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John Rowzée Peyton and the Myth of the Mound Builders

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Donald J. Blakeslee
Donald J. Blakeslee*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, The Wichita State University, Wichita, KS 67208
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Abstract

Some of the first recorded archaeology done in North America was accomplished by John Rowzéé Peyton in 1774. With two companions, Peyton escaped from jail in Santa Fe. Using a compass and a copy of the Delisle map of 1703, he made his way to an Osage camp on the Missouri River and thence to St. Louis. En route, he stopped to excavate in a burial mound. His interpretation of the mounds he saw is one of the first recorded instances of the Mound Builder myth. There is reason to suspect that Peyton may have been responsible for the origin of the myth, as an oral tradition among the educated elite of the American colonies.

Type
Reports
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 52 , Issue 4 , October 1987 , pp. 784 - 792
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1987

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