Below this entrenchment, and on the present site of the town of Piqua, a group of works formerly existed, consisting of circles, ellipses, etc. These have been described at length, by Major Long.[17] There are also various small works on the opposite bank of the Miami. Indeed, the whole valley is here covered with traces of a former dense population.
This work resembles one already described, No. 2 of this Plate. It is situated on the bank of the Great Miami river, three miles below Dayton, Montgomery county, Ohio. The side of the hill towards the river is very steep, rising to the [p024] height of one hundred and sixty feet. The remaining sides are less abrupt. Upon the south is the principal gateway, and here the declivity is gentle. This gateway is covered upon the interior by a ditch, «c c», twenty feet wide, and seven hundred feet long. At «d d d» are dug holes, from which it is apparent a portion of the earth composing the embankments was taken. At «b» is a natural depression forty feet deep, and covering not far from one and a half acres. At the northern slope of the narrow ridge which intersects the work, and within the line of the embankment of which it forms a part, is a small mound. From its top a full view of the surrounding country, for a long distance up and down the river, may be obtained. A terrace, apparently artificial, skirts the north-west side of the hill, thirty feet below the embankment. As remarked in a former instance, this terrace may be natural; it has, however, all the regularity of a work of art.
PLATE IX. No. 1. FORTIFIED HILL, NEAR GRANVILLE, LICKING COUNTY, OHIO.
The work here represented is situated two miles below the town of Granville, Licking county, Ohio. It encloses the summit of a high hill, and embraces an area of not far from eighteen acres. The embankment is, for the most part, carried around the hill at a considerable distance below its brow, and is completely overlooked from every portion of the enclosed area. Unlike all other hill-works which have fallen under notice, the ditch occurs «outside» of the wall; the earth in the construction of the latter having been thrown upwards and inwards. This is observed equally at the points where the hill is steepest; and the result has been, in the lapse of time, that the ditch is almost obliterated, while the accumulating earth has filled the space above the wall, so that the appearance of the defence, at these points, is that of a high, steep terrace. The height of the wall varies at different places; where the declivity is gentle and the approach easy, it is highest,—perhaps eight or ten feet from the bottom of the ditch; elsewhere it is considerably less. The embankment conforms generally to the shape of the hill. It is interrupted by three gateways, two of which open towards springs of water, and the other, or principal one, upon a long narrow spur, which subsides gradually into the valley of Raccoon creek, affording a comparatively easy ascent.