----- Original Message ----- From: "Richard Thornton" <rtrobroy@bellsouth.net> To: "Dorothy" <dgpagano@earthlink.net> Sent: Sunday, July 15, 2001 7:48 PM Subject: Woodland period burials > Hi Dorothy, > > While formerly Principle Planner in the Cobb County Planning Department, I > was also responsible for all historic preservation and archaeological work > in the county. The stone piles you are talking about are Woodland Period > graves. There also many of them on a hillside within the Kennesaw Mountain > National Battlefield Park. These are protected by national and state laws > and should not be touched under any circumstances unless part of a > professional investigations authorized by the State of Georgia. > > The Woodland Period population in the Etowah River Drainage Area was > enormous. There were permanent agricultural villages there as early as 500 > BC and a town with temple mounds as large as Itaba (Etowah) around 0 AD, > about a mile south of the Etowah Indian Mounds site. We really do not know > what people built the graves, villages, towns and mysterious stone rings > that once crowned many of the mountains in northwest Georgia (including > Kennesaw.) > > Later on in the 900's the Muscogeans moved into the area and built hundreds > of villages up and down the Etowah River, Allatoona Creek, Pumpkinvine > Creek, Petit Creek, Euharlee Creek and Stamp Creek. DeSoto remarked that > during the 2 1/2 months that his expedition was in modern day northwestern > Georgia, his men never stopped seeing either cultivated fields, houses, > villages or towns. > > The archaeologists working for the Division of Historic Preservation, > Georgia Department of Natural Resources + the Georgia Native American > Affairs Commission should be notified immediately about the graves being in > danger. > > Good Luck > > Richard