Ormond Mound - Wikipedia

Ormond Mound

Location	Indian Mound Park, Volusia County, Florida
Nearest city	Ormond Beach, Florida
Coordinates	29°16′48.5″N 81°3′12.4″W / 29.280139°N 81.053444°W / 29.280139; -81.053444
Governing body	City of Ormond Beach

Location of Ormond Mound in Volusia County

Ormond Mound is a Pre-Columbian burial mound of the St. Johns culture, in Ormond Beach, Volusia County, Florida, US.

Overview

[edit]

The Ormond Mound (a burial mound that can be classified as an earthwork or conical mound and is defined as a heap of earth placed over prehistoric tombs or remains}^[1] has been preserved as an intact burial mound in eastern Florida. The site was turned into a city park in 1982 due to the efforts of the community. In 1982, the owner of the property that the mound was constructed on wanted the mound removed. Controversy surfaced in the community as the property owner attempted to level the land in order to build a house. As a result of public outrage, the community’s and Volusia Anthropological Society's^[2] demand for the site to be classified as a historical monument, the Ormond Mound and surrounding area was purchased by the city. Government officials hired archaeologists in an effort to validate who built the site and for what purpose. The archaeologists concluded that the mound was constructed by Timucuan Indians, also identified as the St. Johns people. The Timucuan were inhabitants of the area before European settlers.^[3]

History

[edit]

It has been estimated that over 100 individual burials are in Ormond Mound, based on salvage excavations that were conducted in 1982. As more bodies were deposited into the area and were covered with sand and other minerals, the earthwork took its "distinctive mounded appearance".^[2] Most of these remains were laid to rest during the late St. Johns period, after A.D. 800. The remains were oftentimes buried with their most prized possessions.^[2] Apart from human bones, items found after the site was analyzed included utensils, Indian beads, Spanish trading beads, and pottery sherds.^[3]

A charnel house, a structure used to store bodies prior to burial, was located near the Ormond Mound. These structures were separate from the village^[2] and were used by the St. Johns people to prepare the corpses of mostly high-ranking and important people for the afterlife. The dead were laid out on wooden racks and allowed to decompose. A charnel house attendant, usually a high priest or a bonepicker,^[2] would carefully remove the flesh from the bones as they decomposed. The job of a bonepicker was known throughout the community as one of the most prestigious jobs to have.^[4]^[5]

After the bodies dried away, the charnel house priest would end up with individual sets of cleaned bones.. Each set of bones was bundled up and buried in mounds during special ceremonies. This method accounts for the many skeletons found in burial mounds.^[4]^[5]

References

[edit]

^ N/A, N/a. "Burial Mound". Dictionary. Merriam-Webster. Retrieved 6 April 2014.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Claire, Dana. "Ormond Burial Mound Contains Remains Of Prehistoric Indians". Newspaper Article. Orlando Sentinel. Retrieved 6 April 2014.
^ ^a ^b Castagnacci, Dave. "Ormond's Burial Mound Rests in Peace". Newspaper Article. Daytona Beach Morning Journal. Retrieved 6 April 2014.
^ ^a ^b True Natives: The Prehistory of Volusia County (1992), By Dana Ste. Claire, The Museum of Arts and Sciences, Daytona Beach
^ ^a ^b A Nature Wooing at Ormond by the Sea (1902), By Willis Stanley Blatchley

Gallery

[edit]

External links

[edit]

Media related to Ormond Mound at Wikimedia Commons

v t e Late Woodland cultures
Mound Builders List of archaeological periods (North America)
Sites	Baum Site Beattie Park Mound Group Book site Bowen Site (12 MA 61) Brinsfield I Site Brokaw Site Clampitt Site (12-LR-329) Fisher site Hoye Site Little Maquoketa River Mounds State Preserve Man Mound Memorial Park Site Nottingham Site Ormond Mound St. Croix River Access Site Sommerheim Park University of Tennessee Agriculture Farm Mound
Cultures	Alachua culture Avonlea culture Clemson Island culture Manahoac Monongahela culture Oliver phase Princess Point complex Springwells phase Suwannee Valley culture Weeden Island culture
Related topics Steuben point Belle Glade culture Extreme weather events of 535–536 Fort Ancient culture Mississippian culture Oneota St. Johns culture

v t e Indigenous peoples of Pre-Columbian Florida
Periods Paleoindians Archaic period Post-Archaic period
Archaeological cultures	Alachua Belle Glade Cades Pond Caloosahatchee Clovis Deptford Fort Walton Glades Leon-Jefferson Manasota Mount Taylor Norwood Orange period Paleo-Indians Pensacola Safety Harbor Santa Rosa-Swift Creek St. Johns Suwannee Valley Swift Creek Weeden Island McKeithen North peninsular Gulf coast
Archaeological sites	Apalachee Bay Aqui Esta Burial Mound Bay Pines Bear Lake Mounds Big Heart West Big Mound City Big Mound Key-Boggess Ridge Bird Hammock Blueberry Bowers Bluff Middens Bubba Midden Burns Lake Butcherpen Mound Cayo Pelau Cayson Mound and Village C. J. Ostl Crystal River Cutler Demere Key Devil's Den Cave Dismal Key Douglass Beach Fort Center Fort Walton Mound Galt Island Garden Patch Green Mound Halfway Creek Helen Blazes Hickory Ridge Cemetery Hinson Mounds Horr's Island Indian Fields J&J Hunt Josslyn Island Jungle Prada Key Marco Kimball Island Midden Lake Jackson Mounds Lake Pithlachocco Letchworth-Love Mounds Little Salt Spring Madira Bickel Mound Mark Pardo Shellworks Miami Circle Mill Cove Monroe Lake Mound Key Mount Elizabeth Mount Royal Mount Taylor Mullet Key Myakkahatchee Creek Naval Live Oaks Cemetery Nocoroco Ormond Mound Ortona Prehistoric Village Otis Hare Page-Ladson Persimmon Mound Pierce Pineland Platt Island Plaza Pompano Beach Mound Portavant Mound Porter's Bar Princess Mound River Styx Roberts Island Rock Mound Rookery Mound Ross Hammock Safety Harbor Shark River Slough Shell Bluff Landing Spruce Creek Third Gulf Breeze Thomas Creek Turner River Turtle Mound Twin Mounds Upper Tampa Bay Useppa Island Velda Mound Waddells Mill Pond Wakulla Springs Yent Mound Yon Mound and Village
Human remains	Manasota Key Offshore Melbourne Man Vero man Warm Mineral Springs Windover
Miscellaneous	Beaver Lake point Indigenous peoples of the Everglades region Protection of Native American sites in Florida Shell ring List of shell ring sites#Florida Shell works Simpson point Suwannee point
Related Pre-Columbian era

v t e Pre-Columbian North America
Periods Lithic Archaic Formative Classic Post-Classic
Archaeological cultures	Adena Alachua Ancient Beringian Ancestral Pueblo (Anasazi) Anishinaabe Avonlea Baytown Belle Glade Buttermilk Creek complex Caborn-Welborn Cades Pond Calf Creek Caloosahatchee Clovis Coles Creek Comondú Deptford Folsom Fort Ancient Fort Walton Fremont Glacial Kame Glades Hohokam Hopewell List of Hopewell sites La Jolla Las Palmas Maritime Archaic Mississippian List of Mississippian sites Mogollon Monongahela Old Cordilleran Oneota Paleo-Arctic Paleo-Indians Patayan Plano Plaquemine Poverty Point Red Ocher Safety Harbor Santa Rosa-Swift Creek St. Johns Steed-Kisker Suwannee Valley Tchefuncte Troyville Weeden Island
Archaeological sites	Angel Mounds Anzick site Bandelier National Monument Bastian Benson Blue Spring Shelter Bluefish Caves The Bluff Point Stoneworks Brewster Cahokia Candelaria Cave Casa Grande Chaco Canyon Coso Rock Art District Crystal River Cuarenta Casas Cueva de la Olla Cutler Eaker El Fin del Mundo El Vallecito Effigy Mounds Etowah Indian Mounds Eva Folsom Fort Ancient Fort Center Fort Juelson Four Mounds Gila Cliff Dwellings Glenwood Grimes Point Helen Blazes Holly Bluff Hopewell Culture National Historical Park Horr's Island Huápoca Key Marco Kimball Village Kincaid Mounds Kolomoki Mounds Lake Jackson Mounds Lehner Mammoth-Kill Site L'Anse aux Meadows Lynch Quarry Site Marksville Marmes Rockshelter Meadowcroft Rockshelter Mesa Verde Moaning Cavern Moorehead Circle Morrison Mounds Moundville Mummy Cave Nodena site Ocmulgee Mounds Old Stone Fort Orwell site Paquime Painted Bluff Parkin Park Pinson Mounds Plum Bayou Mounds Portsmouth Earthworks Poverty Point Pueblo Bonito Rassawek Recapture Canyon River Styx Roberts Island Rock Eagle Rock Hawk Rosenstock Village Russell Cave Salmon Ruins Serpent Mound Sierra de San Francisco Shell ring sites Spiro Mounds Stallings Island SunWatch Taos Pueblo Town Creek Indian Mound Turkey River Mounds Upward Sun River Velda Mound West Oak Forest Earthlodge Wickiup Hill Windover Winterville Wupatki
Human remains	Anzick-1 Arlington Springs Man Buhl Woman Kennewick Man La Brea Woman Leanderthal Lady Melbourne Man Minnesota Woman Peñon woman Spirit Cave mummy Vero man
Miscellaneous	Aridoamerica Ballgame Black drink Ceremonial pipe Chanunpa Chunkey Clovis point Container Revolution Eastern Agricultural Complex Eden point Effigy mound Falcon dancer Folsom point Green Corn Ceremony Horned Serpent Kiva Medicine wheel Metallurgy Mi'kmaq hieroglyphic writing Mound Builders N.A.G.P.R.A. Norse colonization of North America Oasisamerica Piasa Projectile point Southeastern Ceremonial Complex Stickball Three Sisters agriculture Thunderbird Transoceanic contact Underwater panther Water glyphs
Related Genetic history Pre-Columbian era