Fort Ancient State Memorial
Fort Ancient is located on hilltops overlooking the Little Miami River valley near Lebanon, Ohio (located in Warren County between Cincinnati and Columbus). Fort Ancient is a large hilltop enclosure that was constructed over about a 400 year period, starting about 2,200 years ago by ancestral American Indians (Fort Ancient-Woodlands culture), Nearly 18,000 feet of earthworks (earthen walls and ditches) surround about 125 acres of social and ceremonial gathering grounds. The grounds were still used by local Indian tribes at the time of early contact with European explorers.Fort Ancient Earthworks & Nature Preserve was established as Ohio’s first state park in April 1891. The park is now maintained by the Dayton Society of Natural History (http://www.fortancient.org/). Today the park includes three miles of hiking trails with scenic overlooks and the Fort Ancient Museum. The larger Fort Ancient Earthworks & Nature Preserve also encompasses the forested hillside and river bottom area below Fort Ancient along the Little Miami River valley where an ancestral Indian village site is protected with the preserve.
This view shows Ohio Route 350 enters through a gap between two earthen walls where it enters the ancient ceremonial ground of Fort Ancient.
