appendix: EF.F.PHANT pipes and INSCKIHEO lAHLKl'S. 541 



authenticated facts seem to sufficiently establish the genuineness of 

 these interesting relics. 



"Mr. Putnam observes that, 'their authenticity established, arch;^3l- 

 ogists will find in them strong corroborative testimony that man and 

 the mastodon were contem[)orary on this continent.' 



"The pam[>hlet closes with an appendix in which a figure is given of 

 one of the elephant pipes. The form of the elephant, and the large 

 ears and trunk, are unmistakable, but the tusks are wanting.' — Mav, 

 1885. 



Nature, London, EnglaiiJ. 



"The most recent contribution to the much-discussed question of the 

 origin of the Mound-builders of the United States is a pamphlet by Mr. 

 C. E. Putnam, issued by the Academy of Natural Sciences of Daven- 

 port, Iowa. The Bureau of Ethnology connected with the Smithsonian 

 Institution champions the theory that the race which constructed these 

 mounds may be traced to the ancestors of the present American In- 

 dians, while another school of archaeologists holds that the Afound- 

 builders were more advanced in civihzation than the American Indians, 

 and have endeavored to trace them to a Mexican origin or to some 

 common ancestry. This being the broad question at issue, the Dav- 

 enport Academy, which appears to have adopted no theory on the sub- 

 ject, became possessors by donation of three inscribed tablets and two 

 elephant pipes — /. e.^ pipes with the figure of an elephant carved on 

 them — which are stated to have been found in Iowa. In the words of 

 Mr. Putnam, 'if their authenticity is established, then arch;eologists will 

 find in them strong corroborative evidence that man and the mastodon 

 were contemporary on the American continent, and the Mound-builders 

 were a race anterior to the ancestors of the present American Indians 

 and of higher type and more advanced civilization.' But doubts have 

 been cast on the authenticity of these curious relics by the Bureau of 

 Ethnology, and the Davenport Academy has taken the matter up with 

 some warmth. Mr. Putnam's pamphlet is the Academy's re[)ly, and is 

 a vigorous defense of the genuineness of the elephant pipes and in- 

 scribed tablets. It describes in detail the circumstances under which 

 they were discovered, the witnesses present, etc., and lays especial 

 stress on the fact that the two pipes were dug up at different times and 

 places, by independent persons, one, at least, of whom had no notion 

 of the value of the object. The whole subject is one of extraordinary 

 interest, and Mr. Putnam's statement, vouched as it is by a formal res- 

 olution of the Davenport Academy, must play an important part in any 

 subsequent discussion as to the value to be attached to these remains, 

 which, if authentic, are acknowledged to have much infiuence on the 

 final settlement of the question as to who the .Mound-builders were." — 

 April 1 6th, 1 88 5. 



[Proc. D. a. N. S., Vol. IV.J 38 [March 13, ISSti.J 



