by Lying at an altitude of 9462 feet near the summit of Medicine Mountain in the Bighorn National Forest of north-central Wyoming is the Bighorn Medicine Wheel.
The Pre Columbian structure is made of local white limestone laid upon a bedrock of slightly sloping limestone.
It is 82 feet in diameter, includes 28 spokes extending from the center to the rim, and a series of seven stone circles (cairns) – six at or near the rim and a larger (12 foot in diameter) cairn in the center.
The only reliable scientific date gleaned from the Bighorn Medicine Wheel thus far is one tree-dating sample derived from wood incorporated into the structure of the western cairn.
This sample’s latest growth ring dates to 1760 CE. Artifacts and other archaeological evidence clearly indicate that the Medicine Wheel has been visited by Native Americans for nearly 7,000 years.
No indigenous people have publicly claimed to have built the Big Horn Medicine Wheel. The Crow people have stated that the Wheel, which rests within their homeland, was already present when they came into the area.
Oral history from several indigenous nations sets the Bighorn Medicine Wheel as already existing, having been built by “ancient ancestors”.
Source
The Pre Columbian structure is made of local white limestone laid upon a bedrock of slightly sloping limestone.
It is 82 feet in diameter, includes 28 spokes extending from the center to the rim, and a series of seven stone circles (cairns) – six at or near the rim and a larger (12 foot in diameter) cairn in the center.
The only reliable scientific date gleaned from the Bighorn Medicine Wheel thus far is one tree-dating sample derived from wood incorporated into the structure of the western cairn.
This sample’s latest growth ring dates to 1760 CE. Artifacts and other archaeological evidence clearly indicate that the Medicine Wheel has been visited by Native Americans for nearly 7,000 years.
No indigenous people have publicly claimed to have built the Big Horn Medicine Wheel. The Crow people have stated that the Wheel, which rests within their homeland, was already present when they came into the area.
Oral history from several indigenous nations sets the Bighorn Medicine Wheel as already existing, having been built by “ancient ancestors”.
Source
