The Great Serpent Mound

Ohio, USA.

A meteorite’s impact on the land 320 million years ago, a message from time, a remnant from the birth of our solar system. Time transported and imprinted into the Earth. Encoded in the elemental composition and shape of the surrounding rocks marking the landscape as other.

Many years have covered this violent upheaval of life in a layer of living matter but still the faint shadow remains. The Adena culture with their deep connection with the land possibly recognized this “otherness” and added their own layers of charcoal, sandy-silt, and fire burned earth. The reasons behind the creation of the “Great Serpent” effigy mound is and will remain a mystery, its secrets locked away with the death of the Adena culture. But through history we can attempt to translate their meaning.

In the Mississippian mound building culture, the “Great Serpent” was thought of as a symbol of the Underworld and was a great malevolent spirit. It was a reminder that time and death are inevitable, like the river winding beside the mound it continues in an unbroken cycle.