Essay - Ceremonial Stone Landscapes by Dr. Eric Johnson

Ceremonial Stone Landscapes (CSLs) are defined as locations of Native American ceremonial activity characterized by stone features that were assembled or altered by humans—including cairns, effigies, split or propped boulders, rock shelters, etc.—and may incorporate “natural” landscape features—including hilltops, outcrops, boulders, or glacial erratics—that are significant to Indigenous cosmology, spirituality, or ceremony (Moore and Weiss 2016). CSLs’ significance to Indigenous archaeology in Eastern North America is not well understood. This is partly due to a longheld misconception that Northeastern Indigenous peoples did not use stone in such a way.

It’s true that there isn’t much evidence of Native Americans using stone for domestic architecture or property boundaries, conventions introduced to the region by Europeans. But it seems strange to assume Native people did not use or manipulate stone for other purposes, particularly in the rocky landscapes of Eastern North America.

We know that for thousands of years, Native Americans west of Appalachia were constructing monumental earthen mounds, animal effigies, or celestially aligned wooden structures with ceremonial and cosmological purposes. Consider places like Cahokia or the Great Serpent Mound. These earthen constructions were first built over 2,000 years ago and were venerated and renovated for centuries after. Why not use stone for similar purposes in regions with less soil to spare? Or look east across the Atlantic and around the globe, where humans have constructed elaborate complexes of stone—from Stonehenge in southern England to Göbekli Tepe in Turkey—aligned with celestial events and imbued with ceremonial significance. Consider mentions in historic documents of Native veneration of stone piles in the region. A 1684 land patent in the lower Hudson Valley area notes “…heaps of stones upon which the Indians throw upon another as they pass by from an ancient custom amongst them” (Robert Livingston Patent, Gilder Lehrman Institute). In my opinion, the question isn’t “why would Native people use stone for ceremonial purposes,” but rather “why not?”

The notion that stone piles are “invariably” anything, let alone non-Indigenous, is flatly untrue (Moore and Weiss 2016). Other SHPOs are less explicit, but a general policy of assuming stone piles are of Euro-American origin has the effect of leaving countless numbers of CSLs unprotected in the path of development. Native nations, such as the Narragansett, the Ramapough, and others, have been on the frontlines of defense. In New Jersey, those CSLs that are still standing are typically located in pockets of undeveloped land in the densely settled hinterland of New York City. As such, they’re often at risk of destruction.

Led by Michaeline Picaro, the work of documenting ceremonial stone landscapes in ancestral Munsee Lenape territory has just begun. In October of 2021, I helped lead a small pilot survey in Sussex County. I found myself a part of a larger community of other CSL defenders from across the region. It is a project of justice – righting past mistakes and historic harms. Yet in hiking the forested ridgetops while scouting for stone, I felt this sense of community extend to the flora, fauna, soil, water, and air where we spent our time. In this way, the work is also an act of care. Caring for these stones means caring for everything they are connected to, human and non-human alike. For all my backward-looking as an archaeologist, I am reminded that preservation is always about the future. The only question is what kind of future it will be.