400 ANNUAL EEPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1934 



Minerals: Red, white, yellow paints. Clay objects in form of 

 disks and balls with reed impressions. No pottery. 



European objects: Glass and porcelain beads, bits of iron. 



The culture in general is similar to that of the historic San Joa- 

 quin Valley tribes, showing a few outside contacts from the east, 

 south and west. The general results of the work give us a good 

 example of a simple hunting and fishing people who developed a 

 distinctive culture in a marshy lake environment based i^rincipally 

 upon varied uses of tule and other rushes for house material, rafts, 

 textile fibers, burial shrouds, and even for fuel. A plentiful supply 

 of shellfish, fish, fowl, and game made the food quest a relatively 

 simple one. Evidently the camp sites were moved in accordance with 

 the rise and fall of the lake level. Several wave-cut terraces high 

 up on the mounds indicate more than one period of high water 

 when the occupants of the site were probably forced to move. 



It is probable that the site was occupied for several centuries 

 and that the population diminished rapidly after contact with the 

 whites. The mound shows marked cultural connections with the 

 shell mounds of the San Francisco Bay region, and it is quite pos- 

 sible that the builders of Tulaniniu migrated from that region. No 

 evidence has yet been found in the San Joaquin Valley of any earlier 

 people. Trade contacts with the Shoshoneans is seen in the use of 

 obsidian, and with the coastal Chumash in marine shells. The stea- 

 tite industry in the valley was evidently late ; although the material 

 was obtained locally, the use of steatite was probably learned from 

 the coastal people. Basketry making and weaving of mats were well 

 developed. Asphalt was used to make water-tight baskets. These 

 sites, which bridge the period between the historic and the pre- 

 historic, give us a picture of a long-continued simple and remarkably 

 static culture. 



