52 SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 



shallow water, coral reefs, and keys. The island consists of two parts, 

 a northern and a southern section, the latter apparently uninhabited 

 in prehistoric times, as there are no shell middens along the coast, and 

 the caves hear no evidence of former Indian occupancy. Traces of 

 aboriginal culture or prehistoric human remains are limited to spo- 

 radic surface finds. The many caves explored by the writer in the Casas 

 and Caballo Mountains of the northern portion of the island revealed 

 no trace of prehistoric human occupancy. 



Next was undertaken a reconnaissance of the known sites of former 

 Indian villages, shell heaps, and kitchen middens of the extreme 

 western portion of Pinar del Rio Province. Working from the village 

 of Guane, the writer investigated caves and former Indian village sites 

 in the Valle San Juan, at Cayo Redondo, and Vihales. Shell heaps and 

 village sites are here clearly distinguishable, in part as Ciboney and 

 in part as Arawak in origin. There is no evidence of other extraneous 

 culture stages. Clearly the Maya did not influence the culture of 

 western Cuba. 



The scene of our investigations was next shifted to southeastern 

 Cuba and to the southern coast of the Province of Camaguey. Here at 

 El Caney de las Muertos in the vicinity of Santa Maria de Casimba 

 Bay, as early as 1846, Rodriguez-Ferrer had made the first systematic 

 excavation in Cuba of an Indian shell midden or kitchen refuse heap. 



Attention was recently called to the thirty-odd circular caneyes or 

 refuse mounds of southern Camaguey Province in a letter from 

 Leonard B. Fox, of Florida, Cuba, in which he describes the results 

 of an excavation by him of a " mound about 30 feet high by 100 feet 

 in diameter," consisting of " successive layers a foot to a foot and a 

 half in thickness of shells and ashes. In the layers of shells we found 

 several very crude utensils made of shell and stone, but no sign of 

 pottery." Mr. Fox lent every assistance to the writer, at the occasion 

 of his visit, as did also the officials of the two neighboring sugar 

 centrals, Florida and Agramonte. 



Much remains to be done before the non- Arawak Indian cultures 

 of Cuba, Haiti, Santo Domingo, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico may be 

 assigned their proper place in the prehistory of the Antilles. The 

 writer feels assured that during their comparatively brief occupancy 

 of Cuba, the Arawak had practically eliminated their primitive pred- 

 ecessors, the Ciboney. Future investigation should discover whether 

 the Ciboney themselves had gradually passed through several culture 

 stages, or whether the marked differences apparent in the widely 

 distributed, non-pottery-yielding non-Arawak shell middens and ref- 

 use heaps of Santo Domingo, Haiti, and Cuba are ascribable to early 

 arrivals from Florida and the Bahama Islands. 



