902 PAPERS RELATING TO ANTHROPOLOGY. 



SHELL HEAPS AND MOUNDS IN FLOEIDA. 



By James Shepard, of New Britain, Conn. 



In February, 1884, in company with Dr. F. H. Williams, of Bristol, 

 Conn., I visited Palatka. Many walks about the town were covered 

 with small snail shells which were gathered from large deposits in that 

 vicinity. It was a common belief that these were marine shells; and 

 frequent was the inquiry why the Indians brought these shells from 

 the distant sea. The answer is, " They did not," for the shells are mostly, 

 those of the river snail, Vivipara contectoides (Binney). Several of 

 whom I inquired thought that like specimens of live shells could not 

 be found near Palatka. In this opinion they are probably mistaken. 

 On being informed that there was a shell heap on the Saint John's Eiver 

 a few miles below Palatka, four of us started out the next morning to 

 explore the land in that vicinity. Late in the afternoon one of our 

 party discovered a shell heap. It was on low ground, in the woods or 

 hummock, probably not far from the Saint John's Eiver, although the 

 river was not visible. It was literally a heap, quite irregular in form, 

 covering three or four square rods of ground and varying in depth from 

 2 to 5 feet. It was just such a heap as one would expect a pile of debris 

 to be. There were no indications that any shells had been removed or 

 that the heap had ever been dug into. On the surface the shells were 

 bat little broken, and the entire heap appeared to be composed of two 

 kinds of shells, the Pomus depressa (Say) and Vivipara contectoides 

 (Binney). By digging below the surface, pieces of river mussels or 

 Unios were found, very much decomposed and covering the other shells 

 with a nacreous paste. Bones of small animals and birds and flint chips 

 were numerous, with many pieces of pottery and an occasional arrow- 

 head. There were only a few shells in the entire heap of any genera 

 other than the Pomus, Vivipara, and Unio. 



On sailing up the Saint John's Eiver we saw several shell heaps on 

 the banks of the river apparently of the same general character, only 

 some of them were much more extensive. We stopped only at Sanford, 

 and there found a shell heap a mile or two below the steamboat land- 

 ing. This was much larger than thePalatka mound and spread irregu- 

 larly over the ground. Shells had been carted away from here and 

 the heap dug into in many places by relic hunters. All of the shells 

 were of the same three kinds, Pomus, Vivipara, and Unio. The shells 

 at the surface were very much crushed, indicating that they had been 

 much trodden on. Many pieces of pottery were scattered about over 

 the surface, and others were found by digging. Arrowheads and flint 

 chips were infrequent. In some places indications of ancient fires were 

 found, the shells being burned and firmly cemented together. Below 

 the layer of cemented shells and ashes the shells were found in a 

 remarkable degree of preservation, some of the Vivipara showing the 



