oldest working civil boundary stone in america anyone

I am wondering if there might be evidence of any boundary type markers put in place by pre-1492 inhabitants.Perhaps contacting a University that has folks who study s that era might help. It mnight be that settlers casually ended upo using the sdame markers and perhpas some of those are still being used.

Here's a candidate in Hampton, New Hampshire from 1659

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kensington_Runestone

There are quite a few runestone's out there. Many fabricated, but some seem pretty legit.;-)

You were/are probably looking for later boundary monuments thought.:-( When some of the east coast posters get done taking their mid morning nap, I'm sure they'll chime in.;-)
Cheers.

The Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock in 1620, but that might not qualify as a boundary marker.

As you know, the original 13 colonies were founded by Great Britain between 1607-1732. I'm sure they must've set something....;-)

The rivers and the ridge lines seemed to be the best monuments, at the time, so that's pretty much what they used. You know; "I claim this river and all the lands that drain to her, for the King of England!" And like that.

Is your quarry simply curiosity, or will this knowledge gain you some academic accreditation?

Radar

Not nearly as old as the ones mentioned above but very interesting...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/13/AR2009051303585.html

Boundary Stones of the District of Columbia

I'm sure it's not the oldest but

here's one that I've visited.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellicott%27s_Rock

Andy

I am currently working on a project on Martha's Vineyard that may involve stones from the mid 1600's... I'll keep you informed...

Don

PS Not that it's a boundary marker but this stone is still around
Young Mayhew's Rock

I'd put a vote for stone cairns called INUKSHUK

I was going to nominate Plymouth Rock.

In my research, I found that it has been moved for safety purposes several times and has been relocated at a higher tide line than original located.

Now that's funny A. Harris!!! We don't know, firs to f all, if a stone was used when the Pilgrims landed, and then again if there was a stone, which one it is! The Plymouth Rock is currently less than half it's original size and is housed under a Greek type structure. The Indians covered it back in the 1970's, as I recall, in protest of thanksgiving.

Funny not so well known "fact", is that the bones of the Pilgrims that died that first winter are in the top of the mausoleum that covers the stone now. The bones were uncovered during the construction of roads near the waterfront. The pilgrims buried their dead at night so the Indians wouldn't be aware of the devastating losses they had over the winter. it was in vain though, the Indians were aware of the losses.

Wasn't Jamestown before Plymoth? Wondering if any of the lots etc from that might still have valid markers being used.
There were a number of native groups that tilled lands, had irrigation, built cirns for various reasons, I wonder how likely it is that some of these might have been used in early property descriptions just like natural features; "thence right at the Indian rock pile" etc...

I've been thinking FLA....isn't the oldest settlement in St. Augustine?

Or how about the Pueblo's in AZ?

I'm goin' to have to say St.Augustine,Florida.Just throwing it out there,because of Castillo de San Marcos National Monument.:-)

Heavner Rune Stone

On Poteau Mountain near the small town of Heavener, Oklahoma, near the Arkansas line, stands a slab of stone which is 12 feet tall, 10 feet wide, and 16 inches thick, like a billboard. There is writing on this billboard, consisting of 8 deeply pecked letters, whose edges have eroded to smoothness, even though the stone`s hardness on the Moh`s Hardness Scale is 7, where a diamond is 10.

In the 1830`s, the Choctaws of Indian Territory saw the writing but could not read it. Various citizens in the 1800`s saw the stone and named it "Indian Rock", although the Indians had no alphabets.In 1923 the lettering was submitted by Carl Kemmerer of Heavener to the Smithsonian Institution, who identified the letters as Norse runes.

In 1948, research to find out what the letters said, when they were made, and by whom, was begun by Gloria Stewart Farley, who had seen the inscription as a child.. She spent a total of 38 years finding the answers to these questions. She renamed it The Heavener Runestone in 1951. Based on her research, the Runestone State Park came into existence to preserve this stone in 1970.

By 1967 the runes were believed to represent the date of November 11, 1012 with the runes used as numbers in a Norse cryptopuzzle, according to Alf Monge, a cryptanalyst who was born in Norway. The authenticity of the stone being made by ancient Vikings was supported by the finding of two more runestones in the vicinity of Poteau Mountain, another smaller inscription of eight runes at a foothill of Cavanal Mountain, 14 miles away, and another stone bearing five runes at Shawnee, Oklahoma.

In 1986, it was found that these 5 runestones had apparently been made even two or three centuries earlier, before 800 A.D. Translations were made in words, not numbers, by Dr. Richard Nielson, whose doctorate was obtained at the University of Denmark. By making an in—depth study of the ancient literature and hundreds of Scandinavian runestones, he determined that the second and eighth runes are actually variants of the letter L, which permitted him to say that the Heavener runes are G—L—O—M—E—D—A—L, meaning Glome`s Valley, a land claim. The similar Poteau runes are a memorial to the same man, meaning, "Magic or protection to Gloie (his nickname)". The Shawnee runestone is the name MEDOK, and was probably a gravestone, but had been moved because of construction work. The other two runestones on or near Poteau Mountain do not have enough runes for a translation, but the four stones were placed in a straight line, miles apart. These five inscriptions are all from the oldest 24—rune FUTHARK, used from 300 until 800 A.D. in Scandinavia.

It is believed that these Norse explorers crossed the Atlantic, rounded the tip of Florida into the Gulf of Mexico, found the Mississippi River, and sailed into its tributaries, the Arkansas and Poteau Rivers, around 750 A.D. This date is indicated by the grammar used on the Poteau Runestone.

DDSM:beer:
(Since it was not a 'called for' monument...lol)

Good point about the pueblo's, but folks seemed to be getting a bit euro settler centric on it. There were mound builders and cairn makers all over north america. and even if one left out the varied theories about other folks like the norse, or even that one guy's book about some chinese expidition or somegting like that there is good evidence that there were lots of folks here even before the spanish, and other europeans. Ddin't people have to pass though here ont he way to make the huge civilizations in south america? It is not stretch to belive that there might be a call in a description to some pre-columbian artifact (pile of stones, mound, structures, trail marker). If north america includes greenland, there were settlments there as well. But if the question is just about the U.S. and post euro settlers (and excluding the spaniards) then that sorta discounts a whole other history of this continent. I'm tryin g to find an old news piece about some stone carvings near Nanaimo BC that were mentioned in somebody's legal description as a boundary. I'll try to find it.

hi & thanxx all for your helpful points & ideas

let me just respond
i am a total amateur & without academic affiliation
but rather only a boundary trypointing nut
who has sought & visited most of the 87 federal multipoints of the usa
including the many tristate points etc
&
many other distinguished boundary points
including nearly all the beauties you all mention

& have seen some well attested if mostly natural precolumbian boundary markers
but am not aware of any that continue to perform as such

likewise there may well be colonial civil boundary markers of other than british origin & jurisdiction

say in 16th century florida or new mexico etc etc

but again i am hard pressed to imagine how any of these
if they ever did exist as such
could have survived til now as working demarcations

for i havent yet found any evidence of geopolitical subdivision anywhere within our 16th century spanish legacy area stretching from florida to california
let alone of any historical continuity or trace of such down to any present day boundaries

& i have learned that spanish colonial jurisdiction in general was notoriously sketchy & fickle anyway
while being actually more ecclesiastical than civil
just as was french apparently

so any particulars in these areas would be especially appreciated

but back in the british areas
3 or 4 extant town line stones of barnstable mass are in the national historic register with citations purported from 1644 if not 1641 or 1639
tho i havent yet seen any of the rocks or docs
&
there are possibilities of earlier 1630s that may also be worth checking out in the massachusetts bay colony

& in virginia certainly the 1634 distribution into 8 shires
if not also the original distribution into 4 citties dating perhaps from 1617
could have left monuments that continue undisturbed to mark any of half a dozen virginia county lines today
running along geodetic lines

the isle of wight county lines in particular strike me as promising in view of their combination of straightness & remoteness & colonial coincidency

however
my experience with virginia county line demarcations
even much later ones & even including tripoints
has been generally rather disappointing to date

& this in sharp contrast to massachusetts
which tho a bit younger has evidently been far more conscientious about demarcation & maintenance

& it doesnt appear to be for no reason that usgs topos of massachusetts are littered with county line markers & even town line markers yet are practically devoid of them in virginia

in fact the 2 states appear to be opposites of type in this regard

so
it becomes a question of whether to prefer looking where you think you really might find something
or in a place that might be theoretically more favorable but actually less plausible

for it seems my quest must ultimately boil down to
which is the oldest known working boundary pillar ever recovered in america
rather than just some defunct or hypothetical or possibly older but still elusive probability

i admit its a funny game

oops & i dont count hawaii out even if it is not in america but havent a clue how to search there

I googled and found this (which I love):

"just for the record
ak
age 67

there are no victims
& we are all the creators of our own realities

thanks, ak

Don

It is not an easy quest if there are so many qualifiers.
Surveyors know that lines of occupation are valid monuments; road centerlines, stone walls erected when land was cleared. These are manmade objects have often been adapted as monuments, but did, in thier own way already mark civil boundaries (or Not if you discount past civilizations as not being true civilizations).
Marks from ancient times still mark boundaries in othe parts of the world (even much older than many european civilizations); why would that be so unlikely in north america?
I would think it somewhat odd to discount human marks on the land in whatever form or from whatever era as possilbe candidates. Do you think that someone marking out parcels would completly ignore a cairn or rock wall or marker as a convnient monument?
Your points are intriguing; but I am puzzled by the insistance in discounting anything that did not come from colonial times.
But, I appreciate you bringing on this exercise.
Now I'm interested in finding an example.