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I've done some major expanding on this page. If you could clean it up or wikify it more, it would be greatly appreciated. Last Pantagruelist 03:41, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
The first image is dead...anyone know why? Alex 03:44, 11 November 2005 (UTC)
Nice article - one quibble regarding Serpent Mound and cryptoexplosion structure
"Though the meaning is grounds for debate, the mound's placement on such an area is almost undoubtedly not by coincidence"
I would argue that it is likely coincidence and they they simply chose a local topographic high. The structure is several km across and the mound is not in the center but rather at the rim uplift. The word "undoubtedly" seems strong.
Otherwise it suggests that the mound builders knew that the local geology was slightly anomalous (at least by Ohio standards). I would argue that while the builders were undoubtedly keen observers and may have noted some differences, the change in bedrock geology definitely not obvious, especially prior to roadcuts, quarries, and the like. It is clear that the meteor or possibly volcanic explosion occurred tens of millions of years before humans existed.
There are a few minerals (flourite, etc) that are rare in this part of Ohio that occur in the Serpent Mound disturbance and maybe those were noticed but otherwise it takes systematic mapping of faults, strikes, and dips to identify it.
Does anyone know why the footnotes were removed from the bottom of the article? The footnote superscripts are still in the body of the article 205.133.190.7 01:37, 23 August 2007 (UTC)dkc
The article should be titled, IMO, "Great Serpent Mound" vice "Serpent Mound"--there are other serpent mounds such as the serpent mound in Ross County Ohio! Thoughts? Doc Rock 16:10, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
The 1848 map illustration suggests an obvious sperm/vagina interpretation, but the article does not seem to mention any sexual possibilities. - 69.87.200.153 22:57, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
The present introduction contains a detailed description of the snake figure which does not belong in the introductory paragraph at all. Other stuff belongs in the introduction however that aren't there. __ meco ( talk) 16:05, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
-- Style -- This article has very poor style for an encyclopedia article. Asides about 'archaeological interests' and problems with terminology are written in an opinionated style. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.211.104.116 ( talk) 21:17, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
"which suggest the mound may have been built 3,000 years ago. " Unless it is sourced, we can draw our own conclusions, thank you. Carptrash ( talk) 17:11, 17 February 2010 (UTC)
Please do not reinsert this material, [1], [2] User:Ross hamilton unless you have reliably sourced WP:CITEs showing that other scholars disagree with the current attribution of the mound to the Fort Ancient culture. Edit warring over this matter without providing the relevant requested citations will only exacerbate the situation. He iro 18:15, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
I'm sitting here dumbfounded by the fact that 1000 years ago, people were capable of projecting a 2D image onto a 3D surface and then somehow pulled enough workers into the project to carve it out. I'm not going to touch the page at all but shouldn't there be some wiki page about causality? Even if it's just conjecture it's part of the evolving wiki. Are there really no sources to try to explain why and how these geograms exist? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.87.1.230 ( talk) 23:12, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
User:Wheres Dan, this Native American archaeological site has ZERO to do with ancient egyptians, mesopotamians or isrealites. Insert any information that implies this in any way and it will be removed. Any source that states that this site is connected to those things is WP:FRINGE and not WP:RELIABLE. He iro 02:55, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
"Historians have noted its similarities to the worship of the Egyptian deity Kneph, the Iranian deity Ahura Mazda, as well as Indian and Japanese traditions relating to the serpent, the egg, and the creation of the world." This would be acceptable based on the source provided. It doesn't say that is what it is, rather was it resembles.
What we know is that 1) it is an effigy mound, i.e. religious. 2) Ancient Egyptians, Iranians, Indians, and Japanese worshipped similar things. 3) DNA has been found to link Middle Easterners and Asians to the region. 4) It is similar to the egg on the mound from the Ogdoad and Kneph was a hawk-headed serpent which is similar to the Ogdoad egg coming from a bird on a mound. {See: "The new Schaff-Herzog encyclopedia of religious knowledge"} 5) The Hopi people and Kickapoo people were known to have built dracontia serpentine mounds in North America; {See: "The new Schaff-Herzog encyclopedia of religious knowledge"} this serpentine mound is aligned with the Draco constellation. 6) Haplogroup A from Africa has been found in the Hopi. {See: "Prehistoric lifeways in the Great Basin wetlands: bioarchaeological reconstruction and interpretation"} Haplogroup Q from Central Asia/India has been found in the Kickapoo, who are a Northeastern American tribe {See: "Asymmetric Male and Female Genetic Histories among Native Americans from Eastern North America"} 7)The ancient Ohio Valley races have been compared to the Ancient Egyptians and Indian Brahmin with their geometric accuracy and societal order {See: "New light from the great pyramid"} 8) Kshetras are Indian pilgrimage sites, and also refer to the cosmos serpent Draco going back to Vedism {See: "Buddha and early Buddhism"}
Wheres Dan ( talk) 06:38, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
( edit conflict)Just leave. If you can't tell the difference between para-masonic armchair philosophers and modern archaeologists, and are incapable of looking at sources younger than Strom Thurmond, you are useless to this site. Ian.thomson ( talk) 19:28, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
I'm a very serious scholar of anthropology, linguistics, and archaeology, and I find the above discussion amateurish and close-minded. So what if there is no connection between Egyptian snake-eclipse myths or such and Serpent Mound ? Then at least there is a conceptual connection worth mentioning if it's not original research. What editors like Hiero represent is the grass-roots version of the USA nationalistic propoganda goal of erasing Indians, no, Amerinds, no, now Native Americans from public, private, or academic discussion by intolerating any conceptual or possibly actual connection they might have to the larger Eurasian historical paradigm.
Sigh. So many other Wikipedia pages at least give some (disdainful) voice to these "dissidents" or "creative thinkers" and their proposed theories. Apparently I find here that the Serpent Mound is a backwater of Wikipedia, which is not surprising considering the memory-genocide the USA government continues to wage against the Indians : that first it sought to slaughter them without warning under General Sherman and now under with the pens of men like Lyle Campbell it writes the Indians out of American memory and discussion.
And as all humans are probably from the same place, and the Native Americans supposedly came over here from Eurasia some 25 thousand years ago or so, does it really boggle the mind of editors like Hiero that they might share myths with peoples living in Eurasia ? Are myths and religions known to be so transient that they change completely over time, or more conservative ? Editors like Hiero not only seem to view the Serpent Mound Builders (let's call them the Cherokee, gasp) but also Pre-Islamic Egypt and Israel as irrelevant, though they seem to mean a whole lot to people all over the world and in every country.
But I suggest that future contributors try to find in the literature these things, and add them : Solstice-equinox alignments are known from many other ancient sites around the world. Apparently, knowing the seasons helped humans do their hunter-gatherer or early-agriculture thing, along with structuring a religious calendar of worship of their perceivedly supernatural beings. Also, even slightly unusual geological phenomena are used the world over by every religion that has ever existed. The Kaab in Mecca supposedly houses a meteorite, and hills and big stones and nice waterfalls, etc, are prime places for designation as a place of worship the world over. (And mentioning the Kaab is nonsense?) The Serpent Mound is not some big mysterious thing IF you study a whole ton. It could be a fluke that they built it at the rim of a million+ year old meteorite crater - look at all the other mounds and stuff we have from Indians in America, are they built next to craters ? No. The Indians perhaps found a nice cliff. And what if they were led by some supernatural entity? Most peoples do claim things like this. Is it the place of Wikipedia to surpress theories of supernatural phenomena ? Well, apparently it is, since neutral point of view tends to wind up being modern Western academiaical Socialist-Atheism, but it shouldn't be this way.
Also, totally lacking from the internet as a whole, and from this article, are the viewpoints of the people who think Serpent Mound is evil and should be destroyed, or even what local people think of it. From my reading and travels, I have encountered people like this, and I think the article as it stands sounds too much like what the State of Ohio has at the site and on its websites.
Dwarfkingdom ( talk) 04:27, 20 January 2013 (UTC)
The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Serpent Mound/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.
Does anyone know why the notes at the bottom were removed? The superscript notes still remain in the body 205.133.190.7 01:25, 23 August 2007 (UTC)Dkc |
Last edited at 01:25, 23 August 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 05:48, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
MAybe I am missing something. The lede says it has been attributed to three cultures, Adena, Fort Ancient, and then Adena again. By my count, that is only two cultures. Am I missing something (is the lede missing something)? Agricolae ( talk) 03:27, 15 November 2017 (UTC)
I just read in 'Hamlyn History - Archeology' by Maev Kennedy © 1998 'that the Great Serpent Mound could not have been built by a small community'. My back of envelope calculation disagrees: Using data from the book: 1.6m high, 6m across => cross area ~ 6sqm 370m length => volume ~ 2.500cum
Assumptions: 10 liter buckets, 5 min per bucket => ~ 21.000 man hours 16 men at 3 hours/day => ~ 450 days
Formulas: /info/en/?search=Circular_segment
Ing.walter.hartmann ( talk) 10:15, 28 December 2017 (UTC)
Does anyone have a source for the museum discussion? — Preceding unsigned comment added by DkcOhio ( talk • contribs) 18:10, 7 November 2019 (UTC)
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 31 January 2022 and 13 May 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Peer reviewers: Dsm9603, IsaiahCastro.
The dating of the mound is no longer disputed too much. I clarified the matter somewhat. Eio-cos ( talk) 02:18, 16 May 2022 (UTC)
Graham Hancock's account should be considered that serpents mount is over 20,000 years old. 2603:8080:DC00:A4D8:1ED0:2490:C0A7:1E00 ( talk) 19:00, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
Given the ongoing nature of the Graham Hancock situation, and the continuing multiple IP attempt to insert UNCITED and WP:FRINGE material based on it, would it be appropriate to ask for a month or two semi-protected or autoconfirmed status edit filter for this article so editors with other things to do don't have to come here every other day to revert the change? It's been going on for almost two months now, and doesn't seem like it will let up any time soon. The filter may break the pattern. He iro 18:40, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
Given the much earlier dates shown in recent radiocarbon analysis, the "meaning" section comes off as anomalous. It begins with a reference to the CE 1070 date as if it's solid fact. If one is reading the article from the beginning, that date has already been fairly convincingly set back at least a millennium or two. So the references to Halley's comet and a supernova around 1070 are, well, kind of ridiculous, and contribute nothing to the reader's understanding. It might be better to say "we just don't know" than to perpetuate a hypothesis that, while reasonable, seems more to be based on faulty assumptions. Kellymac ( talk) 05:20, 15 January 2023 (UTC)