FORT HILL,
PAINT VALLEY

THE GREAT TOMB

Most people buried on this floor were cremated first. Among the few to be laid out unburned were four young adults and two infants, placed together in a large common tomb and surrounded by thousands of freshwater pearls.

One theory suggests that among them was a vital leader, whose death required that the others be sent to their deaths, too. This grand burial may have been the last at the M’sikamekwi, for the tomb was marked twice after the building was dismantled and mounding began.

On three feet of clay, five oversized pipes (brought from far away) were offered, perhaps as guardians. Many feet higher, on the primary stage of mounding, a printed fabric canopy was pegged down, over the tomb’s location. Finally, more earth was added to create the final memorial, thirty-two feet high and about two-hundred-fifty feet long.

Fort Hill, Paint Valley

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