ART. 11 PEEHISTOKIC PIT HOUSE VILLAGE SITE KEIEGER 17 



White pine (pinus moniicola) Firewood; canoes. 



Red fir {Pseudotsuga mucronata) - . Firewood. 



Juniper {Junipera occidenialis) Berries for food; uses varied. 



Wild onion {Alium geycri) Food. 



Wild carrot (Daucus pusillus) Do. 



Ash wood Used as bow staves. 



Wild tobacco "kinnikkinnik" Smoked in pipes as tobacco. 



(Valeriana edulis). 



Lichen (Aledoria sp.) Used as a food when stripped from bark of 



pine trees and boiled. 

 Huckleberry (Vacciniujn membra- Used as food, both fresh and preserved. 



naceum) . 



Spruce root As a twine and in making coiled or twined 



baskets. 



Sunflower seed (Helianthus sp.) Food. 



Currant (Ribes aureum) Do. 



Gooseberry (and many other varie- Do. 



ties of berries gathered in the 



mountains in midsummer). 

 Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis).. Used as a food. 



Wapato (Sagittaria latifolia) Roots used as a food. 



Kouse (Lomatium kaus) Tubers used as a food in much the same 



manner as camas. 



C&msis (Camassia esculenta) Tuberous roots used as food which was 



roasted in ovens and dried. 



Habitation structures at Wahluke, as indicated by their ruins, were 

 semisubterranean circular pit houses. They were 30 in number. No 

 evidence remained to show the type of superstructure, as practically 

 all of the original framework had rotted away. This condition is in 

 striking contrast with the well-preserved artifacts of wood that were 

 exhumed from cremation burials. Sunilar conditions of decay in pit- 

 house ruins were noted at Pasco, Vantage Ferry, at the mouth of the 

 Yakima River, and elsewhere. One possible explanation of this 

 condition is to attribute greater age to such structures than to the 

 cremation burials. Another more plausible explanation is that the 

 excavations for pit-house structures are usually on a lower bench than 

 the cemetery and that during an unusually high stage of the river were 

 inundated, water often remaining within these pits for an entire season. 

 Decay of all wood framework and utensils, such as were used, was 

 inevitable. The pit house as a habitation was formerly built by 

 peoples in British Columbia, in Alaska along the Yukon, and on the 

 coastal islands from the Aleutians to Bering Straits, also in Siberia, 

 This habitation structure was formerly known to groups of Plains 

 Indians, as the Pawnee, Mandan, and others. It survives as a cere- 

 monial chamber among the Pima, Pueblo, and certain California tribes, 

 and as a sweat house among the Columbia River Indians. 



Two such structures were observed by the writer — one at the lower 

 falls of the Yakima River and the other at the mouth of Crab Creek. 



