NEW YORK (AP) – A spiraling, sunken court with a 24-foot-high chamber meant to encourage reflection has been chosen as the memorial design for a site where the remains of hundreds of slaves and free blacks were found 14 years ago.

The design for the African Burial Ground, by architect Rodney Leon of Aarris Architects, was unveiled Friday at a news conference at the federal building that rises next to the site in lower Manhattan.

“It’s an opportunity to tell our story to the world, and to specifically honor the memories of those ancestral Africans who have passed,” Leon told reporters.

“It is a story and a history of extreme sacrifice and the profound contributions that the African people have made to the creation of the United States of America,” he said.

Archeologists working for the federal government came across the remains in 1991, as construction was being planned for the federal building. More than 400 sets of remains were discovered, and part of the site was preserved.

The remains were studied by scientists and re-interrred in fall 2003.

Leon’s design includes a sunken, circular court surrounded by a ramp that spirals downward and is inscribed with symbols and hieroglyphics. Jutting up from one side of the court is a slender, 24-foot-tall “ancestral chamber.”

The design drew mixed reactions during a lengthy public comment period for five designs that were named as finalists.

“I love this design,” one person wrote in a comment submitted at the federal building. “To me it shows what was lost or forgotten (our people) and rediscovered. Also it is circular, how situations in our lives often come full circle.”

But another person wrote: “Although it is quite attractive, this does not reflect a burial space. It seems to take away from the fact that there are graves under the ground.”

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