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Source:Times and Seasons:1 Jan 1842:Near Newark in the county of Licking, Ohio, is situated one of the immense works or fortifications of the ancient nations of America
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Times and Seasons (1 Jan 1842): "Near Newark in the county of Licking, Ohio, is situated one of the immense works or fortifications of the ancient nations of America"
I will next introduce the description of some of these ancient fortifications and military works of defence, as recorded in the American Antiquities, by Josiah Priest, and also introduce a history of the building of these fortifications and works of defence, as recorded in the Book of Mormon; and I will here remark, that the Book of Mormon was published in A.D. 1830, and the American Antiquities, by Josiah Priest, was not published until A.D. 1833, three years after. Antiquities, page 158 and 159, “Near Newark in the county of Licking, Ohio, is situated one of the immense works or fortifications of the ancient nations of America. It embraces in the whole, a circumferance of about six hundred rods, or nearly two miles; a wall of earth about four hundred rods, is raised on the sides of this fort next to the small creek which comes down along its sides from the west and east. It would seem that the people who made this settlement, undertook to encompass, with a wall, as much land as would support its inhabitants, and also sufficient to build their dwellings on, with several fortifications arranged in a proper manner for its defence. There are within its ranges four of these forts, of different dimensions; one contains forty acres, with a wall of about ten feet high; another containing twenty-two acres, also walled, but in this fort is an elevated observatory, of sufficient height to overlook the whole country; a third fort, containing about twenty-six acres, having a wall around it thrown out of a deep ditch on the inside of the wall. This wall is now from twenty-five to thirty feet in height. A fourth fortification encloses twenty acres with a wall of about ten feet high.”[1]
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