822 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1895. 



to liave made what lie thought may have been intended, or perhaps 

 even ventured to introduce a British sjanbolic figure, the signification 

 of which he did comprehend. 



It is probable, also, that, in the absence of good tools for engraving 

 metals, some of the simpler designs were made by using a pointed 

 punch or like tool, and punching the i)atterns or parts of i)atterns 

 desired. The pellet, surrounded by a ring of pellets, was equivalent 

 to a ring with its nucleus, as in plate 46, fig. 8. The figure also pre- 

 sents itself as a circle with four small pellets arranged in the form of a 

 cross, and plate 46, figs. 2 and 6, and finally in the semblance of a wheel 

 with six, seven, or eight spokes, illustrations of which are given in 

 plate 46, figs. 7 and 8, and plate 47, figs. 1, 2, and 8. Leaving ofi" the 

 circle suggested a cross, as in the former, and a star, as in plate 47, fig. 

 3, both without doubt Druidical symbols, as was also the nucleated 

 ring, of all of which numerous examples occur. This cross or star form 

 ultimately gave rise to imitations of crab-like objects, which in turn 

 were interpreted to denote figures resembling the hand. Such gradual 

 though persistent imitation resulted in some remarkably dissimilar 

 patterns, as may be noted by comparing the typical Philippus in plate 

 46, fig. 1, with the illustration, plate 46, figs. 5 and 6, while beneath the 

 figure of a disjointed horse on plate 47, fig. 3, the star survives; wliile 

 the head upon the obverse retains but a few rectangular marks to denote 

 leaves, while the right-hand upper figure signifies the eye, and the lower 

 broken circle, bearing a <-shaped attachment, the mouth. 



The A, whi(!h has been referred to as a variant, and rarely occurring 

 beneath the body of the horse, has been reproduced as a triangle, the 

 angles of which consist of nucleated circles connected by short lines. 

 This symbol is also an astronomical character, and is of frequent occur- 

 rence on various petroglyphs located in that area of country formerly 

 occupied by the several tribes of Indians composing the Shoshonian 

 linguistic family. 



Again, the same object figures extensively in the mnemonic records 

 of the Ojibwa Indians, especially those records relating to the sha- 

 manistic ritual of the Mide'wiwin, or Grand Medicine Society, elsewhere 

 described in detail.^ Another symbol found in lieu of the triangle, 

 though without doubt a variant of it, resembles an Ojibwa symbol to 

 denote " the mystic power of looking into the earth and there discov- 

 ering sacred objects." It consists of three rings, or perhaps even 

 nucleated rings, placed in the form of a triangle, a wavy line extending 

 around the upper circle and downward to either side toward the lower 

 ones, denoting '• lines of vision." What the signification of the char- 

 acter upon the coins may have been it is impossible to imagine, unless 

 it were merely a variant of the A , which in turn may have been a con- 

 ventionalized form of the helmet, as shown in the typical Philippus on 



1 See tlie writer's exposition of this ritual in the Seventh Annual Report of the 

 Bureau of Ethnology for 1885-86, 1891, p. 143. 



