﻿66 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 76 



Perigneux. Angouleme and Gueret. Then followed a return to Paris 

 and a final trip to Havre where the very interesting and but little- 

 known prehistoric collections from the maritime district of Havre 

 were examined in the local museum. 



The trip resulted in an overwhelming sense of the greatness as well 

 as scientific importance of the field of early man in western and central 

 Europe, and in a keen appreciation of the opportunities for coopera- 

 tion in this field by American students. 



ARCHEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS IN SOUTH DAKOTA 



Mr. M. W. Stirling, assistant curator of the division of ethnology, 

 U. S. National Museum, spent the month of June, 1923, in the exami- 

 nation of old village sites on the Missouri River. The region investi- 

 gated was the 12-mile strip between Grand River and Elk Creek, 

 South Dakota. Much of the success of the exploration was due to the 

 able cooperation of Mr. E. S. Petersen of Mobridge, South Dakota. 



During the eighteenth and up to the middle of the nineteenth cen- 

 turies, the upper Missouri River was the scene of a very considerable 

 shifting of native populations. On the one hand there was a south to 

 north movement and a possible reverse tendency ; on the other hand 

 a general east to west movement in which such tribes as the Cheyenne, 

 Sutaro, Arapaho. and others, figured. These tribes before leaving the 

 Missouri River for the nomadic life of the plains were, according to 

 tradition, a sedentary agricultural people, living in earth-lodge vil- 

 lages like those of the Arikara, Mandan, and Hidatsa. The Grand 

 River formed the western pathway for these migrations, and we find 

 the point of intersection of these tribal movements in the vicinity of 

 the junction of the Grand River Avith the Missouri. To establish the 

 identity of the numerous sites in this region is a complex but interest- 

 ing task. 



In all, 10 of these old villages were visited and excavations carried 

 on in four. Three of these, on the west bank of the Missouri, Avere 

 identified as Arikara ; one being the historic upper village of the 

 Arikara visited by Lewis and Clark in 1 804 and later by Brackenridge 

 and Bradbury in iSii. The others were all prehistoric, but from the 

 presence of a few objects of European origin found in each, obviously 

 of post-Columbian age. The fourth site excavated is on the east bank 

 near the town of Mobridge and seems most likely to have been 

 Cheyenne. 



There is a close similarity existing between the material culture 

 remains of all of the upper Missouri tribes. Because of this fact, 



