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Archaeologists research history of Marietta’s earthworks

Archaeologists research history of Marietta’s earthworks

Photo submitted by Jean Yost On Friday, Jarrod Burks of Ohio Valley Archaeology, Inc. conducted the geophysical mapping of the Quadranaou Mound located near the intersection of Warren and Fourth streets, as a part of the ongoing project with The Friends of the Museum.

One of Marietta’s largest and most unique mounds, Quadranaou, has been under deep research recently by professional archaeologists Jarrod Burks and John Schweikart, of the Ohio Valley Archaeology, Inc.

The professional archaeologists from Columbus conducted specialized geophysical mapping at the mound located near the intersection of Fourth and Warrren streets, wrapping up the work on Sunday.

“This is a major new piece of information,” said Wes Clarke, local archaeologist. “It’s the kind of thing archaeologists get excited for.”

According to Jean Yost, a board member of the nonprofit Friends of the Museum, this is a part of a long, ongoing project in conjunction with the Campus Martius Museum to document, interpret and promote the mounds in Marietta.

“In February, we hired Wes to do an in-depth study of the Marietta earthworks and all of the known data about the earthworks since the start of written time,” said Yost. “We expect we are going to end up with thousands of pages with what everybody has done prior to this date, which gives us a good starting point.”

Clarke said the geophysical mapping of the mound is a breakthrough for the project.

“We are trying to pull information together and learn new things about the mounds,” he said. “We’ve been waiting to see this project happen for a number of years.”

The Quadranaou Mound is part of the Marietta earthworks site, which is a large Hopewell culture (100 BC- AD 500) ceremonial center.

Three segments of the Marietta earthworks are maintained as public parks today. The large burial mound surrounded by a circular enclosure is called Conus, the largest of the flat-topped earthen pyramids is called Quadranaou and the next largest pyramidal mound is called Capitolium.

Yost said Burks and Schweikart used magnetometer and ground-penetrating technologies that provide imagery of natural and cultural features in the ground without disturbing the soil of cultural remains.

“They are specialists in this kind of work,” said Clarke. “They are very technical and specialized. Dr. Burks goes all over the world and does this sort of thing, it was great that we had somebody of his caliber come and be a part of this project.”

According to Clarke, the goal was to obtain an impression of what the internal structure of the mound looked like, as well as prehistoric and historic cultural features that exist in the open ground around the mound.

“There were structural features in the mound and there were some in the open area as well,” he said. “We will definitely have more answers and possibly see if some of this may relate to when the mound was used as a Civil War camp or any other potential human activity during the prehistoric period.”

Burks said with magnetic data they detected several things on the top of the mound as well.

“It could be anything from fire pits from the Civil War or the remains of old buildings from thousands of years ago,” he said. “It may take some excavation to figure it out exactly.”

Clarke said they have not received the final visual representations from the project, but they are very

excited to see the end results.

“We are very excited that we finally got this done and we are looking forward to see what the information shows,” he said.

Burks said it was  interesting to be able to examine every square foot of the mound.

“I was very much impressed with the site,” he said. “It’s one of the better intact ones. It was in  really good shape.”

The Quadranaou Mound is considered to be rare and unique due to its shape.

“Only a few platform mounds occur in the earthwork complexes,” said Clarke. “Most of the mounds are big and circular and these are more rectangular. There just aren’t as many.”

The next phase of the project will include bringing in a drone to see all of the mound’s smallest abnormalities.

“As the leaves begin to fall, we will bring in the drone and we will be able to see abnormalities as small as an inch,” said Yost. “It’s very high resolution and we will end up with contour maps that will end up as small as a one-inch scale.”

After 18 years in archaeology, Burks said he still enjoys the thrill of the chase when it comes to geophysical mapping, but aside from that he enjoys learning more about the society that lived thousands of years ago.

“They are a kind of society that is hard to identify with,” he said. “They were able to build these large things based off of how things worked in the sky. They also knew how to motivate people, and do it without the trappings of the world, such as money and technology.”

According to Yost, this project can lead to further knowledge of preserving materials and artifacts in the local mounds.

“Part of preserving is knowing what is there now, and as we go into the future we will know how to preserve these mounds and realize what has been found,” he said.

In the future, the Friends of the Museum board is planning  to explore and research all of the mounds in Marietta.

“As you drive by you don’t notice much but then you think of the other complexities such as how was it built and how it’s connected to other mounds in North America,” said Yost. “If I can demonstrate what we are doing here and what we’ve found in the archaeological digs, I will be happy. It’s important we understand how things worked back then.”

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