Nephilim Sun Temple 666 Feet in Circumference in Madison County, Kentucky
This map of the two
henges at the Bogy Mill was originally published in The
Prehistoric Men Of Kentucky by Colonel Bennett Young in
1910. The smaller henge has a circumference of 450 feet and the
larger was reported at 663 feet. The larger was more likely 666 feet
and Young gave it a more benign measurement.
The Prehistoric Men
of Kentucky, 1910
The best types of these circular
enclosures are found in Fayette, Montgomery, and Madison county(s).
Silver Creek, in Madison County, seems to have been a favorite place
not only for the construction of mounds for habitation, but also for
the erection of enclosures and ceremonial structures. Three of these
can be found within a distance of three miles on Silver Creek—two
of them on the land of Mrs. Fred Ferris, eight miles from Richmond,
near a post office called Ruthton. They are both remarkable products
of the prehistoric age, and one of them is practically untouched and
uninjured. These two structures lie on the north side of Silver
Creek, and with the exception of the circular enclosure on the North
Elkhorn in Fayette, there is no earthwork better preserved in
Kentucky than the small one of these. It was built on the spur of a
hill coming down toward Silver Creek and nine hundred feet from the
water line, with an elevation of probably fifty feet above the
stream. On the west side was a steep slope, on the east side another
slope, while on the north side it was only lifted about four or five
feet above the original surface, and on the south side there was a
descent to silver Creek.
Squire Boone, a brother of Daniel, in
passing down Silver Creek noted the fine location of this particular
point for a mill site, and told his companions it would be one of the
best of such sites in Kentucky. In the early pioneer days a mill was
erected by James Bogy at this place. He patented the
land and died some time early in the Nineteenth Century, and chose
the middle of the smaller of these structures for a family
burying-ground. The larger structure consists of an embankment six
hundred and sixty-three feet in circumference, inside of this moat or
ditch. The height of the embankment has an average of four feet, the
ditch a depth of from four to six feet. The width of the wall at the
base is thirty-six feet, the width of the ditch forty feet. This
ditch had evidently been filled up several feet by decaying
vegetation and by erosion. The diameter of the inside plateau, or
space surrounded by ditch, is one hundred and thirty-five feet.
These structures are only about four hundred feet apart. The second
is smaller but retains its form more perfectly, and is splendid
demonstration of the symmetry with which these enclosures were laid
out. It consists of an earthen embankment thirty-six feet in width.
Inside of it is a ditch twenty-one feet wide, with a present depth of
ten feet. The circumference of the embankment is four hundred and
fifty feet. Inside of the ditch is a raised spaced with a diameter
of seventy-five feet. This is covered now with a perfect sod of
bluegrass, and trees are growing upon it, which show an age of one
hundred and twenty-five years. The Bogy family, who patented this
land, recognizing the splendid situation of this prehistoric
structure and the symmetrical form of the plateau inside the ditch,
with its seventy-five feet of diameter, appropriated it for a family
burying-ground. These burials began in the Eighteenth Century and
continued down to 1850. Every available space in the circle has been
occupied by these intrusive burials. White and colored pioneers were
here laid side by side. […]
North of Mrs. Ferris's place, about
three miles farther down Silver Creek, is another of these
enclosures, almost a counterpart of the two previously described.
This is an aerial from Microsoft
Terra Server of the remaining smaller Bogy Henge. I was unable to
access the site for a ground-level photograph because the drive back
to the circle was gated. According to Kentucky law, if a member of
the Bogy family asked that this graveyard be accessible, the owners
of the property would be required to keep the gate open. The
location of the Bogy circle is a half a mile east of Ruthton.
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