346 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1951 



facts from the same level consist of diagonally chipped blades, stone 

 and bone arrow points, microlithic side-blades, and decorated and 

 slotted bone. The side-blades and the bone suggest a Mesolithic tra- 

 dition. The other cultural materials, separated from the former by 

 more than a meter of debris, are of a type that elsewhere in Alaska has 

 been found to be approximately 1,000 years old. A base log from a 

 Paleo-Eskimo house at Cape Denbigh tested 2,016 ±250, wdiile charred 

 wood from the middle levels of the same site showed 1,460 ±200. 

 Spruce wood from a site at Gambell, St. Lawrence Island, yielded 

 2,258 ±230. The dates for the Alaskan remains, however, do differ 

 from archeological conceptions as to their age and as yet there is no 

 satisfactory explanation for the discrepancy. 



There is one interesting series of dates covering a long sequence of 

 cultures in the Chicama Valley, Peru (Bird, 1951). The range is 

 from 4,424±104 to 2,211±200 and so far as the archeological evidence 

 is concerned there is nothing which would throw doubt on the validity 

 of the radiocarbon determinations. The same cannot be said, how- 

 ever, for dates for certain remains in the United States. The latter 

 are much younger than many of those in Peru and involve the so- 

 called Hopewell and Adena cultures. Archeologists had generally 

 agreed that the Adena and its typologically related cultures preceded 

 the Hopewell. When three different kinds of organic material com- 

 prising six samples from Hopewell sites were tested they w^ere found 

 to be 1,951 ± 200, 2,044 ± 250, 2,285 ± 210, and 2,336 ± 250. The Adena 

 materials, on the other hand, range from 1,168 ± 150 to 1,509 ±250, and 

 the related cultures from 633 ±150 to 1,233 ±250, and 1,158 ±250 to 

 1,276 ±150. Generally speaking radiocarbon shows that Hopewell is 

 not only older than Adena but antedates it by 1,000 years (Griffin, 

 1951) . Since this is so contrary to the accepted archeological chronol- 

 ogy, the the results have been sharply questioned. The discrepancy 

 probably cannot be attributed to the method itself because all the dates 

 are within the range of carbon-14 determinations that were checked 

 by samples of known age. Consequently it would seem that either 

 the archeological concepts need to be changed or the specimens used 

 in the tests were contaminated. 



There are various other dates of anthropological significance now 

 available but space will permit the consideration of only two more. 

 They are of particular interest for other than strictly archeological 

 reasons. A test was made of a sample from a carved wooden lintel 

 from a building at the ruined Mayan city of Tikal in northern Guate- 

 mala. The building is believed to have been the sacerdotal palace or 

 residence for the priests serving a nearby temple. The lintel in ques- 

 tion formerly spanned an interior doorway and was composed of five 

 sapote beams. The complete lintel was decorated with an inscription 

 giving the Maya date 9.15.10.0.0 3 Ahau 3 Mol. The correlation of 



