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Ghosts, Water Barriers, Corn, and Sacred Enclosures in the Eastern Woodlands

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Robert L. Hall
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Abstract

Certain enigmatic prehistoric constructions in the eastern United States were possibly designed partly as barriers to restrict the movement of spirits or to protect the enclosed area from unwanted supernatural influences. Ethnographic accounts indicate that in historic times the belief was widely held in the United States that ghosts could not pass through water and that the geometry of a circle was effective in countering magic or supernatural forces. Some implications for archaeology are explored.

Type
Reports
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 41 , Issue 3 , July 1976 , pp. 360 - 364
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1976

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