SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I928 I45 



above the reach of the sea. A considerable period of time must be 

 allowed to account for the sinking of the land or the encroachment of 

 the sea to such an extent. 



In addition to the evidence of the sinking of the land, the antiquity 

 of the Punuk village site is attested l^y the enormous accumulation of 

 refuse, by the leveled and filled-in appearance of the house pits, and 

 most significant of all, by the large number of implements, weapons, 

 and other objects differing markedly from those used by the modern 

 Eskimo. Among the objects from the later houses were iron tools 

 of many kinds ; closed-socket thick harj^oon heads with metal blades ; 

 relatively flat adz heads ; and small ivorv Ijird figures. In contrast to 

 these forms the older village yielded open-socket thin harpoon heads 

 with slate blades ; closed-socket heads of a distinctive type, usually 

 decorated ; '' shoe-shaped " adz heads ; drills of bone and ivory ; spear 

 thrower and peg insets for l)utt of darts used with it : and plummet 

 shaped ivory fish line sinkers. Among the several thousand speci- 

 mens excavated from the older site there were onl\' four small ]')ieces 

 of iron and two blue glass beads, all of which came from a depth 

 no greater than i6 inches. 



The incised ornamentation appearing on many of the bone and ivory 

 objects from the old village is of a type heretofore known from a few 

 random specimens from St. Lawrence Island. In its most typical 

 form it consists of dots and gracefully incised lines, straight or slightly 

 curved, into which red ochre had often l)een rubbed. The circle and 

 dot design, emplo} ed in conjunction with more typical line decoration, 

 was also found. This Punuk type of Eskimo art appears to be inter- 

 mediate both in time and in style between the most ancient, which 

 has come to light only within the past three years, and the modern. 



With the possible exception of the upper level, the Punuk settlement 

 is prehistoric, though it is later than the old sites such as Kukuliak 

 and Sevuokuk on the northern and northwestern parts of the island. 

 If the few pieces of iron and the two glass beads are to l)e regarded 

 as properly belonging where found and not as later intrusions they 

 place the abandonment of the village at a time following the entry 

 of the Russians into northeastern Siberia in the middle of the seven- 

 teenth century, for shortly thereafter the Alaskan Eskimo secured 

 small quantities of metal in trade from the Chukchi. 



Late in July a brief trip was made in a wdiale boat to Cape Kialegak 

 on the southeastern end of St. Lawrence Island. Here was found an 



