Central Ohio was just the epicentre. Sites with earthworks based on this new, Hopewellian geometrical system can be found dotted along the upper and lower reaches of the Mississippi valley. Some are the size of small towns. They might, and often did, contain meeting houses, craft workshops and charnel houses for the processing of human remains, along with crypts for the dead. A few might have had resident caretakers, though this isn’t entirely clear. What is clear is that for most of the year these sites remained largely or completely empty. Only on specific ritual occasions did they come to
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