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Hopewell Figurine Rediscovered

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Don W. Dragoo  and
Charles F. Wray
Don W. Dragoo
Affiliation:
Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Charles F. Wray
Affiliation:
Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
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Abstract

An exceptionally fine and significant stone figurine of the Ohio Hopewell Culture was found recently among the items in the collection of the late James L. Wright of Rochester, New York. Purchased by Mr. Wright's father in 1882, this figurine was found in one of the mounds of the famous Newark (Ohio) earthworks group in August 1881. The figurine is that of a shaman or priest masked by the head and skin of a bear, the probable totem of his clan or group. The shaman holds in his right hand a human head. The presence of typical Hopewellian earspools on both the shaman and the head indicates the possibility that the shaman is performing one of the rites in the ceremonies concerned with the dead and that the head is that of a fellow clan or group member.

Type
Facts and Comments
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 30 , Issue 2Part1 , October 1964 , pp. 195 - 199
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1964

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References

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