Piketon Mound Cemetery

The 4 mounds in Mound cemetery at piketon exemplify the more ordinary mounds which dotted the Scioto Valley at the time of anglo-american settlement. Squier and Davis, writing in 1848, said:

“It is common to find 2 or 3, sometimes 4 or 5, sepulchre mounds in a group. In such cases, it is always to be remarked that one of the group is much the largest, twice or three times the dimensions of any of the others; and that the smaller ones, of various sizes, are arranged around its base, generally joining it, thus evincing a designed dependence and intimate relation between them.”

The largest of the Piketon mounds is about 25’ high; the 3 smaller mounds vary between 5’ and 10’ high. In one of the small mounds the skeleton of a girl wrapped in bark was found.

This mound group lay near one of the most magnificent of known graded ways. The way passed in a generally north-south direction from the 3rd. terrace to the second terrace of the scioto river, now 17’ below. The way was 1,080’ long and over 200’ wide. (in the 19th century the Chillicothe and Portsmouth turnpike passed through the bordering embarkments.) At places the dirt thrown up to level the massage formed an embankment 22’ above the grade surface. The Eastern wall, now obliterated by cultivation, extended southward another 2,580’ toward the cemetery mounds. Most of this impressive earthwork has been destroyed by modern highway construction and the extraction of under laying gravel.

Directions: Follow U.S. 23 S from Piketon, exit onto Ohio Route 124, go E .4 miles, crossing Beaver Creek, then N at tavern for .4 miles to Mound Cemetery on E side of road.

Public use: Open year round during daylight hours.
For additional information: contact: Town of Piketon, Piketon, Oh 45661, 614-289-2581

Map shown below:



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