Alma 48:8
Yea, he had strengthening the armies of the Nephites, and erecting small forts, or places of resort; throwing up banks of earth round about to enclose his armies, and also building walls of stone to encircle them about, round about their cities and the borders of their lands; yea all about the land.
The following section contains legends and commentary by people who had spent time with the Siouan tribes in the west and chronicled their migrations from the Ohio Valley.
Migrations of the Hopewell Sioux
Siouan Tribes And The Ohio Valley, American Anthropologist 1943, John Swanton
“When Europeans came in contact with the Dakota tribes they were living in three main divisions
with several detached tribes. The largest group was located west of the Mississippi from Lake
Winnipeg in Manitoba south to the mouth of the Arkansas River. The second largest group was in the
Piedmont of Virginia and the Carolinas with settlements that extended to the coast and into the
Appalachian Mountains. The third group was found on the Pascagoula River in Mississippi and along
the gulf coast were the Biloxi; and on the Yazoo River, the Oto. The Winnebago Indians lived on the
western shores of Lake Michigan at present day Green Bay, Wisconsin, and were separated in later
days from the Mississippian tribes by Algonquin Indians.
Linguistically, the tribes in North and South Carolina were the most aberrant of all of the Siouan
speech. The speech of the Virginia Sioux is closer to that of the western dialects. The conclusion is
that at one time the Virginia Sioux and the Mississippian Sioux was split into two groups.”
John Lawson writes in The History of Carolina 1860, concerning the eastern Sioux, “When you ask
them whence their forefathers came, that first inhabited the country, they will point westward, and say,
“where the sun sleeps our forefathers came thence. Thus the western tribes say they came from the east
and the eastern tribes say they came from the west and in between is the Ohio Valley.”
Swanton continues, “ In brief, traditions among the western Siouans, J.O Dorsey, the Siouan
specialist, wrote of the Omaha in 1882: “indicated a former home in the east toward the country of the
eastern Siouans and in the case of some tribes, notably the Quapaw, residence on the Ohio, while
traditions among the eastern Siouans pointed to a home toward the west in the direction of the western
Siouans. These traditions would not seem to vary then from what one might have expected.”
Excursion through the Slave States 1840, G. W. Featherstonhaugh
Maj. George C. Sibley, son of the famous Dr. John Sibley, who in 1834 furnished G. W.
Featherstonhaugh with the following information he had obtained from an old Osage chief: “The old
chief further said...that the tradition had been steadily transmitted down from their ancestors, that the
Whashash (Osage) had originated and emigrated from the east in great numbers, the population being
to dense for their hunting-grounds; he described the forks of the Allegheny and Monongahela river, and
the falls of the Ohio, where they had dwelt some time, and where large bands had separated from them
and distributed themselves in the surrounding country. Those who did not remain in the Ohio country,
following its waters, reached St. Louis, where other separations took place, some following the
Mississippi up to the north, others advancing up the waters of the Missouri.”
George Catlin, North American Indians 1860, discussing the Mandan Indians, saying: “There
are other, and very intersesting traditions and historical facts relative to a still prior location and
condition of these people, of which I shall speak more fully on a future occasion. From these,
when they are promulgated, I think there may be a pretty fair deduction drawn, that they
formerly occupied the lower part of the Missouri, and even the Ohio and Muskingum, and have
gradually made their way up the Missouri to where they are now.”
In 1908, N.H. Winchell added in the, “The Popular Science Monthly,” “The Sioux and Iroquois
Legends, Prehistoric Aborigines of Minnesota and Their Migrations.”
“The Osage and perhaps the Omaha, who belong to the Dakota stock, and who have a tradition
which is confirmed by other traditions, that they once lived east of the Mississippi in that very region,
[southern Ohio]. With this understanding it is, I repeat, a remarkable fact that, aside from the
Muskogee earthworks of the gulf coast, which have distinctive characters, only the Dakotan and
Iroquois stocks can be shown either by history or tradition to have been characteristic mound builders.
This legend is found amongst several of the Dakota tribes, and even amongst the later Algonquin who returned westward to the Mississippi Valley. The Osage, Omaha, Mandan, Kansa and Akansea,
and Ponca. These tribes concur in saying that they formerly dwelt in the Ohio and Wabash valleys, and
that they moved down the Ohio Valley, where they were separated into two divisions at the mouth of
the Ohio River, some of them going down the Mississippi and some of them up the same river.
It is due to the research of the Late J. V. Brower that the Dakota tribes of Minnesota have proved to
belong to the so-called mound-builder dynasty.
“There is also a remarkable series of effigy mounds in central and southern Wisconsin, which
extended across the Mississippi into Minnesota and Iowa. As to the prevalence of serpent worship, we
have shown that there were serpent effigies in Ohio, Illinois, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Dakota, and
that all these were situated along the line of migration, which according to tradition of the Dakotas,
was followed by their ancestors on reaching their later seats on the Mississippi and Upper Missouri
Rivers.” We may conclude from this that the Winnebago were not only effigy builders, but they were
serpent worshipers, and that these various serpents were their work.”
Earthen serpent effigies surrounding a Hopewellian burial mound, along with bird-like and serpent effigies on the eastern side of the creek; similar effigies are also found in southern Ohio. Note the earthwork at the fork of the creek that resembles the snake swallowing the sun disc at the Serpent Mound in Adams County, Ohio. Mounds and earthworks are located in in Pipestone County, Minnesota. Diagram is from The Mound Builders, Shetrone, 1941.
Aboriginal Religions in America, Stephen Peet, 1905: “The region in Ohio where the serpent
effigies are the most prominent was once the dwelling place of a tribe of hunters who are
known to have migrated from their original seats east of the Alleghenies, following the buffalo
in their retreat westward, namely, the Dakotas or Sioux, and it is quit likely that the name of the
snake people, which tradition has preserved, was the one given to them. Confirmatory of this is
the fact that the serpent effigies are found all along the track taken by the Dakotas in their
migration westward to their present seats. One was discovered by the writer on the bluff near
Quincy, Illinois, another on the bluff neat Cassville, Wisconsin, another on the ridge near Lake
Wingra, near Madison, Wisconsin, another near Mayville, still another, discovered by Prof. J.
A. Todd, on the bluff called Dakota. And the fact that carved animal pipes, resembling those in
Ohio, have been found in the mounds in Illinois and Iowa, the most interesting of which has the
serpent coiled around the bowl exactly as the one found in the fort called Clarks works.”
Stephen Peet writes in Ancie
nt America Vol. II, 1892 “The effigy mounds may have been built by
the Winnebago who fled northward when the Lenape crossed the Mississippi. They are thought to have
remained in southern Wisconsin during the Lenape-Alligewi war, and in the end were there to welcome
the fugitives back when they returned. This may explain why the Winnebago are isolated in the west
from the other Dakota tribes. It is also worthy to note that the Winnebago is oldest dialect of the
western Dakota and are called “grandfathers” by the other tribes.”
As to the prevalence of serpent worship, we have shown that there were serpent effigies in Ohio,
Illinois, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Dakota, and that all these were situated along the line of migration,
which according to tradition of the Dakotas, was followed by their ancestors on reaching their later
seats on the Mississippi and Upper Missouri Rivers.”We may conclude from this that the Winnebago
were not only effigy builders, but they were serpent worshipers, and that these various serpents were their work.”
To the left is an earthwork that was located in Dade County, Missouri originally published in the American Antiquarian in July, 1878, showing a burial mound within a circular enclosure with two serpents whose heads are poised toward a central circular mound, symbolic of the sun. To the right is an earthwork in Butler County, Ohio and originally published in “The Mound Builders” by J. P. McLean in 1879 that is of similar iconic design.
In an unpublished work written in June 2001, archaeologist and ethnohistorian Alan R. Woolworth
dealt with the question of the tribal affiliation of the effigy and burial mounds in Minnesota in “Who
Built the Prehistoric Burial Mounds in Minnesota and the Dakotas.”
“Available information demonstrates that the burial mounds in most of southern Minnesota were
created by Siouan speaking Indians who had originated in the Ohio River Valley and eventually
migrated into this region.
The ancestral homes of many Siouan-speaking Indians such as the Teton, Yankton, Yanktonai,
Assinboine and Santee Dakota peoples were in the Ohio River country. Also, in this general area were
the Dhegiha and Chewere Siouan speakers. Perhaps all of these groups migrated down the Ohio and
Mississippi rivers to the general vicinity of Cahokia and then travelled northward to Minnesota region.
Chewere Siouans composed of the Winnebago, Iowa, Oto and Missouri groups, had likewise
migrated down the Misssissippi River to the large fortified Azatlan site in the south central Wisconsin and later moved westward into the Minnesota area.”
The era of the Adena and Hopewell had ended. The Lakota-Dakota Sioux, Cherokee, Iroquois would
rise again in a new tradition of mound building called the Mississippian, (800 A.D.-1500A.D). In this
era, people were still buried in mounds of earth but the geometric earthworks of the Adena and
Hopewell were replaced by great platform mounds where the houses of the Chiefdoms and Sun Priests
resided.
Evidence of a Siouan presence in southern Indiana was documented in the, Archaeological Notes on
Posey County, Wm. R. Adams, Indiana Historical Bureau, 1949 “Griffin has recently stated the
possibility of a proto-historic occupation of the Ohio Valley from the Wabash to the Mississippi by the
Arkansas and mentions the Murphy Site as “most strongly” suggesting such an occupation. Earlier Eli
Lilly had made the suggestion that Murphy Bone Bank, and the Indian “citadel” at Merom on the
Wabash in Sullivan County, were indicative of a Siouan relationship, equating the three with the
Oneota culture.”
“Moorehead called attention still earlier to the anomalous nature of the materials from
Murphy. He rightly compared the ceramics with “Missouri Arkansas” forms and might have
included Kentucky and Tennessee in the same temporal reference. He also stated the pipes
were early Siouan.”
Physical remains of the Mississippian Sioux, within the geographic area of the guide are still
visible at the platform mounds at Marietta, Angel Mounds in Evansville and at the mouth of the
Wabash. One of three large mounds at Vincennes, Indiana was a platform mound implying that
the remaining two, may also prove to be Mississippian Sioux in origin.
According to the Lene Lenapi Alqonquins, the Adena were the Allegewi; a name that still
survives today in the Allegheny River and Mountains. The Hopewell were a confederation of
the kindred tribes of the Sioux, Iroquois and Cherokee. Mounds and earthworks found in this guide that are located in the southern tier of Michigan, northeast Indiana and northwest Ohio
were Point Peninsula Iroquois, who at first shared many Allegewi traits, but later were similar
to the Ohio Hopewell. Iroquois in western Indiana and southwest Michigan were influenced by
Hopewell Sioux residing in southern Illinois and Missouri. Archaeologist call these Siouan
tribes, Havanna Hopewell. Ft. Ancient mounds that once were numerous in southern Indiana
and Ohio were constructed by the Shawnee.
The Shawnee migration south was chronicled in the ancient Bark Record or Walam Olum of
the Lene Lenape, or Delaware. This movement to the south may have been precipitated by the
island of Krakatoa exploding; sending the world into “nucular winter” for a duration of about
two years. Evidence of this sanguin battle was chronicled in county histories in the form of
mass graves containing large skeletons that are associated with the Allegewi. Further evidence
of an Adena presence north of their mound sites are the number of surface finds of their spear
heads.
The Sioux nation and all of their tribes, concur in a migration out of the Ohio Valley, some
going north to Wisconsin and Minnesota and other s going south into Missouri and Arkansas.
Whether this migration was precipitated by the explosion of Krakatoa and the climatic change
that followed or was the result of the incursion of the Algonquins or a combination of both is
yet to be determined.
Of greater importance is that we know what Native Americans built the mounds and
earthworks. Under the provisions of the Native American Graves Protection Act, 1991, all of
the mounds should be protected from any further excavations by universities. The current trend
in archaeological excavations is directed toward the ceremonial centers. These Native
American sacred sites should be given the same Federal or State protection as the burial
mounds. Generations ago, we took these people's land; let's not be the generation that takes their dead.
The Nephilim Chronicles: Fallen Angels in the Ohio Valley Page 45
