The Manitowoc tribune. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1866-1878, 1872-08-15
CHE Uribunf.
THE MOUND BUILDERS.

There is a universally received tradi-
ton among the natives of New Spain,
of a foreign Atlantic colony arriving be-
fore the Christian era on the shores of
Florida. proceeding across the Gulf of
Mexico, landing on the Peninsula at
Y ucataD and founding great cities now
in ruins, the greatest of which was des-
troyed thousand years before the arri-
val of the Spaniards. Con6rmatory of
this landing of fcreign Atlantic col
ony, is the statement of Montezuma to
Cortez that the ancestors of the Next
ans came, as did the Spaniards, from
the place of the rising sun.
Passing down the Atlantic coast, and
following up the great valley of the
Amazon to the headquarters of its afflu-
ents near the Pacific we come to the
city of Cuzco and the vast remains of
the sun worshippers of Peru, in the high
valleys of the Andes. Upon the shores
and islands of the. sacred lake of Tit
caca we find the remains of a civilizasion
analogous to that of Copan but more
purely Egyptian and Assyrian and hold,
ing relation of priority to the religion
ofthe Incas like of the ruins of Copan
to the Attic line of the Montezumas
The highest type of the crania of the
ancient races'of Peru suggests strongly
the head of the mould builders before
given. The principal deity of these
sun-worshippers of Peru appears to
have been Chon answering In name and
attributes to the old Phenician Baal-
chon or Saturn.
Passing northward and leaving behind
those colossal monuments which excited
the wonder and admiration Of Humboldt
we follow the high valleys of the Cor
dilleras through Central America, and
coming out in the valley of Mexico with
its temples and teocalli, we arrive at
the great pyramid of Choula the cul-
minating point of the entire mound
building system of the two continents.
From this point northward following the
Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi we
arrive at the pyramid groups Of Cahokia
opposit what is now St. Louis, the site
OF the ancient capital of the mound
builders of the present United States.
The mounds of the United States
must be looked at as the northern termi-
nus of system which had southern CEN
tire and tendency. Working northward
being pressed upon by the. ncmads of
the northwest, to cover and protect its
agricultural civilization, it was forced
into the building of earthworks serving
the double purpose of teocalli and fortl-
fcation. Such state of affairs would
leave the northern mound-bullders little
leisure or inclination to build on the vast
scale of their southern brethren even
could they have commanded the mater
ials and the laborers. The eastern
Asiatics of Central America appear to
have arrived there with a sufficiently
pronounced civilization of their own, to
be able to modify the monuments of a
more cultured race by the 1nterfusion of
their own ideas and symbols, uniting
with them to build those colossal and
bizarre specimens Of architecture so per-
picking when viewed as the product of
one people.
The mound builders of the United
States had no such plastic material in
the wild nomadic tribes of the north
by whom they were always liable to be
overborn and driven southwark. In
these circumstances they appear to have
taken possession Of a central point near
the junction of the Mississippi and Mis-
souri, rivers which they held with great
strength throwing out their lines of
fertilization along the affluents Of these
rivers. At the headquarters of the Ohio
their lines of defence met kindred sys-
tenn of Notifications, which held the
affuents of the Chesapeake and the re-
geon south of Lake Ontario from its mill
tary centre at Onondago thus covering
and protecting the important agricultural
civilization of central and western New
York. Within these lines of Defence
between the Mississippi and the Atlantic
was embraced region in which traces
of truly vast agricultural civilization
are found, and which must have reckon
ed its inhabitants by millions. Galaxy
for JulY