298 PAPEllS RELATING TO ANTHROPOLOGY. 



A few of the grooved stoues and uotcLed pebbles classed as un- 

 doubted net sinkers bave been found in California. Fig. 22 represents 

 one from Bodega, Cal. Might not some of them have been used as war- 

 ckibs or hammers "] And were not the grooves made for the purpose of 

 attaching handles of withes ? Their shape would indicate their use in 

 some of their manufactures, whereas a "net sinker" would not require 

 to be made after any particular pattern ; anj-thiug possessing the requi- 

 site weight, and of any form that could be attached to the net, would 

 have answered the purpose. 



If the Indians did not fish with nets, these "uudoubted net siukers" 

 •were not "net sinkers," and if used in fishiugat all they were line sinkers. 

 The Indian Eafael, who will be referred to hereafter, when shown the 

 implement represented by Fig. 22, said that it was used as a line sinker 

 for fishing. 



In Explorations of the Aboriginal Remains of Tennessee, by Joseph 

 Jones, M. D., published by the Smithsonian Institution under the head 

 of " Stones employed for mechanical purposes," is a figure and descrip- 

 tion of a plummet of black magnetic irou, highly polished, with a hole 

 through the upper end 5 and he supposes that this, together with a 

 number of similar implements which have been found in Middle Ten- 

 nessee in the cultivated soil, and also in the stone graves, were used in 

 spinning threads and in weaving. He says : " It has been suggested 

 that they may also have been employed as weights in fishing." 



Ilad they been used in spinning and weaving, as Dr. Jones suggests, 

 they would probably have been made of uniform size and shape. 



Dr. Charles Ran, in The Archa'ological Collection of the United 

 States National Museum, published by the Smithsonian Institution, 

 illustrates a variety of stone implements under the name of " pendants 

 and sinkers," which name, he says, have been given to a class of sym- 

 metrically-shaped and well-finished objects, which were evidently de- 

 signed for suspension, though it is not quite certain for what special 

 purpose they were used. On account of their shape and the pains be- 

 stowed upon their production they have been classed anu)ng aboriginal 

 ornaments. Yet the former inhabitants of this country devoted much 

 time and labor to the manufacture of objects of a useful character, and 

 hence it appears not improbable that the articles in question were, in 

 part at least, weights for fishing lines. 



After a short description of a number of the implements figured, 

 ascribing to them several uses, such as net sinkers or weights, orna- 

 . ments or amulets and perforated net sinkers, he says, in reference to 

 net weights (page 27) : " Some are roundish stones of various sizes, 

 either worked or left in their natural state, and grooved around the 

 middle for fastening the strings or thongs by which they were con- 

 nected with the nets. - - - It is not always easy to distinguish 

 specimens of this description from grooved hammer-heads." C. C. Ab- 

 bott, in Yol. VII, Reports of U. S. Geological Survey west of the one 



