Bear Rock (NJ)

by Ray Whritenour – Oct. 17 2011

(A reworking of an old talk I (Ray Whritenour )gave at the North Jersey Highlands Historical Society's annual conference, October, 1995.)

“The uses of Bear Rock and the reverent regard in which it must have been held are confirmed by the evidence of archaeology and ethnology…its form suggests a huge lumbering quadruped when viewed from the south, and a great perched raptor with wings outspread, or a giant tortoise head, when viewed from the north.”

THE CULTURAL SIGNIFICANCE OF BEAR ROCK AND ITS ENVIRONS

     "Bear Rock stands at the heart of the Pyramid Mountain Natural and Historic Area (part of the Morris County, New Jersey park system), serving, today, as a boundary stone separating the municipalities of Kinnelon and Montville. It is an enormous glacial erratic deposited in the intervale between Mine Ridge and Pyramid Mountain during the last ice age. It forms a double rockshelter by virtue of a deep niche in its eastern side and an upward sloping overhang on the western side—the latter formed when a huge slab of the rock split off and fell to the ground, providing a bulwark for the western shelter./1/ Here, on an ancient trail /2/ between the Rockaway and Pequannock river systems, Bear Rock was employed as a hunting lodge by the Indians of northern New Jersey for thousands of years./3/ Just fifteen minutes away, on foot, atop Pyramid Mountain, is an unusual rock formation known, locally, as Tripod Rock. It consists of a huge boulder held aloft by a stand of three smaller stones. This, too, is a glacial formation./4/

Bear Rock in the valley, Tripod Rock on the mountain--the former well-known, the latter obscure--each possessed more than practical significance for the indigenous people of New Jersey--those who held this land the longest. To understand that significance, in the absence of documentary records, we must turn to a discussion of stone as a manifestation of spiritual power among the Lenape, and try to see these monoliths and their surroundings through Lenape eyes…

…Lenapes perceived the spiritual power inherent in stone and bestowed the honorific title, "Our Grandfather," on some rocks./6/ Among them, as among other Algonquian peoples, certain peculiar rocks and boulders were recognized as the haunts or habitations--or even the embodiments—of powerful spirits. Brian Leigh Molyneaux has written:

"The Ojibwa of the Upper Great Lakes regarded unusual rocks and other atypical features of the landscape as the dwelling places of spirits."/7/

And, in his study of Lenape religion, Mark R. Harrington wrote:

"Certain localities, it is said, were thought to be the dwellings of local genii, to whom offerings were occasionally made, especially such places as displayed curious or unusual natural features, while even certain stones were said to have an animate principle or indwelling spirit."/8/

The idea that a particular rock or stone regarded as sacred achieved that status because of its association with supernatural beings—and that that association was suggested by features the rock or stone exhibited--was a concept deeply ingrained in the Lenape religious attitude. One need only consider the various "Spook Rocks," "Standing Stones," "Indian Heads," and so on, that dot the landscape of the old Lenape homeland and other areas of the Northeast, to see how pervasive this idea was./9/

Contemplation of the stony contours of certain rocks may reveal the likeness of a figure or face. Lenape belief dictates a taboo against looking too long at such features, for they may begin to talk, and that may be for evil./10/ On the other hand, those seeking a vision may receive what they desire from the spirits animating these forms./11/

Remember the famous Delaware story, wherein seven prophets transform themselves into seven stones. Some "pure youths" discovered them on a mountain ridge "among rocky cliffs" and gained access to their wisdom. However, this allowed others (presumably unqualified to receive visions) to find their hiding-place, whereupon the stones changed, first into evergreens, then into stars, in order to escape these other folks./12/

It was also "among the rocks on a hill" where the Lenape first encountered that powerful "Mask-Spirit," Mizinkhoalikun, who told them how to obtain his power, which included the ability to cure diseases./13/ Mizinkhoalikun means "living solid face"/14/--strongly suggesting its prototype was one of these stone countenances…

The uses of Bear Rock and the reverent regard in which it must have been held are confirmed by the evidence of archaeology and ethnology. Tripod Rock is a nearly unique formation in the land of the Lenape. It surely exhibits all the characteristics which mark a sacred stone. It is nothing, if not "atypical," "curious," and "unusual;" its form suggests a huge lumbering quadruped when viewed from the south, and a great perched raptor with wings outspread, or a giant tortoise head, when viewed from the north..."

    Note: The photos come from friendof theforest who comments on Jan. 25, 1012:

"I know this orginal post is quite old by now but I enjoyed reading it so much that I figured I would take some pictures of Bear Rock specifically to share with the community here.  These were taken about a month ago and sadly its taken me this long to post them online.  The area is a favorite of mine, however on most nice days there are too many people traversing the trails looking for fairies or portals to other worlds at tri-pod rock,  right up the hill from bear rock.  Most of the hikers pass by Bear rock and just marvel at its size and continue on to tri-pod rock which is the more well known attraction these days.   If you have the chance to get out to the site and see it for yourself, climb on the rock and note the ampi-theatre affect the surrounding hills have on the site.   You can make animals noises and scare all the new agers up at tri-pod rock, haha...not saying I do this ever.   The dogs in the shot are mine and are there for perspectives sake.  The larger tan colored one is a 110lb cane corso.  The last picture is of the "fire remnants on the underside of the larger shelter, the ground is also still quite black from fires throughout the ages."  

http://woodlandindians.org/forums/viewtopic.php?id=9273

Wetness of Wetlands Disputed (Yet a little more about the 7 Stone Heaps)

I read about the proposed land use of the section of land mentioned in my recent posts

"7 Rock Piles"

{http://rockpiles.blogspot.com/2014/01/7-rock-piles.html}

"More on the 7 Stone Heaps" 

{ http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2014/01/i-just-noticed-this-sign-other-day-as.html } 

 and "Bear With Me"

{http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2014/01/bear-with-me.html}

I wrote that "I walked up from some trails and rocky wetlands and first saw the stone row" and also wanted to add a photo of  a spot where water was actively coming out of the ground that day, where some dead fall branches cover stones that may possibly be a stone worked spring:

I wonder at the accuracy of the newspaper's map. I'm not a surveyor (or a surveyor's son), but that wedge of green that represents Ashford Woods subdivision looks smaller than 9 acres to me. I sincerely hope the 7 Stone Mounds and the remnants of the enclosing stone row won't be impacted. There's really no way to know that these stone mounds are not Native American graves.

The mounds aren't on state land but could possibly be deemed a Sacred Site by the Native American Heritage Advisory Council so it's worth citing a Connecticut Law here:

Sec. 10-390. Penalty. (a) No person shall excavate, damage or otherwise alter or deface any archaeological or sacred site on state lands or within a state archaeological preserve unless such activity is in accordance with the terms and conditions of a permit issued under section 10-386 or in the case of an emergency.

(b) No person shall sell, exchange, transport, receive or offer to sell, any archaeological artifact or human remains collected, excavated or otherwise removed from state lands or a state archaeological preserve in violation of subsection (a) of this section.

(c) No person shall engage in any activity that will desecrate, disturb or alter any Native American burial, sacred site or cemetery, including any associated objects, unless the activity is engaged in pursuant to a permit issued under section 10-386 or under the direction of the State Archaeologist.

(d) Any person who violates any provision of this section shall be fined not more than five thousand dollars or twice the value of the site or artifact that was the subject of the violation, whichever is greater, and imprisoned not more than five years or both.

(e) Any person who violates any provision of this section shall be liable to the state for the reasonable costs and expenses of the state in restoring the site and any associated sacred objects or archaeological artifacts.

(P.A. 89-368, S. 12.)

Sec. 10-391. Inventory of Native American burial sites and cemeteries. On or before January 1, 1991, the Department of Economic and Community Development, in consultation with the State Archaeologist, the Native American Heritage Advisory Council established under section 10-382 and the Commissioner of Energy and Environmental Protection, shall develop procedures to inventory Native American burial sites and cemeteries. Such procedures shall provide for the availability of the inventory to state agencies, departments and institutions.

http://www.cga.ct.gov/2013/pub/chap_184a.htm#sec_10-390

Here's the article:

More on the 7 Stone Heaps

      I just noticed this sign the other day as I was on the way to the place I work. It’s on the edge of what I think of as my old neighborhood. It’s the borderline of my hometown Watertown, just about on the town line of Waterbury CT. I did time as a paper boy, walking up to this section of Bunker Hill where my route ended just past this spot. I remember thinking, as I passed by the other day, that I’d never spent any time as a young kid exploring this little bit of woodland in the 1960’s, since it was claimed by another bunch of kids who were prone to throwing apples at you when apples were in season and then throwing rocks at you when they weren’t.

(Re-reading the above, I realize that an important point is that the drive takes me from one Indigenous Village site to another. I’m travelling from the historically known Nonnewaug Wigwams, which in the big scheme of things is relatively minimally developed, and Mattatuck, an abandoned pre-contact Village. I leave my home on Nonnewaug Road, a former Indian Trail still bounded by remnants of stone rows, travel briefly on Bethlehem Road where the stones have almost entirely disappeared, and then along the Quassapaug Road, another former Trail that still has remnants of zigzags on either side of it too. I turn onto Bunker Hill Road, still with a little bit of remaining zigzags bordering it for just a brief while. I’m old enough that I can remember some of the stone “walls” that have now disappeared, sometimes gratified that I can back that up sometimes with 1965 aerial photos from http://www.cslib.org/aerials/ - and see what existed back in 1934.)

Looking East on a Bing Bird’s Eye View below is halfway decent capture of the little remnant site that I wandered into after spotting it on Bing, just before I wandered in:

(Above West at top, below East at top)

(Take a look for yourself here: http://binged.it/1akeuRl - and if you zoom out, to the west you’ll find another little remnant site I posted about here: http://rockpiles.blogspot.com/2010/11/volvo-car-lot-edge.html where a stained stone on a mound caught Peter’s attention: http://rockpiles.blogspot.com/2010/11/rockpile-on-hamburger-edge-of-hometown.html and http://rockpiles.blogspot.com/2010/11/quartz-stone.html )

    I enhanced the rather linear yet curved stacked stone row remnant in black lines. Those wavy lines are possibly an old farm construction over a water feature, and the biggest circles are approximate locations of two large piles of stones, the smaller are smaller heaps that lead back to the stone row (there are actually five I took photos of, not four).

I walked up from some trails and rocky wetlands and first saw the stone row (looking West):

(Looking North toward the curve, about where the mounds line up on the stone row:)

Looking NNW above, WSW below...

I didn’t get too close to the first mound pictured, but I took a closer look at the second mound. Quartz was present, and possibly there was some sort of careful stacking going on, some kind of structure and/or form, but it was just too leaf covered to tell…

There were five small piles in a row leading east from this mound:

This third mound was the most interesting, a diamond or rhomboid shape perhaps, an eastern sort of branch extending toward the stone row, although that north segment pointed to another portion of row that twisted off westerly and up a small rise in elevation…

Another shot of that middle one, facing south more or less:

Note the rhomboid on the right (above) and the smaller piles (below), debris covered, heading to the stone row:

Looking back toward the mound, almost visible through the trees:

Before these mounds actually came into focus, the first feature of or in the stone row that caught my attention - and that I keep coming back to as I ponder the stone row is this one spot:

It looks a little fallen apart and I'll probably brush some leaves out of the way next time, but there's a couple stones that look "book matched:"

 I wondered for a while if this could be two "faces" or something until I thought about that foot or foreleg of that Diamondback Terrapin on that stone row down in Madison CT:

A couple more details:

I can't help but think "Testudinate:"

Maybe that's a little bear: 

Yesterday's: http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2014/01/bear-with-me.html has this photo of a possible bear in a stone row at the corner of my yard that I immediately thought of:

There's quite a bit of quartzite:

One even sort of propped up in the stone row:

Bear with Me

Above is a detail of a stone row remnant in Waterbury CT;

below is a detail from a stone row in Woodbury CT.

One Bears (pun intended) some resemblance to the other...

Pretending It's the First Day of the New Year...

I thought I might just do one of those "Highlights of 2013:

      My Find of the Year was yet another testudinate "species specific" stone representation/petroform, of a Diamondback Terrapin incorporated into a very beautifully stacked stone row (a very long linear segment of an Indigenous Stone Pile?) at the top of a small hill above a salt marsh in Madison CT, just where you might indeed actually find Malaclemys terrapin.  
{ http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2013/08/species-specific-diamondback-terrapin.html}

     
You could just call it a Terrapin, since according to Wikipedia: The name "terrapin" is derived from the (Virginia) Algonquian word torope...The name originally was used by early European settlers in North America to describe these brackish-water turtles that inhabited neither freshwater habitats nor the sea." Both Mr. Merriam and Mr. Webster agree that it is an "alteration of earlier torope, from Virginia Algonquian*to·rəpe·w. They also believe the word's First Known Use was in 1613 - but not in Madison since you had to wait for War of 1635 to open up the area to European acquisition.
       The good part it that the Diamondback is in Hammonasset State Park. The bad part is a trail that's planned to stretch to East Haven, on the edge of the former Indian Path Along the Shoreline that is being constructed by robbing the ancient stonework that connected to and perhaps bordered the Path. 
I tell that story here:

 http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2013/08/shoreline-greenway-trail-madison-ct.html

       As well as here, finding perhaps a baby Diamondback Terrapin - or at least another "single stone" rock art turtle, a cobble placed on a "Stones on Boulder" sort of Stone Concentration or Stacked Stone Feature or *(edited on 7/23/2022)* a Káhtôquwuk or Stone Prayer, “invested with prayers for the balance of the universe,” something that is heaped high, ceremonially, religiously, by placing one stone above another stone:

http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2013/08/sgt-part-2.html

And I even continue to drone on: http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2013/08/shoreline-greenway-trail-part-3.html including a photo of this that I always meant to call to to the attention of Mr. badbadpotato - a variation of a table or shelf sort of thing, perhaps:

And my friend DC hooked me up with some Google Images on a post called:

Thanks DC!

http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2013/08/thanks-dc.html

There's the new construction looking so bright above, the far more ancient stones hiding under a cover of green, waiting for the LiDAR to show what's left of the fuel breaks of the Indigenous Sacred Landscape Before 1635, when the People cared for the land with prayer and sacred fires in Ceremonies that are long forgotten - but probably very similar to others that are known in other places - just like other stonework in other places... 

I continue on here, seeing either some (eroded with time) human enhancement or just another example of myself exhibiting and recording some delusional pareidolia:

http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2013/08/shoreline-greenway-trail-4.html

Just when you think you can't take any more, I begin to correct myself as visit the spot for the third time, which  "involved taking the "Bob Cat Trail," the trail left by that little machine that I was pretty certain was borrowing stones from somewhere..."

The Aerial Photo of 1934:

In the comments Someone asked: Could this be an ancient fish trap?

I meant to reply: "I can answer that very quickly: I don't know."

http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2013/08/reminds-me-of-stone-rows.html

I don't know when I'll get to the next segment of the trail to look more closely - whether I'll have the chance to take some photos of what still exists or just witness it's silent departure.

If you get there first, take some photos before more disappears.

The other highlight was the inclusion of a photo of mine in a book on the Connecticut's Indigenous Peoples by Dr. Lucianne Lavin, who actually labelled it as "turtle-shaped."

     

The above makes me feel some degree of validation - and I don't want to forget a little more, another highlight, the number of sites I've documented that Curtis Hoffman includes on this map of "stone constructions in the eastern seaboard:"