The Turtle Mound Largest Shell Midden in the USA Near New Smyrna Beach in Florida Marks Delta Piscium and the Mount Royal Temple Mound Near Welaka Marks Xi Piscium: Map of Florida Mounds of the Lower Fish of Pisces

Our decipherment image at the end of this posting shows the Florida mound sites that mark the lower fish of Pisces, into which have now also integrated our new decipherments of the Turtle Mound and of the Mount Royal Mound and neighboring mound sites.

The decipherment image for Mount Royal will be presented first.

Mount Royal is a "famous site". See Famous Florida Sites: Mt. Royal and Crystal River, Southeastern Classics in Archaeology, Anthropology, and History, 1999, by Jerald T. Milanich (Editor), where he discusses the work of Clarence B. Moore. See also Jerald T. Milanich and Early archaeology in Florida).

The large temple mound at Mount Royal is located near Welaka, Florida on the St. Johns River just north of Lake George. In our decipherment image below, it marks Xi Piscium.

As noted at the Wikipedia for Mount Royal:

"Mount Royal (8PU35) is a U.S. archaeological site of a Timucua Indian village, perhaps the town of Enacape, an important center of the Utina tribe. It is located three miles (5 km) south of Welaka, Florida, in the Mount Royal Airpark, off County Road 309 on the eastern bank of the St. Johns River. On May 7, 1973, it was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places."

William N. Morgan, Precolumbian Architecture in Eastern North America, Ripley P. Bullen Series, Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida Press, Gainesville, FL, 1999, http://www.upf.com/ has a site image of Mount Royal but shows only one mound, from which we could draw no probative conclusions, although we of course knew the general location of the stars sought because of the previous decipherment of neighboring mound sites.

What proved extremely useful to us is the Archaeological Overview of Mt. Royal by Keith H. Ashley which can be downloaded at http://www.unf.edu/~kashley/Other Files/2005-MtRoyal.pdf.

That source provides a map of Mt. Royal and neighboring mound sites at Figure 7, page 280, and that map was essential to locate Mount Royal in the stars. We have redrawn it in the decipherment below. Click on the image for a larger version.

The Decipherment of the Mount Royal Mound as Xi Piscium

As can be seen above, the Mount Royal Mound marked the bright star Xi Piscium, very likely in the era when it marked the Celestial Meridian of the Vernal Equinox in ca. 240 B.C.

We have also identified the Davenport Mound 8PU50 as the star HIP8998, The Murphy Island Mounds 8PU20 and 8PU21 as marking the stars Alpha Piscium and HIP8576 and the Dunn Creek Mound 8PU14 as marking the star 112 Piscium. When set to a star magnitude limit of 6.90 the only stars shown in this area of the sky by Starry Night Pro are those in the image above.

Proving the stellar identity of the Turtle Mound is a bit more circumstantial.

As written at the Wikipedia under Turtle Mound:

"Turtle Mound is a prehistoric archaeological site located 9 miles (14 km) south of New Smyrna Beach, Florida, on State Road A1A. On September 29, 1970, it was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places.

It is the largest shell midden on the mainland United States, with an approximate height of 50 feet (15 m).... The turtle-shaped mound contains oysters and refuse from the prehistoric Timucuan people. 

Today, the site is owned and managed by the National Park Service as part of Canaveral National Seashore.

Visible seven miles out at sea, early sailors used Turtle Mound as a navigational device."

By our analysis, the Turtle Mound south of New Smyrna Beach in Florida marks Delta Piscium and the stars to its back, including 62, 60 and 96 Piscium. The Turtle Mound has the shape of a turtle and, as marked in the decipherment image below, a turtle shape could have been seen by ancients in those stars.

Delta Piscium is significant as marking the middle of the lower fish of Pisces.

Our decipherment image for the Turtle Mound shows the position of the mound in the context of the other Florida sites marking the lower fish of Pisces. Click on the image to obtain a larger version.

The Stars of the Turtle Mound and of Mount Royal in the Context

of Other Sites in Florida as Marking Stars of Pisces

What we know now from these decipherments of the mounds of Florida as marking the stars of Cetus and Pisces, is that when Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León "named" the land Pascua Florida, this may have had nothing to do with Easter, as some have thought, but may have meant "Pisces" Florida, the land of fish and flowers, perhaps even reflecting a native knowledge among the inhabitants that Florida's location marked the stars of Cetus and Pisces in the Native America land survey by astronomy.

THIS POSTING IS Posting Number 79 of
The Great Mound, Petroglyph and Painted Rock Art Journey of Native America

The Turtle Mound Largest Shell Midden in the USA Near New Smyrna Beach in Florida Marks Delta Piscium and the Mount Royal Temple Mound Near Welaka Marks Xi Piscium: Map of Florida Mounds of the Lower Fish of Pisces