Hopeton Works photograph

Photograph showing mounds and features of the Hopeton Earthworks. The Hopeton Earthworks are located in northern Springfield Township in Ross County, Ohio, in an area north of Chillicothe historically referred to as Hopetown. The earthworks were constructed by people of the Hopewell Culture (100 BC-AD 400) and sit on the east bank of the Scioto River opposite Mound City. The complex consists of a 20-acre circular embankment that intrudes into a slightly rounded square enclosure of equal area. When first surveyed in the 1840s there were also two smaller circular earthworks on the eastern flank of the square, and a set of parallel walls extending southwest toward Mound City that measured just under a half-mile in length. A commercial graveling operation later obliterated most of the parallel walls as well as several nearby habitation areas, and years of farming have greatly reduced the relief of both the square and circle. The National Park Service gained control of the site in the 1990s and included it as a component of the newly-created Hopewell Culture National Historic Park. Recent research indicates that the walls of the circle were erected over a series of large wooden posts, perhaps for the entire circumference. Referred to as a wood henge, it was detected using sophisticated remote sensing instruments. Surveys indicate that henges are fairly common at earthwork sites but none on such a grand scale. Hopeton Earthworks is one of seven Ohio Hopewell Ceremonial Earthwork sites presently under consideration by the United States Department of the Interior for nomination as a UNESCO World Heritage Site