the right. Or maybe it's a structure with some farming function. Across the street is this structure, incorporated into the landscaping.

And finally, a few blocks away in another vacant, thorn-choked lot, another outcrop with a ruined stone house, and this:

This outcrop also has a stone row with a manitou.

All of these are less than 0.25 mile from each other, and in a neighborhood 1 mile from the Providence city limits!

Two Waterfalls

2011-09-09T16:15:00.000-07:00

Along the same river in the previous post (9/3/2011), there are two waterfalls. The first is a natural waterfall, and by the top of this waterfall is a supported slab.

This slab is visible in this photo taken from the bottom of the falls in winter. Further upstream from this slab are a manitou, and a structure of three overlapping rocks. This overlapping structure is common in this area.

Further downstream, the river enters an urban area, and falls over a modern concrete dam. Beside the dam is an old wall which was probably part of the original dam. This dam appears on maps of the area dating from the 1880s. On top of the wall is a niche.

The original dam wall is visible in the background. The presence of these two structures at two very different waterfalls indicates the spiritual importance of waterfalls, and the persistence of Indian beliefs.
The natural waterfall is so beautiful, I painted it without the clutter of fallen trees and branches.

By a River in Northern Rhode Island...

2011-09-03T12:23:00.000-07:00

Welcome to SecretLandscapes. You may know me from Larry Harrop's blog as "Catherine from Johnston". These posts of photographs of stone structures, bent trees, and cultural items are intended as possible interpretations of the original use of the sites. Where useful, I include my own artwork. These landscape paintings are based on GPS waypoints and photographs, and show how sites might look without excessive trees, trash, or modern development.
Without any further ado, here is one of my favorite sites. This large structure faces South towards a small river, and consists of large stone slabs stacked under a huge manitou-shaped slab. There is a smaller manitou at the front center of the structure.

One of the slabs forms a small chamber, seen at lower right.

A view of the whole structure from one end.

Behind the structure, a 5-foot tall manitou stands. There is also a small cairn behind the structure.

I think this large structure was constructed, and is not just a collection of fallen slabs. Here is a similar site in the same area, for comparison. Note how this outcrop has the same pointed shape, and the fallen slabs are parallel to the outcrop, and not perpendicular. The manitou imagery and small chamber in the riverside structure suggest some religious purpose.
Here is my reconstruction of the site, including a nearby stonerow.

This certainly is a beautiful and imposing structure, suggesting a temple rising from the earth.