Serpent Mound
comment:
Around 1000 CE, Indians at Cahokia were busy making “Woodhenge” and the Cahokia main mound that lines up with it on the Woodhenge axis. So it would have made sense if our many times grandfathers were were doing similar in other sites at the time. Heck, our Osage villages did it multiple village sites over at least 2000 years. So I would EXPECT it. And positions of the moon make sense, too. Can’t let the Indians next door or across the river show “us” up, is a common gentle thing between tribes. Oh, and “of course” it’s Osage. Cuz we rock! Or at least we we had a part in the rock painted Picture Cave rein Missouri that was referred to. Seriously, more important than obsessing about what year it was started, is what current TRIBAL historians/researchers think. About who made it and what significance there is. Doesn’t take a rocket scientist or a priest to tell you it was sacred to the people who made it. Which makes it meaningful to Indians now, just like Notre Dame Cathedral is to French people, even though they have much different evolution of their beliefs since then. Whether or not it was made by Osage or Shawnee or Ho-Chunks or someone else, when I see it, it’s body reminds me of the seven bends of the river that is our life on this earth. And the sun coming up there, entering the snake and blessing it with life giving force- of course it is sacred. Just as I am inspired in cathedrals and mosques and on the main mound at Cahokia, I think it is harder to NOT be inspired by the love that people put into it, than to worry about the minor details of “when” and exactly “what was meant then”. Love and wonder are both timeless, and if imparted to future generations, despite the details changing, then we have succeeded.
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