212 BULLETIN 18 3, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



sandstone sharpening blocks, pierced deer phalanges, stone drill points 

 with expanded base, large stone effigy pipes, and such ubiquitous items 

 as hammerstones, pecking stones, and the use of hematite. Few, if 

 any, of the elements just enumerated have specific diagnostic value, 

 and taken by themselves most of them would be quite inconclusive as 

 to the cultural affinities of the site concerned. 



As for the burial complex, there is a close parallel between the 

 massed hilltop interments at Steed-Kisker and the somewhat simi- 

 larly situated Dickson cemetery on Spoon River in Fulton County, 

 111. (Cole and Deuel, 1937, p. 120). In each case the dead were in- 

 terred in close proximity to one another in the extended supine posi- 

 tion, with occasional individuals flexed or buried in a bundle. Asso- 

 ciated artifacts were much less common at Steed-Kisker, but the 

 straight-sided flat-bottomed bowl with opposing head and tail flanges, 

 the miniature handled and shoulder-incised ollas, as well as the badly 

 weathered fragment of Busycon columella and small triangular stone 

 arrowpoints, are all strongly reminiscent of specimen types at the 

 Dickson burial site. 



Because no serious attempt has yet been made at a comprehensive and 

 thoroughgoing statistical analysis of Middle Mississippi archeology, 

 and since our trait series from Steed-Kisker is relatively short, the 

 exact relationship of the Platte County materials to the general 

 horizon is at present uncertain. In classificatory terms, the sites with 

 which comparisons have been made above, except for the Gordon site, 

 have been grouped together in the ISIonks Mound aspect (Cole and 

 Deuel, 1937, p. 218). There can be no doubt, I think, that Steed- 

 Kisker stands in much closer relationship to this aspect than to any 

 of the more southerly manifestations such as Gordon-Fewkes, Etowah, 

 or eastern Arkansas. In respect to pottery types, burial methods, and 

 the general outlines of the known culture inventory, moreover, there 

 are numerous similarities to materials assigned to the Spoon River 

 (Illinois) focus, and, perhaps in lesser degree, to others incompletely 

 described but provisionally designated as the Kingston focus (Cole and 

 Deuel, 1937). There are also close resemblances to artifacts from 

 Cahokia where on the basis of recent archeological investigations, two 

 apparently distinct culture horizons have been recognized (Kelly, 

 1933, pp. 102-103; Titterington, 1938, p. 15). Neither of these "cul- 

 tures" has been fully inventoried as yet, and the pottery remains at 

 Steed-Kisker include vessel forms found apparently in both complexes 

 (see Titterington, 1938, fig. 43). I am not prepared to say how closely 

 some of the Platte County sherds resemble the "thin black polished 

 ware" attributed to the Old Village culture, but it should be noted that 

 such other Old Village items as platform mounds, ear spools, pottery 

 trowels, and stone blades have not been recorded for Steed-Kisker. 



