22 AiinnjAL eeport smitksonian h^stttutton, i940 



EXPLORATIONS AND FIELD WORK 



The work of the staff in the field was wide and varied in scope and 

 was carried on principally through funds made available through 

 the Smithsonian Institution. The field studies thus arranged are one 

 of the most important sources of new materials for the National 

 Museum and result in new facts and information of many kinds. 



Anthropology.— On April 15, 1939, Dr. Ales Hrdlicka, curator of 

 physical anthropology, left New York on an anthropological trip to 

 Europe, with particular emphasis on studies in Kussia and Siberia. 

 The main objects of a visit to London were to see the remains of early 

 man from Palestine and whatever Siberian skeletal material there 

 might be in the museums of that city. In France the main purpose 

 was to see the newly established Museum of Man in Paris. In Russia 

 and Siberia the chief objective was to examine such skeletal and cul- 

 tural materials from Siberia as might have a bearing on the problem 

 of Asiatic-American connections. The main part of the trip was in 

 the Soviet Union, where the stay was divided between Leningrad, 

 Moscow, and Irkutsk. In the anthropological institutes and museums 

 of these cities, Dr. Hrdlicka found exceedingly rich and valuable 

 materials from Siberia, all of which he was allowed to utilize freely. 



The examinations in Leningrad were carried on in the new Anthro- 

 pological Institute and Museum, which has a very large and valuable 

 collection of human crania and skeletons, including important series 

 of skulls of the Chukchi and other Siberian peoples. In the Anthro- 

 pological Institute of the Moscow University there is another huge 

 cranial and skeletal collection, including other important series of 

 Siberian materials. Finally, at the Irkutsk Museum there is a large 

 and very important collection of neolithic skeletal remains from the 

 Angara River and Baikal Lake regions. 



The Siberian crania examined and measured included large and 

 particularly interesting series of the Chukchi, Ostiaks, Tungus, and 

 the neolithics of the Irkutsk region. Dr. Hrdlicka had the further 

 privilege, partly at Leningrad and partly at Moscow, of seeing the 

 skull, remains of bones, and associated cultural materials of a Nean- 

 derthal child from Uzbekistan, in central Asia. This is a find of 

 outstanding anthropological importance, and the skull, lower jaw, 

 and teeth are in excellent condition. 



To determine, first, the extent of Puebloan influence in western 

 Kansas and, second, the prospects for injecting time perspective into 

 the earlier archeological history of the region, Dr. Waldo R. Wedel, 

 assistant curator of archeology, extended into the High Plains an 

 archeological survey begun in Kansas in 1937. A month was spent 

 in and near Scott County State Park. Traces of a seven-room pueblo 

 ruin opened by Williston and Martin in 1898 were relocated. Middens 



