NO. lO NEBRASKA ARCHEOLOGY STRONG 137 



edge is broken. Another broken shell spoon (pi. ii, fig. i, d) with a 

 carefully worked lug for the attachment of a wooden handle shows 

 signs of hard use but is undecorated. The third spoon or ladle is even 

 simpler, having a ground notch and a hole over and under the hinge, 

 presumably for the attachment of some sort of handle (pi. ii, fig. i, a). 

 A small hole (i mm in diameter) has been bored or punched through 

 the center of this artifact. 



The only other piece of worked shell is a small, carefully cut piece 

 of shell, 40 mm in length, rectangular in outline with a rounded point. 

 The upper end is broken, and the artifact suggests a tooth from a shell 

 comb. No work in copper or other metal was recovered. 



Basketry 



In the floor layer above cache 2 small baked clay fragments were 

 recovered which bore the imprint of what, at the time, was thought to 

 be corn on the cob. Later, in the laboratory, these imprints were com- 

 pared with that of charred corncobs from similar sites and with the 

 imprint of coiled basketry. It was quickly apparent that whereas the 

 corncobs left an irregular imprint on modeling clay, the coiled basketry 

 imprint was identical with those on the baked clay. The largest of 

 these baked clay mold fragments (40 mm in length) is illustrated 

 (pi. 16, fig. I, /). From this original imprint it can be seen that the 

 stitches alternate from row to row over what was probably a single 

 rod foundation. These small fragments are a clear indication that the 

 dwellers in house i used coiled basketry, although all other evidence 

 has vanished. 



Animal and MolluScan Remains 



For reasons previously stated, no careful analysis of the animal 

 remains from house 2 was possible. In the course of excavation the 

 bones of the bison, deer, and various smaller mammals were noted. 

 Deer bones were rather abundant, but bison bones were surprisingly 

 rare. Rodent skulls and bones were numerous in cache 2, evidently 

 having been left by the inhabitants. Other rodent remains elsewhere 

 in the excavation were probably of accidental occurrence, since the 

 already disturbed soil of a house site is favorable to their burrowing 

 activities. At the top of cache 2 a considerable mass of fishbones has 

 been noted. The only identifiable remains were the spines of large 



