﻿192 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 78 



Walla Walla, Deschutes, Wenatchee, Methow, Okanogan and others 

 began at the Dalles, in the state of Oregon, and continued to the 

 environs of Kettle Falls, near the Canadian border. The falls and 

 gorge of the Columbia River in the vicinity of the D'alles where the 

 Columbia breaks through the Cascades, mark the beginning of the 

 wooded area of the lower river which possessed an equally well 

 marked distinct type of native culture, the Indian tribes there using 

 principally wood in their arts and crafts, and the tribes of the middle 

 and upper river being expert stone cutters and workers in horn and 

 Ijone. Accompanied by Mr. H. T. Harding, a section of the river was 

 covered as far north as Wenatchee. Mr. Harding's assistance was in- 

 valuable as he is intimately acquainted with the archeology of the 

 region due to many years of experience in the field. Traces of Indian 

 occupation are being rapidly obliterated by the plow, which is today 

 the most productive excavator of antiquities. Where land has been 

 l)roug"ht under the plow, no record of former village sites and ceme- 

 teries is available other than that collected by members of the Columbia 

 River Archeological Society. 



Of the many sites inspected, excavation was undertaken at eight. 

 The site yielding the largest collection of material such as ceremonial 

 l)urial otTerings and skeletal material was the prehistoric site at 

 Wahluke in Grant County. There was no evidence of the burials there 

 ever having been disturbed. Neither was there any indication of Hud- 

 son Bay Company influence in the objects recovered from the graves, 

 such as trade beads of glass or of the shell beads which in historic 

 times were traded to the Indians as a substitute for the Dcntalkun 

 indianormn, or of iron tools and weapons. 



The village of Wahluke is located on the east bank of the Colum- 

 bia in Grant County, at a point where the river, which at this part of 

 its course flows north, strikes a precipitous escarpment formed of 

 yellowish gray volcanic debris and ash, known as White Blufi^s. The 

 Columbia here changes its course to a general southeasterly direction 

 and completes the final segment of the course known as the big bend. 

 Wahluke lies well within the territory occupied by the Shahaptian- 

 speaking tribes within historic times, although early accounts and 

 evidence obtained from the nature of the burial offerings indicated 

 that in prehistoric times the entire area on the north and west bank of 

 the Columbia as far south as the Dalles was Salish territory. 



White Bluffs, which lies hard against the northern end of Wahluke, 

 is a continuation of a range of hills known locally as Saddle Mountains 

 from the fact that the range extending from west to east lies at right 

 angles to the Columbia where it breaks through the narrow gorge just 



