NEWARK WORKS. An elaborate and complicated group of prehistoric works at the junction of two branches of Licking river, near Newark, Licking county, Ohio. Situated on a plain 3o to 5o ft. above the bottom land, the works consist of a series of square, circular, and octagonal enclosures, with mounds, ditches and connecting avenues spreading over nearly four sq. miles. They are composed of two groups, nearly two m. apart, connected by two walled avenues averaging 200 ft. wide. The western group consists of a large circle, 3 to 14 ft. high and with a mean diameter of 1,054 ft., connected with a symmetrical octagon by an avenue 30o ft. long and 8o ft. wide. Outside the octagon are two small circles, and at each corner of the octagon is a gateway, opposite which and 6o ft. within is a small mound 3 to 6 ft. in height. The length of the walls between the centres of the gate ways averages 621 ft., from which the greatest variation is only four ft., except in one wall that falls 8 ft. short of the average.
From the S. side of the octagon a walled avenue stretches south ward two m. or more, and from near its E. side two similar avenues extend eastward with a low wall on each side, one con necting with the square of the eastern group, the other running E. to the descent to the lowland north of the square. Disposed along these avenues are circles. The eastern group of the works consists of a large circle connected with the square mentioned by a broad avenue and several adjoining lines of walls. The wall of the circle is accompanied with an inside ditch 28 to 4o ft. wide and 8 to 13 ft. deep, while the wall itself is 35 to 55 ft. wide at the base and from 5 to 14 ft. high. There is a gateway at the N.E. with flanking extensions of the wall into the walled avenue leading to the square, the sides of which are 926 to 951 ft., yet the angles at the corners do not vary from the right angle more than one degree.