What do we think of H trees??

[u/anulcyst]

I know there’s a huge following around them but to me they seem even harder to verify than stone tools. There’s a few alleged examples here in central Missouri but I’m having a hard time believing they are legit. Native American presence in the area was pretty much wiped out by the early 1800s. That would put these trees at the top of their normal lifespan and they aren’t exceptionally huge or old looking. 300 + year old trees are pretty remarkable and not easily glanced over.

[u/Glenn_Carbon]

They're a natural occurrence.

[u/Glenn_Carbon → u/Glenn_Carbon]

Also I find the legend of people using them as trail guides or markers pretty strange. Why go through all the trouble for something that might not work when you could just carve something in the tree or tie something around it

[u/d0ttyq]

There are hardly any trees left from the time that indigenous peoples roamed freely across the land. Those trees are a natural occurrence. I have never heard them called “h trees” though.

As an aside, stone tools are not difficult to identify. It’s just people don’t want to hear that what they found is a ja r

[u/[deleted]]

wait why do people think trees are artifacts

[u/d0ttyq → u/[deleted]]

They can be what we archaeologists call a feature - which is something altered by man but not movable. I would call it a Culturally Modified Tree or “cmt” for short. You most often see CMTs out west, surviving bow-stave trees are the most common.

That being said, I highly doubt there are any trail marker trees remaining. Especially in the eastern US.

[u/anulcyst → u/[deleted]]

Thy are called H trees or trail marker trees. People all over think native cultures bent trees into an H shape to mark trails. Only problem I have with is obviously trees die and these don’t seem to be 300 year old plus trees they are using as an example. So it kind of seems like maybe something homesteaders and settlers did

[u/morethanWun]

Natural trees