Ok, Rock. Let’s assume a secret creek means a sacred creek, right? You mentioned that you didn’t see any reason for it to be a sacred/secret creek. Like I said before, animism is the basis of many ancient religions. It is the belief that the natural landscape is filled with spirits or mini deities. The Shinto religion of Japan is a good example of this. Shinto believes that Kami, or spirits, inhabit natural features. So Features such as Mt. Fuji, in Japan, are believed to be actual gods themselves. Remnants of such beliefs may even be found in the bible. You’ve got God’s holy mountain, Sinai, and even Jacob wrestles with an angel at a river (interpreted by some biblical scholars as originally meaning one of the nomadic generic deities of the landscape, this time, the spirit of the river who didn’t want Jacob to cross through it’s waters). Getting back to your creek, we can see how this applies. Barring the very good possibility that some significant event may have occurred here in the distant past to make it sacred, animism is almost certainly at play here. If I’m not mistaken, Native American religions are strongly nature based, aren’t they? So now that we’ve seen the likelihood of the stream having animistic significance, let’s move on to your gold. Under such circumstances, I’d take a completely different view which might help you in your search. First off, I would stop thinking of that gold as merely buried treasure. It is not. Take the time to see it from the perspective of the Native Americans and their animistic beliefs. They are not concealing gold. They are entrusting gold, taken from their enemies, gold for which their people may have been killed, to the deity or spirit of the creek to guard. Obviously, the creek’s spirit helped them in the past. It gave them water, and gave the landscape life. It may even flow year – round, which would make it more powerful than other creeks which seasonally dry up. Knowing the benigness of the deity, they have trusted it to conceal their gold. What you have there Rock, is a votive offering. Votive offerings are found on every inhabited continent, and are as old as mankind itself. Basically, they consist of valuable items concealed as a religious offering to a deity. You find many of them buried outside of temples in Europe and the Mid East. There are two basic types: buried and submerged. Buried is concealed in the ground, as the name suggests. Submerged means being concealed by water. Often, in the New World, this means being thrown into deep lakes and pools. The Golden Sun Disk of the Incas was believed to have suffered this fate, being thrown into the deep lake of Titicaca, Bolivia, when the priests heard about the coming Spaniards. It was not only concealment, but an offering to the lake goddess to keep the sacred treasure safe (these were holy objects, not revered for their material value, remember, and they didn’t want the Spaniards getting them). I believe that the vast Incan hoards of the Llanganatis, the ransom that would have been used to save the Incan Emperor’s life, had he lived, and which was hidden in the obscure desolate mountain range, can be thought of in the same way. You have to remember that the ransom of the Incan Emperor, Atahualpa, was stripped from all the religious temples across the empire. They were sacred treasures. And so I think that they were entrusted to one of the mountain gods as a votive offering for concealment. Which is different from a motivation for merely concealing gold for it’s monetary value, and makes all the difference in the world when it comes to picking a hiding place. But I digress (I tend to do that). I’d first find out who the tribe or people of the region were, especially those in the area at the time of the tail of tears. Then, I’d look closely at their religious beliefs, especially ay any sorts of offerings they made. Votive offerings. Find out how they made them and if there was a pattern they used (did they tend to hide such sacred caches in water, or under important trees, or on hills, etc). Then go back to your topo maps of the area, and try and identify likely places that such gold would have been hidden by the tribe. Remember, that it is not that easy. You are assuming a lot. You’re assuming that the source text you read is correct and that the gold is there. Can you find any other reliable references to this gold? If you’re going to put in effort, make sure that it’s there. Secondly, the gold may be buried deep. In which case, metal detectors might not do…more of a job for magnetometers. The bummer is, they cost money. Mississipian culture is one of the most fascinating cultures of North America from my perspective! Any connection between the creek and the earlier culture? Could that be the reason why the later NA believed it was sacred? Was the gold definitely hidden near the creek, or was it deposited in the ruins of the Mississippian culture (on a hill)? If there are any old wells nearby, you might want to look at those as well. In many cultures across the world, from South America, to the Mediterranean to Asia and the Middle East, well have been quick and nasty ways of disposing and concealing valuables when suddenly faced with danger. In addition, they have also been held to be sacred by many ancient cultures, especially when connected to a spring (for example, later Irish Christian belief in a ‘blessing well’ may actually hearken back to pre – Christian Celtic belief in a pagan deity residing there, which in turn goes back to an animistic origin). The idea of the wells significance is simply transferred from one religious culture to another. This is how wishing wells originally started. The wish was actually directed as a votive offering to a deity inhabiting a well or spring in ancient times, but with the passing of time, the beliefs were forgotten, and only the practice was remembered, though not the reason for it. Hope that helps. Sorry for getting a bit off track. I love theories, I guess. Any thoughts?
