The Native American Mound Builders

19th century academics theorised that the Native Americans were too primitive to be associated with the mounds, instead, implying that they belonged to a lost culture that disappeared before the arrival of Columbus in 1492.

One of the earliest theories suggested that the mound builders were Norse in origin, who settled in the Americas and migrated south to become the Toltecs in Tula, Mexico. Later theories have connected them with descendants of the Israelites, the Ancient Egyptians, Welsh, Irish, Polynesians, Greeks, Chinese, Phoenicians, and even crossing into the realm of pseudo-science by implying an association with the lost continent of Atlantis.

Cahokia - Copyright: Alamy