Human Sacrifice and a Giant Skeleton at Charleston, West Virginia Burial Mound
Dunbar Mound in Charleston, West Virginia
Adena burial mound located in Shawnee Park, in Dunbar, West Virginia.
The Kanawha Spectator, Vol. I, 1953
“The excavations made inthe Dunbar mound revealed it to be a double storied structure. The exploration was made by first sinking a vertical shaft through the center of the mound, down to and slightly below the original surface of the ground. This mound was about 175 feet in diameter and 35 feet high-as high as a modern three-story house. Within the mound were found successive layers of skeletons, some of them sepulchered in a stone vault, and those nearer the bottom in a large wooden vault. Some of the beams of the latter were of walnut, and were 12 inches in diameter.
Criel Mound positioned between two henges that were 666 feet in circumference. The sacred via is aligned to the winter solstice sunrise and the summer solstice sunset.
Dunbar Mound in Charleston, West Virginia
The Kanawha Spectator, Vol. I, 1953
“The excavations made inthe Dunbar mound revealed it to be a double storied structure. The exploration was made by first sinking a vertical shaft through the center of the mound, down to and slightly below the original surface of the ground. This mound was about 175 feet in diameter and 35 feet high-as high as a modern three-story house. Within the mound were found successive layers of skeletons, some of them sepulchered in a stone vault, and those nearer the bottom in a large wooden vault. Some of the beams of the latter were of walnut, and were 12 inches in diameter.
“About half way down to the bottom the earth was mixed, for a depth of three or four feet, with ashes. One skeleton, still enclosed in a coffin made of bark, was in a better state of preservation than the others.
“Within the large wooden vault, near the bottom layer of earth, lay the principle figure, a huge skeleton measuring seven and a half feet in length and nineteen inches between the shoulder sockets. This figure lay prone, the head pointing toward the east. Around this skeleton were four others. Dr. Hale, who watched some of Colonel Norris’ excavations, states that the irregular positions of these four skeletons indicated that they had been placed in a standing position, at each of the four corners; and that their irregular heaps suggested to some who saw them ‘the possibility that they may have been buried alive, toaccompany their great chief to the happy hunting grounds and land of spirits.’”
“Within the large wooden vault, near the bottom layer of earth, lay the principle figure, a huge skeleton measuring seven and a half feet in length and nineteen inches between the shoulder sockets. This figure lay prone, the head pointing toward the east. Around this skeleton were four others. Dr. Hale, who watched some of Colonel Norris’ excavations, states that the irregular positions of these four skeletons indicated that they had been placed in a standing position, at each of the four corners; and that their irregular heaps suggested to some who saw them ‘the possibility that they may have been buried alive, toaccompany their great chief to the happy hunting grounds and land of spirits.’”
Photo from 1909 where the sacred via that led to the Kanawha River can still be seen.
