ARt'llEOLOGICAL RKSKARCIIES TN AR(JENT[NA A.\l> I'.OI.INI \. ^Tf) 



As already iiK'nlioiuMl, in the majority of cases articles had Ix-eii 

 deposited iu the fj^raves with the (h'ad bodies; as a rule these arti- 

 cles consisted of a 1)()av1, some corncohs, and a cup. which at the 

 time of tlie burial was probably filled with water, as is the custom to 

 this day among the Chorotes Indians. Some graves, however, were 

 more ])lentifully supplied with similar articles, as small cu[)s of 

 burnt clay, clay bottles with painted ornamentation, a small red 

 clay bottle of a beautiful sliape and of a fine material, a clay bowl 

 with a handle in the shape of an animal's head. At the l)ott«)m 

 of this bowl there is a black cross, painted, and with arms of equal 

 size. Some corncobs were found in the l)owl. In one grave two cups 

 of exactly the same size and ai)|)earance were found, cut out of one 

 j)iece of a hard kind of wood (pi. ix, fig. 3) ; the exterior is richly 

 adorned with engraved oi'iiaments. The discovery so far from the 

 sea of some shells of marine nuissels, probably u^ed as spoons, is 

 remarkable. In these gravi's were further found a bone case 

 containing cactus j)rickles, used doubtless in tattooing, as is still 

 the case among the Chorotes; an instrument flattened like a s])oon 

 at one end; some of the so-called llama bits. It is ]X)ssible that the 

 objects in question were actually used for that purpose, but if so 

 1 presume that they were not placed in the animaFs mouth, but 

 across its nose, for I have not been able to discover any trace of 

 wear by the teeth on any of the numerous specimens T have come 

 across. On one of the ""bits" of the same description there is a 

 rein of llama wool fastened to it. 



Outside most of the grave grottoes I found that the sand for a 

 somewhat limited area around was mingled with splinters of pottery, 

 pieces of chipped stone, bones of animals, charcoal, etc. These 

 collections of remnants of a bygone civilization each extended over 

 an area of at the utmost 15 square meters; in places they were as 

 nuich as one-half meter in depth. That dwelling places and graves 

 were found so close together goes to show that the custom preva- 

 lent, for instance, among the Chiriguano Indians of burying the 

 dead near their residences Avas general in this portion of the Puna, 

 too. In the collections spoken of above I came upon some clay 

 vessels of rather larger size than the generality. Besides splinters 

 of pottery, chipped stone, charcoal, corncobs, and sundry bones of 

 llan.ias, etc., I also found there arrow and lance heads, axes, spindle 

 whorls, stone beads, etc. The axes or parts of axes discovered there 

 were made of schist and were all of approximately the same type. 

 One of the axes is about 15 millimeters thick and the edge has been 

 sharpened on one side. Some of the other axes found there, how- 

 ever, had their edges sharpened on both sides. Ambrosetti and 

 Lehmann-Nitsche describe implements of an exactly similar char- 

 acter, but thev do not seem to have found anv trace of the axes 



