Old Hand Dug Holes Found And What Took Me There

There's so much to learn about the secret's of those that carved the profiles / symbols and I believe that every site ( League Square ) will have its own profile, rabbit / fish and soforth, other's are if its a triangle / square / rectangle and there may be others, I also believe that the internal carvings ( yard ) may have the same pace, 33 inches per vara thru out, the square league seems to have a different vara as reference and I believe they are common, The Kings Trail may have something different for a vara and I believe they are common, the thought that seems to bother me is that a Fish in a Square league used for possible settler's may have a different meaning along a desert trail, I believe it would be foolish for ME to believe that a fish beside a River would have the same meaning as one on top of a mountain or inside a square league
 

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Well here goes another thought that has me wondering, It is my belief that the Square League that may have been for the settlers from Spain, they all seem to have things that's common to all that I have seen, they all seem to be in either a Triangle, Square, Rectangle, they seem to all have used a 33 inch pace, used a Cordel for measurements Plus and Or Minus, 1 and a half / 1/2 or 95 feet and sorforth, They will turn the the map pattern and all may have the cache at the North corner of the map, It seems that they may have used the Triangle as 1/2 of a gate hinge, has the shape of a V when folded and the shape of a diamond when its in use, a door hinge type when its a square or a rectangle. IT SEEMS that the number of drill holes associated with a burial location also ( and I will try to explain the best I can ) you find the MAP on the East side of the yard, it may have 0 drill holes and I have seen as many as 6 which I believe is the number of times you flop the actual Cache site when you find it, on a triangle it will be the East side of the site and will be used in a manner that the 2 south symbols will take you out and away from the site. Time is up more later
 

Well my thought's are on maps today, those that are carved on boulders of various sizes ? some have marble size holes, some have kitchen match size ( 1 mm ) I have some Thom has some, Lost Horse has a wonderful example and I believe there's others also, the distance between holes should = distance, even tho the distance between the holes may vary with the with the distance to the next marker it is my belief that the map thats carved on a 6 ft high or long boulder would indicate the distance may be in leagues, one thats on a waist high boulder may have a distance of 1/2 league, one thats carved on a knee high boulder may indicate a cordel or a pace, I REALLY BELIEVE the heigth of what you find the symhol carved on tells only part of the story. I guess Rattle Snake Hill is gone he said as he sticks his bottom lip out
 

Would it help anyone to go thru the method that I used to work the square league that seem to go from coast to coast. GOOD to hear from you Kim / Losthorse, and others
 

I can't find the lazy 8 that's been posted before, I'm sure I seen it somewhere and I have a thought to share if someone will re-post for me
 

dsty said:
Thank You Lost Horse for allowing me to post and write all over it, your post off your site, your Idea that it is a sluice box used to collect gold is very likely but I wonder if its a map showing a Royal Trail also, with monuments ( symbols ) that spur off to the sides,a symbol showing upstream and turn right / left to the Mines or Caches, the dots follow the trail up stream, the turtle head is going down stream which to follow it to mines or caches would be to travel up stream, it would be interesting to see if it has a tail, although it does have a body, ( indicating travel both ways ), anyway my thoughts are that its possibly both, this is a sluice box and a map . Thanks Lost Horse for allowing me share my thoughts
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I'm trying to get this interesting post to come back to the top. I do bnelieve that's it important . Don't know how to bring the photo back to the top butt its on page 4-- I believe it to be a REALLY ROYAL TRAIL and several others with a spur off of it, the distance from start to finish may be 100 plus miles, since the first photo looked to be 6 ft long I assume that the distance was measured in leagues and indicates mines
 

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dsty said:
Thank You Lost Horse for allowing me to post and write all over it, your post off your site, your Idea that it is a sluice box used to collect gold is very likely but I wonder if its a map showing a Royal Trail also, with monuments ( symbols ) that spur off to the sides,a symbol showing upstream and turn right / left to the Mines or Caches, the dots follow the trail up stream, the turtle head is going down stream which to follow it to mines or caches would be to travel up stream, it would be interesting to see if it has a tail, although it does have a body, ( indicating travel both ways ), anyway my thoughts are that its possibly both, this is a sluice box and a map . Thanks Lost Horse for allowing me share my thoughts
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This one?
-Mike
 

Thank's Weekender and Mike, My thought's are that this a ROYAL TRAIL ( green ) with Royal Trails going off this to mines ( red ) may not have done enough marking on this I'm pretty sure it was a turtle but may have an egg, in the bed of a creek, anyway it belongs to Lost Horse and its a wonderful example of their work. She really gets around, may have a jumpin mule and a burro. I would'nt try to scare her in the woods unless I was behind something really big and bullet proof
 

dsty said:
Thank's Weekender and Mike, My thought's are that this a ROYAL TRAIL ( green ) with Royal Trails going off this to mines ( red ) may not have done enough marking on this I'm pretty sure it was a turtle but may have an egg, in the bed of a creek, anyway it belongs to Lost Horse and its a wonderful example of their work. She really gets around, may have a jumpin mule and a burro. I would'nt try to scare her in the woods unless I was behind something really big and bullet proof
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LMAO.........yep, she sure comes across as city wise and country capable. :occasion14: And you're probably right about that "not scaring her in the woods." :laughing7:
 

Bill, what do you think about the theory of different measurements for the pace, from 28 inches to 36 inches, the square league that they may have set aside for the settlers that they may have fixed up with a cache site at each one and the placement of Churches every 25 miles ( 10 leagues ) apart, each site seems to be numbered for some reason / purpose, lots of work went into all of this, trails, roads with monuments at each corner.
 

dsty:
The varying distances for the "pace" is a puzzle to me. Especially when they must be different, due to the different types of terrain involved......flat land to rough mountain trails. I wonder if a long piece of rope or rawhide with equally spaced knots could have been used to drag over a trail like today's land surveyors "drag" surveyor's chains while measuring distances for topographic surveys. The space between the knots could have been equal to a pace, whose value was determined by the trail maker. Maybe the distance between those knots was coded and left in the midst of other codes and symbols at the trail heads and forks and intersections of several trails. Hey, maybe the measurements between the knots was coded by some of the straight lines and distance symbols like the snake figures that are found on many trails. The value number could be taken as the number of leagues to travel as well as the measurement value between the knots. I just thought of that. Makes me kind of wonder now.

The 25 mile distance between churches reminds me of the distances between "stands" on the Natchez Trace. A "stand" was the term given to stopover points that usually consisted of a one or two room cabin or shanty set up by people to sell food and drink to travelers on the Trace. The "stands" were spaced at about a day's travel distance apart and were also the places many travelers would spend the night........and sometimes get mugged or killed for their valuables. There are probably an unknown number of small caches along the Trace left by murdered travelers who hid their goodies before bedding down and subsequently being killed. If there were not enough preachers / priets around to "man" all those churches......the 25 mile distances could have been something a traveling preacher / priest could handle when making the "rounds" to preach to their "flocks".
 

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Shortstack said:
The 25 mile distance between churches reminds me of the distances between "stands" on the Natchez Trace. A "stand" was the term given to stopover points that usually consisted of a one or two room cabin or shanty set up by people to sell food and drink to travelers on the Trace. The "stands" were spaced at about a day's travel distance apart and were also the places many travelers would spend the night........and sometimes get mugged or killed for their valuables. There are probably an unknown number of small caches along the Trace left by murdered travelers who hid their goodies before bedding down and subsequently being killed. If there were not enough preachers / priets around to "man" all those churches......the 25 mile distances could have been something a traveling preacher / priest could handle when making the "rounds" to preach to their "flocks".
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Okay, hi, sorry but I'm new here and one thing seems to stick out from just reading through...

All of this land is "new" to these people. We've got a whole dearth of information which keeps going back, time and time again, to survey distances. (rods, chains, etc)
We've got a distance of league (spanish survey "legua") being ~2.5 miles (thus the reference to churches being 10 leagues apart.)

Carving out stone to represent animals (especially some of the "full boulder" animals I've seen pointed out) are simply non-trivial. And the ability to find the correct "approximate" stones to start with in the correct places

I love all the drill holes and markings and vague animals and whatnot but ... what about the simple and boring: "it's just all being surveyed for later use?"

And as a side note to "O RO" being referenced back to 454 = 1lb of gold ... "oro" is also spanish for "gold." But I do like your biblical path which was super creative and a very interesting "coincidence."

Has anyone actually found anything? One of these "caches?" Ever?

Fascinating stuff, but I worry there's a more mundane reason for the holes and distances. Hopefully I'm wrong and someone out there finds something. =)
 

Well there went my theory drill holes and all and just to think that if I had heard those words 42 years ago just think of the boot leather I would have saved and the awful amount of time I just wasted. How come it took you so long to get me turned around. I was just bringing up the point that 454 grams = 1 pound and it does fit
 

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Hey, GoldenNerd:
Since the Vikings first used drill holes at ocean beach locations and inland river banks , theoretically to anchor their boats, MAYBE those drill holes on the plains and in the mountains were anchoring points for the Prairie Schooners. Or MAYBE they are the marks left by some seriously BAD a-- Woodpeckers.............err......STONEpeckers.

Aaaaah, well, enough giggles. Those drill holes were put into place as coded information and NOT as survey marks. Surveyors used techniques to convey any information in DIRECT and understandable numbers and directional indicators and did not require a secret decoder ring to figure out. Check out the history of land surveying and the accompanying survey markers.

The drill holes on these trails were often given shapes in their bottoms and sides that would indicate directions and distance information.
 

This weekend was very interesting Tinhorn and family came by, we got to talking about Thom's site and the Carved Bell's he showed how they were stacked in a row for delivery possibly, to Churches, we got to thinking that it may be that the reason for so many different types of carvings at so many sites may because they were taking them to where they could be used such as a yard and just left them for future use at another location carry them with them as they went, I have seen podium's, Crosses and other religious carving at time's up gotta go
 

Bill what size did they mold silver bars into. Any of them around 600 grams
 

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dsty:
600grams comes out to a little over 1.3 pounds (U.S. pounds). I did a quick search for "Spanish silver bars" and a link to one of Mel Fishers' sites, had some silver bars at a little over 77 troy pounds and I didn't try to convert that, though.

I remember some treasure finds back in the 1970s and 80s that contained different sizes of bars. One man found a metal "brick" at the base of a backwall on a beach. He took it home, thinking it was lead, and used it as a door stop for a few years until somebody's curiosity kicked in and it turned out to be solid silver.....NO marks. In another story, there were photos of silver bars not much bigger than an adult man's finger. Seems like they were molded using split, green bamboo or something similar. I've also heard of some miners using a cast iron cornbread mold for silver AND gold bars. Then, there are the thin, round pieces of silver that were made when the assayer in a town's assay office, would steal a little silver by pouring some molden metal through the cracks in the floor boards that would cool and solidify waiting for him to recover. THAT assayer did not recover his silver discs.......maybe he was caught tapping someones assay and they killed him. The treasure hunter who found those little discs did so by accident. He was detecting there in hopes of finding some gold nuggets lost throughout the years. And, maybe some coins. He found a lot better things in those discs.

So, the short answer, dsty, is that 600 gram silver bars would be very possible. Seems like the size, and therefore weight, of silver bars were decided on by who ever owned the metal and/or processing site. 1 pound silver bars would be a lot easier to pack and hide throughout one's wagon or cart if they were trying to ease past some snooping soldiers. :laughing7:
 

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Thanks for the reply SS, again some had a purpose and no one knows why, that is why this is so interesting
 

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