Granville, Ohio -- On the basis of science, folklore and admitted speculation, archaeologist Brad Lepper thinks that a spirit panther watches over this tranquil Licking County village.
Lepper, who works for the Ohio Historical Society, arrived at this conclusion after probing the armpit of the Alligator Mound two years ago in an attempt to determine its age.
The 210-foot-long effigy mound crouches on a bluff overlooking Raccoon Creek Valley. Stomped and battered for two centuries by livestock, farmers and quarriers, the mound has been under the protective wing of the Licking County Historical Society since 1991.
It's been known as the Alligator Mound since the earliest days of European settlement, but it seems unlikely that Great Lakes' natives were thinking of tropical reptiles when they constructed the mound about 800 years ago.
Lepper's theory, which he'll outline for a Society for American Archaeology meeting in April, is that Europeans misunderstood when they quizzed resident American Indians about the earthwork.
"My suspicion,'' he said last week, "is that the earliest white settlers or traders or trappers saw the mound and asked the Indians, 'What's that?'
"The Indians may have responded, 'Oh, that's the underwater panther,' but the whites wouldn't have known what they were talking about since any panthers they knew about didn't live in the water.
"So the Indians may have explained it's the monster which lives in the water and eats people. And the whites, based on their experience, would have said, 'Oh, you mean an alligator!' ''
The alligator name has stuck for 200 years, although the mound has also been declared to be the image of a salamander, an opossum, a squirrel, a monkey or a panther.
"I'm not claiming to know the truth with a capital T, but now I think I've got evidence this is an underwater panther,'' Lepper said.
In many American-Indian religions, an underwater panther is a mythic creature from the underworld that prowls earthly waters.
Some traditions viewed these aquatic panthers and other big water cats as helpful, protective creatures. But more often they were seen as malevolent spirits, demon beasts that brought death and misfortune.
"This was a creature of enormous power, and there were shrines where shamans could go to call up the power of these animals,'' Lepper said.
Charcoal bits excavated during a dig into the mound in August 1999 yielded a construction date of about 1200, making it a contemporary of the Serpent Mound in Adams County, Ohio's only other confirmed effigy mound.
Both mounds were built on high bluffs by the so-called Fort Ancient people, who occupied central and southern Ohio from 1000 to 1500.
"In Ohio, if you look at historic Native-American religion and folk tales, there are two main creatures of the underworld: the serpent and the underwater panther,'' Lepper said.
In addition, he said, the mound looks like a panther, with its round head and broad, curling tail.
Underwater panthers were part of the religious tradition of many native groups across the Northeast and Midwest, said Bill Fox, a Parks Canada manager who has studied archaeological evidence across the Great Lakes region.
"It was like all spirits, possessing great power for good or bad,'' Fox said. "It was demonized by the missionaries because it was an underworld figure, but my perspective was that the native view was a little more neutral.''
It was particularly associated with Great Lakes' cultures.
A prehistoric traveler would commonly make an animal sacrifice to the underwater panther before he journeyed out onto the lakes, Fox said.
A panther mound, however, would be extremely rare, Fox said. Underworld figures such as the thunderbird and the serpent were much more common.
Lepper said he won't get much reaction to his proposal until it's published next month in Timeline, the Ohio Historical Society magazine, and at the archaeological society meeting in New Orleans.
But Paul Hooge, former director of the Licking County Archaeological and Landmarks Society, said Lepper's underwater panther is only "a possible interpretation'' of the effigy.
"We still don't know who these Native Americans were or what their beliefs were,'' said Hooge, who moved to Colorado in 1994 but continues to study Midwest archaeological sites.
If there's any consensus, Hooge said, it's that the Alligator Mound does not depict an alligator.
Still, neither Hooge nor Lepper would change the name at this point. It would be too confusing, even if there was hard evidence about its origins, which there is not, they said.
New Interpretation Of Ancient American Earth Mound
[Original headline: Man pounces on panther theory about mound]
An archaeologist says he thinks that the shape of Alligator Mound is an aquatic, cat-like creature
The Columbus Dispatch / OH - By David Lore - January 21 2001
