In 1848 Squier and Davis published their great work on the Mounds of the
Mississippi Valley. The skill and zeal with which these gentlemen
prosecuted their researches in the field, and the ability and fidelity
which mark the presentation of their results to the public are
sufficiently attested by the fact that this volume has proved alike the
mine from which subsequent writers have drawn their most important
facts, and the chief inspiration for the vast amount of work in the same
direction since undertaken.
On pages 251 and 252 of the above-mentioned work appear figures of an
animal which is there called "Lamantin, Manitus, or Sea Cow,"
concerning which animal it is stated that "seven sculptured
representations have been taken from the mounds." When first discovered,
the authors continue, "it was supposed they were monstrous creations of
fancy; but subsequent investigations and comparison have shown that they
are faithful representations of one of the most singular animal
productions of the world."
These authors appear to have been the first to note the supposed
likeness of certain of the sculptured forms found in the mounds to
animals living in remote regions. That they were not slow to perceive
the ethnological interest and value of the discovery is shown by the
fact that it was immediately adduced by them as affording a clew to the
possible origin of the Mound-Builders. The importance they attached to
the discovery and their interpretation of its significance will be
apparent from the following quotation (p. 242):
Some of these sculptures have a value, so far as ethnological
research is concerned, much higher than they can claim as mere
works of art. This value is derived from the fact that they
faithfully represent animals and birds peculiar to other latitudes,
thus establishing a migration, a very extensive intercommunication
or a contemporaneous existence of the same race over a vast extent
of country.
The idea thus suggested fell on fruitful ground, and each succeeding
writer who has attempted to show that the Mound-Builders were of a race
different from the North American Indian, or had other than an
autochthonous origin, has not failed to lay especial stress upon the
presence in the mounds of sculptures of the manatee, as well as of other
strange beasts and birds, carved evidently by the same hands that
portrayed many of our native fauna.
Except that the theories based upon the sculptures have by recent
writers been annunciated more positively and given a wider range, they
have been left almost precisely as set forth by the authors of the
"Ancient Monuments," while absolutely nothing appears to have been
brought to light since their time in the way of additional sculptured
evidence of the same character. It is indeed a little curious to note
the perfect unanimity with which most writers fall back upon the above
authors as at once the source of the data they adduce in support of the
several theories, and as their final, nay, their only, authority. Now
and then one will be found to dissent from some particular bit of
evidence as announced by Squier and Davis, or to give a somewhat
different turn to the conclusions derivable from the testimony offered
by them. But in the main the theories first announced by the authors of
"Ancient Monuments," as the result of their study of the mound
sculptures, are those that pass current to-day. Particular attention may
be called to the deep and lasting impression made by the statements of
these authors as to the great beauty and high standard of excellence
exhibited by the mound sculptures. Since their time writers appear to be
well satisfied to express their own admiration in the terms made use of
by Squier and Davis. One might, indeed, almost suppose that recent
writers have not dared to trust to the evidence afforded by the original
carvings or their fac-similes, but have preferred to take the word of
the authors of the "Ancient Monuments" for beauties which were perhaps
hidden from their own eyes.
Following the lead of the authors of the "Ancient Monuments," also, with
respect to theories of origin, these carvings of supposed foreign
animals are offered as affording incontestible evidence that the
Mound-Builders must have migrated from or have had intercourse, direct
or indirect, with the regions known to harbor these animals. Were it
not, indeed, for the evident artistic similarity between these carvings
of supposed foreign animals and those of common domestic forms--a
similarity which, as Squier and Davis remark, render them
"indistinguishable, so far as material and workmanship are concerned,
from an entire class of remains found in the mounds"--the presence of
most of them could readily be accounted for through the agency of trade,
the far reaching nature of which, even among the wilder tribes, is well
understood. Trade, for instance, in the case of an animal like the
manatee, found no more than a thousand miles distant from the point
where the sculpture was dug up, would offer a possible if not a probable
solution of the matter. But independently of the fact that the
practically identical character of all the carvings render the theory of
trade quite untenable, the very pertinent question arises, why, if these
supposed manatee pipes were derived by trade from other regions, have
not similar carvings been found in those regions, as, for instance, in
Florida and the Gulf States, a region of which the archæology is fairly
well known. Primitive man, as is the case with his civilized brother,
trades usually out of his abundance; so that not seven, but many times
seven, manatee pipes should be found at the center of trade. As it is,
the known home of the manatee has furnished no carvings either of the
manatee or of anything suggestive of it.
The possibility of the manatee having in past times possessed a wider
range than at present seems to have been overlooked. But as a matter of
fact the probability that the manatee ever ranged, in comparatively
modern times at least, as far north as Ohio without leaving other traces
of its presence than a few sculptured representations at the hands of an
ancient people is too small to be entertained.
Nor is the supposition that the Mound-Builders held contemporaneous
possession of the country embraced in the range of the animals whose
effigies are supposed to have been exhumed from their graves worthy of
serious discussion. If true, it would involve the contemporaneous
occupancy by the Mound-Builders, not only of the Southern United States
but of the region stretching into Southern Mexico, and even, according
to the ideas of some authors, into Central and South America, an area
which, it is needless to say, no known facts will for a moment justify
us in supposing a people of one blood to have occupied
contemporaneously.
Assuming, therefore, that the sculptures in question are the work of
the Mound-Builders and are not derived from distant parts through the
agency of trade, of which there would appear to be little doubt, and,
assuming that the sculptures represent the animals they have been
supposed to represent--of which something remains to be said--the theory
that the acquaintance of the Mound-Builders with these animals was made
in a region far distant from the one to which they subsequently migrated
would seem to be not unworthy of attention. It is necessary, however,
before advancing theories to account for facts to first consider the
facts themselves, and in this case to seek an answer to the question how
far the identification of these carvings of supposed foreign animals is
to be trusted. Before noticing in detail the carvings supposed by Squier
and Davis to represent the manatee, it will be well to glance at the
carvings of another animal figured by the same authors which, it is
believed, has a close connection with them.
[Illustration: Fig. 4.--Otter. From Ancient Monuments.]
Figure 4 is identified by the authors of the "Ancient Monuments" (Fig.
156) as an otter, and few naturalists will hesitate in pronouncing it to
be a very good likeness of that animal; the short broad ears, broad head
and expanded snout, with the short, strong legs, would seem to belong
unmistakably to the otter. Added to all these is the indication of its
fish-catching habits. Having thus correctly identified this animal, and
with it before them, it certainly reflects little credit upon the
zoological knowledge of the authors and their powers of discrimination
to refer the next figure (Ancient Monuments, Fig. 157) to the same
animal.
[Illustration: Fig. 5.--Otter of Squier and Davis.]
Of a totally different shape and physiognomy, if intended as an otter it
certainly implies an amazing want of skill in its author. However it is
assuredly not an otter, but is doubtless an unfinished or rudely
executed ground squirrel, of which animal it conveys in a general way a
good idea, the characteristic attitude of this little rodent, sitting
up with paws extended in front, being well displayed. Carvings of small
rodents in similar attitudes are exhibited in Stevens's "Flint Chips,"
p. 428, Figs. 61 and 62. Stevens's Fig. 61 evidently represents the same
animal as Fig. 157 of Squier and Davis, but is a better executed
carving.
In illustration of the somewhat vague idea entertained by archæologists
as to what the manatee is like, it is of interest to note that the
carving of a second otter with a fish in its mouth has been made to do
duty as a manatee, although the latter animal is well known never to eat
fish, but, on the contrary, to be strictly herbivorous. Thus Stevens
gives figures of two carvings in his "Flint Chips," p. 429, Figs. 65 and
66, calling them manatees, and says: "In one particular, however, the
sculptors of the mound-period committed an error. Although the lamantin
is strictly herbivorous, feeding chiefly upon subaqueous plants and
littoral herbs, yet upon one of the stone smoking-pipes, Fig. 66, this
animal is represented with a fish in its mouth." Mr. Stevens apparently
preferred to credit the mound sculptor with gross ignorance of the
habits of the manatee, rather than to abate one jot or tittle of the
claim possessed by the carving to be considered a representation of that
animal. Stevens's fish-catching manatee is the same carving given by Dr.
Rau, in the Archæological Collection of the United States National
Museum, p. 47, Fig. 180, where it is correctly stated to be an otter.
This cut, which can scarcely be distinguished from one given by Stevens
(Fig. 66), is here reproduced (Fig. 6), together with the second
supposed manatee of the latter writer (Fig. 7).
[Illustration: Fig. 6.--Otter of Rau; Manatee of Stevens.]
[Illustration: Fig. 7.--Manatee of Stevens.]
To afford a means of comparison, Fig. 154, from the "Ancient Monuments"
of Squier and Davis, is introduced (Fig. 8). The same figure is also to
be found in Wilson's Prehistoric Man, vol. i, p. 476, Fig. 22. Another
of the supposed lamantins, Fig. 9, is taken from Squier's article in the
Transactions of the American Ethnological Society, vol. ii, p. 188. A
bad print of the same wood-cut appears as Fig. 153, p. 251, of the
"Ancient Monuments."
It should be noted that the physiognomy of Fig. 6, above given, although
unquestionably of an otter, agrees more closely with the several
so-called manatees, which are represented without fishes, than with the
fish-bearing otter, first mentioned, Fig. 4.
Fig. 6 thus serves as a connecting link in the series, uniting the
unmistakable otter, with the fish in its mouth, to the more clumsily
executed and less readily recognized carvings of the same animal.
[Illustration: Fig. 8.--Lamantin or sea-cow of Squier and Davis.]
[Illustration: Fig. 9.--Lamantin or sea-cow of Squier.]
It was doubtless the general resemblance which the several specimens of
the otters and the so-called manatees bear to each other that led
Stevens astray. They are by no means facsimiles one of the other. On the
contrary, while no two are just alike, the differences are perhaps not
greater than is to be expected when it is considered that they doubtless
embody the conceptions of different artists, whose knowledge of the
animal, as well as whose skill in carving, would naturally differ
widely. Recognizing the general likeness, Stevens perhaps felt that what
one was all were. In this, at least, he is probably correct, and the
following reasons are deemed sufficient to show that, whether the
several sculptures figured by one and another author are otters or not,
as here maintained, they most assuredly are not manatees. The most
important character possessed by the sculptures, which is not found in
the manatee, is an external ear. In this particular they all agree. Now,
the manatee has not the slightest trace of a pinna or external ear, a
small orifice, like a slit, representing that organ. To quote the
precise language of Murie in the Proceedings of the London Zoological
Society, vol. 8, p. 188: "In the absence of pinna, a small orifice, a
line in diameter, into which a probe could be passed, alone represents
the external meatus." In the dried museum specimen this slit is wholly
invisible, and even in the live or freshly killed animal it is by no
means readily apparent. Keen observer of natural objects, as savage and
barbaric man certainly is, it is going too far to suppose him capable of
representing an earless animal--earless at least so far as the purposes
of sculpture are concerned--with prominent ears. If, then, it can be
assumed that these sculptures are to be relied upon as in the slightest
degree imitative, it must be admitted that the presence of ears would
alone suffice to show that they cannot have been intended to represent
the manatee. But the feet shown in each and all of them present equally
unquestionable evidence of their dissimilarity from the manatee. This
animal has instead of a short, stout fore leg, terminating in flexible
fingers or paws, as indicated in the several sculptures, a shapeless
paddle-like flipper. The nails with which the flipper terminates are
very small, and if shown at all in carving, which is wholly unlikely, as
being too insignificant, they would be barely indicated and would
present a very different appearance from the distinctly marked digits
common to the several sculptures.
Noticing that one of the carvings has a differently shaped tail from the
others, the authors of the "Ancient Monuments" attempt to reconcile the
discrepancy as follows: "Only one of the sculptures exhibits a flat
truncated tail; the others are round. There is however a variety of the
lamantin (_Manitus Senigalensis_, Desm.) which has a round tail, and is
distinguished as the "round-tailed manitus." (Ancient Monuments, p.
252.) The suggestion thus thrown out means, if it means anything, that
the sculpture exhibiting a flat tail is the only one referable to the
manatee of Florida and southward, the _M. Americanus_, while those with
round tails are to be identified with the so-called "Round-tailed
Lamantin," the _M. Senegalensis_, which lives in the rivers of
Senegambia and along the coast of Western Africa. It is to be regretted
that the above authors did not go further and explain the manner in
which they suppose the Mound-Builders became acquainted with an animal
inhabiting the West African coast. Elastic as has proved to be the
thread upon which hangs the migration theory, it would seem to be hardly
capable of bearing the strain required for it to reach from the
Mississippi Valley to Africa.
Had the authors been better acquainted with the anatomy of the manatees
the above suggestion would never have been made, since the tails of the
two forms are, so far as known, almost exactly alike. A rounded tail is,
in fact, the first requisite of the genus _Manatus_, to which both the
manatees alluded to belong, in distinction from the forked tail of the
genus _Halicore_.
Whether the tails of the sculptured manatees be round or flat matters
little, however, since they bear no resemblance to manatee tails, either
of the round or flat tailed varieties, or, for that matter, to tails of
any sort. In many of the animal carvings the head alone engaged the
sculptor's attention, the body and members being omitted entirely, or
else roughly blocked out; as, for instance, in the case of the squirrel
given above, in which the hind parts are simply rounded off into
convenient shape, with no attempt at their delineation. Somewhat the
same method was evidently followed in the case of the supposed manatees,
only after the pipe cavities had been excavated the block was shaped off
in a manner best suited to serve the purpose of a handle. Without,
however, attempting to institute farther comparisons, two views of a
real manatee are here subjoined, which are fac-similes of Murie's
admirable photo-lithograph in Trans. London Zoological Society, vol. 8,
1872-'74. A very brief comparison of the supposed manatees, with a
modern artistic representation of that animal, will show the
irreconcilable differences between them better than any number of pages
of written criticism.
[Illustration: Fig. 10.--Manatee (_Manatus Americanus_, Cuv.).
Side view.]
[Illustration: Fig. 11.--Manatee (_Manatus Americanus_, Cuv.).
Front view.]
There would seem, then, to be no escape from the conclusion that the
animal sculptures which have passed current as manatees do not really
resemble that animal, which is so extraordinary in all its aspects and
so totally unlike any other of the animal creation as to render its
identification in case it had really served as a subject for sculpture,
easy and certain.
As the several sculptures bear a general likeness to each other and
resemble with considerable closeness the otter, the well known
fish-eating proclivities of this animal being shown in at least two of
them, it seems highly probable that it is the otter that is rudely
portrayed in all these sculptures.
The otter was a common resident of all the region occupied by the
Mound-Builders, and must certainly have been well known to them.
Moreover, the otter is one of the animals which figures largely in the
mythology and folk-lore of the natives of America, and has been adopted
in many tribes as their totem. Hence, this animal would seem to be a
peculiarly apt subject for embodiment in sculptured form. It matters
very little, however, whether these sculptures were intended as otters
or not, the main point in the present connection being that they cannot
have been intended as manatees.
Before leaving the subject of the manatee, attention may be called to a
curious fact in connection with the Cincinnati Tablet, "of which a
wood-cut is given in The Ancient Monuments" (p. 275, Fig. 195). If the
reverse side as there shown be compared with the same view as presented
by Short in The North Americans of Antiquity, p. 45, or in MacLean's
Mound-Builders, p. 107, a remarkable discrepancy between the two will be
observed.
[Illustration: Fig. 12.--Cincinnati Tablet. (Back.) From Squire
and Davis.]
In the former, near the top, is indicated what appears to be a shapeless
depression, formless and unmeaning so far as its resemblance to any
special object is concerned. The authors remark of this side of the
tablet, "The back of the stone has three deep longitudinal grooves, and
several depressions, evidently caused by rubbing,--probably produced in
sharpening the instrument used, in the sculpture." This explanation of
the depressions would seem to be reasonable, although it has been
disputed, and a "peculiar significance" (Short) attached to this side of
the tablet. In Short's engraving, while the front side corresponds
closely with the same view given by Squier and Davis, there is a notable
difference observable on the reverse side. For the formless depression
of the Squier and Davis cut not only occupies a somewhat different
position in relation to the top and sides of the tablet, but, as will be
seen by reference to the figure, it assumes a distinct form, having in
some mysterious way been metamorphosed into a figure which oddly enough
suggests the manatee. It does not appear that the attention of
archæologists has ever been directed to the fact that such a resemblance
exists; nor indeed is the resemblance sufficiently close to justify
calling it a veritable manatee. But with the aid of a little
imagination it may in a rude way suggest that animal, its earless head
and the flipper being the most striking, in fact the only, point of
likeness. Conceding that the figure as given by Short affords a rude
hint of the manatee, the question is how to account for its presence on
this the latest representation of the tablet which, according to Short,
Mr. Guest, its owner, pronounces "the first correct representations of
the stone." The cast of this tablet in the Smithsonian Institution
agrees more closely with Short's representation in respect to the
details mentioned than with that given in the "Ancient Monuments."
Nevertheless, if this cast be accepted as the faithful copy of the
original it has been supposed to be, the engraving in Short's volume is
subject to criticism. In the cast the outline of the figure, while
better defined than Squier and Davis represent it to be, is still very
indefinite, the outline not only being broken into, but being in places,
especially toward the head, indistinguishable from the surface of the
tablet into which it insensibly grades. In the view as found in Short
there is none of this irregularity and indefiniteness of outline, the
figure being perfect and standing out clearly as though just from the
sculptor's hand. As perhaps on the whole the nearest approach to the
form of a manatee appearing on any object claimed to have originated at
the hands of the Mound-Builders, and from the fact that artists have
interpreted its outline so differently, this figure, given by the
latest commentators on the Cincinnati tablet, is interesting, and has
seemed worthy of mention. As, however, the authenticity of the tablet
itself is not above suspicion, but, on the contrary, is believed by many
archæologists to admit of grave doubts, the subject need not be pursued
further here.
[Illustration: Fig. 13.--Cincinnati Tablet. (Back.) From
Short.]