RIVER BASIN SALVAGE PROGRAM — ROBERTS 539 



evident that there was considerable contact between the inhabitants of 

 the Chama Valley and Indians from South Dakota, Nebraska, and the 

 Texas panhandle in the 14th and 15th centuries. Certain features 

 which previously were somewhat puzzling in the eastern Pueblo vil- 

 lages can be fully explained now from the evidence obtained during 

 the salvage operations. Also, the source of some southwestern traits 

 among certain of the Plains tribes now becomes clear. 



Two Eiver Basin Surveys parties excavated in 11 sites and tested 

 19 others in the Allatoona Keservoir Basin along the Etowah Kiver 

 near Cartersville, Ga. A number of the sites uivolved village re- 

 mams, some of them well-developed communities, and a few of a rather 

 rudimentary nature. As a result of the digging, evidence was ob- 

 tained for a cultural sequence of 10, probably 11, different stages 

 extending from the historic Cherokee of about A.D. 1755 back to a 

 period when hunting and food gathering comprised the basic economy 

 of the people. Some of the villages in the Allatoona area were 

 fortified, but they represent a much earlier date than those in the 

 Missouri Basin. During the time when the River Basin Surveys par- 

 ties were working in the Allatoona area, the University of Georgia 

 as a cooperative contribution excavated the remains of a large earth 

 lodge and its associated midden deposits. Three houses identified in 

 the accumulation of debris represented successive groups in the series 

 established by the River Basin Surveys. Useful data obtained there 

 pertaining to the various pottery types for the different stages con- 

 tributed much toward making clearer the ceramic picture for the area. 

 Tlie results from all the digging in the Allatoona Basin, which is now 

 completely flooded, have done much to establish a detailed story of 

 aboriginal culture growth in northwest Georgia and adjacent areas. 



EXCAVATIONS IN MOUNDS 



Thus far there has not been much digging in large artificial mounds 

 because the available funds have been insufficient to support projects 

 of a nature requiring large groups of workmen and an extensive pro- 

 gram of operation. A good start in large-mound work has been made 

 by the University of Georgia, however, with excavations getting 

 under way in 1959 at the Mandeville site in the Walter F. George 

 Reservoir area on the Chattahoochee River, Alabama-Georgia. Test 

 excavations were made in two mounds in the area flooded by the Bu- 

 ford Reservoir, also on the Chattahoochee River in Georgia. Neither 

 mound had been recorded previous to the present surveys. One of 

 them gave evidence of having been erected over a small natural knoll. 

 The moimd appeared to represent a relatively late and previously 

 unrecognized cultural complex which was pre-Lamar in age. The 

 cultural complex designated Lamar in the Georgia area is believed 



