Turtle Oracle Mound

Off County #35, 20 miles northwest of Deer River

The turtle, which was probably constructed by the Dakota (Sioux) sometime in the early 1700s, is first referred to in writing by John Baptiste Perrault, a fur trader. He noted that “…the Indians consulted the turtle as an oracle (and that) the head was towards the enemy’s country…”

The enemy were the Ojibwe who, when they took over the site, continued to hold it sacred, but moved the head of the turtle to face southwest, toward where the Sioux had gone.

The mound, on the portage between Little Cutfoot Sioux and Bowstring Lakes, is classified an intaglio effigy because it is sunken rather than raised – an example of a rare form of mound building.