Thank you Stacey for threading this extensive and informative read…how ironic (or not) that I was last weekend researchign in Highland County re: my Nichols/Gibson/Collins/Cole/Perkins lines and read about the Fort Hill region nearby the Carmel settlement….when I googled Fort Hill (again) they have a neat little info/tibit about the one here in OH:
“Fort Hill
Home » Prehistory » Places » Fort Hill
Fort Hill is one of the best-preserved examples in Ohio of a monumental hilltop enclosure. Prehistoric Native American people constructed it. A wall made of earth and stone winds around this prominent hilltop for more than one and a half miles. A ditch, or moat, inside the wall was one of the sources of the earth the builders used to make the wall. Measured from the bottom of the ditch to the top of the wall, the earthwork ranges from six to 15 feet in height and it encloses about 40 acres.
Although the site is known as “Fort” Hill, it probably never served as a defensive work. A “moat” on the outside of the walls would have been of more aid to the defenders. Also, there are more than 30 openings, or gateways, in the wall. So many entrances would have been difficult to defend.
Many modern archaeologists believe Fort Hill was a ceremonial or religious center. The people known to archaeologists as the Hopewell culture (100 B.C. to 500 A.D.) built the earthwork nearly 2,000 years ago.
Fort Hill is an Ohio Historical Society site that is open for visitation. It is located off of State Route 41 on Township Road 256. Fort Hill is five miles north of Sinking Springs and three miles south of Cynthiana in Highland County. Fort Hill also is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a National Natural Landmark.
Related Entries
Fort Ancient Earthworks
Highland County
Hopewell Culture
Ohio
Ohio Historical Society
External Links
Fort Hill
References and Suggested Reading
Dancey, William S., and Paul J. Pacheco. Ohio Hopewell Community Organization. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1997.
Earthworks Virtual Explorations of Ancient Newark, Ohio. The Center for the Electronic Reconstruction of Historical and Archaeological Sites. Cincinnati, OH: Center for the Electronic Reconstruction of Historical and Archaeological Sites, 2005.
Byers, A. Martin. The Ohio Hopewell Episode: Paradigm Lost and Paradigm Gained. Akron, OH: University of Akron Press, 2004.
Carr, Christopher, and D. Troy Case, eds. Gathering Hopewell: Society, Ritual, and Ritual Interaction. New York, NY: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, 2005.
Hothem, Lar. Treasures of the Mound Builders: Adena & Hopewell Artifacts of Ohio. Lancaster, OH: Hothem House Books, 1989.
Korp, Maureen. The Sacred Geography of the American Mound Builders. Lewiston, NY: E. Mellen Press, 1990.
Lepper, Bradley T. People of the Mounds: Ohio’s Hopewell Culture. N.p.: Hopewell Culture National Historical Park, 1995
Lepper, Bradley Thomas. Searching for the Great Hopewell Road. N.p.: Pangea Productions, 1998.
O’Donnell, James H., III. Ohio’s First Peoples. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2004.
Pacheco, Paul J. , ed. A View from the Core: A Synthesis of Ohio Hopewell Archaeology. , The Ohio Archaeological Council, Columbus, 1996.
Ricky, Donald B., ed. Encyclopedia of Ohio Indians. St. Clair Shores, MI: Somerset Publishers, Inc., 1998.
Romain, William F. Mysteries of the Hopewell: Astronomers, Geometers, and Magicians of the Eastern Woodlands. Akron, OH: University of Akron Press, 2000.
Warriner, Gray, producer. Legacy of the Mound Builders. Seattle, WA: Camera One for the National Park Service and the Hopewell Culture National Historical Park, 1994.
Woodward, Susan L., and Jerry N. McDonald. Indian Mounds of the Middle Ohio Valley: A Guide to Mounds and Earthworks of the Adena, Hopewell, Cole, and Fort Ancient People. Lincoln: The University of Nebraska Press, 2002.”
Source URL:
http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=2405
Take care~~~~Laurie