ANCIENT ABORIGINAL TRADE IN NORTH AMERICA. 349 



Carver learned from the Wiunebagoes (in tile present State of Wiscon- 

 sin) that tliey sometimes made war-excursions to the southwestern parts 

 inhabited by Spaniards (New Mexico), and that it required months to 

 arrive there.* Similar excursions and migrations, of course, took phice 

 during the early unknown periods of North American history. In the 

 course of such enterprises the property of the vanquished naturally fell 

 into the hands of the victors, who appropriated everything that ap- 

 j)eared useful or desirable to them. The consequence was an exchange 

 by force — if I may call it so — which caused many of the manufactures 

 and commodities of the various tribes to be scattered over the ftice of 

 the country. This having been the case, it is, of course, impossible to 

 draw a line between peaceable barter and appropriation by right of 

 war, and, therefore, while employing hereafter frequently the terms 

 "trade" or "exchange," I interpose that reservation which is neces- 

 sitated by the circumstances just mentioned. 



Of the Indian commerce that has sprung up since the arrival of the 

 Europeans I shall say but little, considering that this subject has suffi- 

 ciently been treated in ethnological and other works on North America; 

 and I shall likewise omit to draw within the sphere of my observations 

 that interesting trade which was, and still is, carried on between the tribes 

 inhabiting the high north of Asia and America, where Behring's Strait 

 separates the two continents. My attention is chiefly directed to the 

 more ancient manufactures occurring in Indian mounds and elsewhere ; 

 and the distribution of these relics over distant parts of the country, 

 in connection with the known or presumed localities which furnished 

 the materials composing them, forms the basis of my deductions. Thus, 

 my essay will assume an archaeological character, and for this reason I 

 shall confine my remarks to that part of the United States concerning 

 whose antiquities we possess the most detailed information, namely, the 

 area which is bounded by the Mississippi valley (in an extended sense), 

 by the Great Lakes, the Atlantic coast, and the Gulf of Mexico. 



A number of archaeologists make a distinction between the builders 

 of the extensive mural earthworks and tumuli of North America and 

 the tribes whom the whites found in possession of the country, and 

 consequently separate the relics of the so-called mound-builders from 

 those of the later inhabitants. Such a line of demarcation certainly 

 must appear totally obliterated with regard to the relations which I am 

 about to discuss, for which reason I shall by no means adhere to this 

 vague division in my essay, but shall only advert to the former Indian 

 population in general. 



In the following sections I have first treated of a number of materials 

 which formed objects of trade, either in an un wrought state or in the 

 shape of implements and ornaments ; and subsequently, in conclusion, 

 I have made some observations tending to add more completeness to 

 my preceding statements. 



* Carver, Travels, «fec., Harper's reprint, New York, 1838, p. 42. 



