AMERICAN MUSEUMS 



49 



c 



Fig. 19. 



may be fairly conjectured, there are many others which 

 appear to be either personal ornaments or objects used 

 in favourite games, or for ceremonial purposes. Of 

 the former class are small stones of various forms, and 

 more or less 

 decorated with 

 pits or incised 

 lines, some of 

 which were 

 probably ear 

 ornam en t s, 

 others gorgets 



(Fig. 19). Great numbers of stone discs have been found, 

 of various sizes, from two or three up to eight inches in 

 diameter, some of which are worked beautifully true and 

 smooth. They are usually hollowed on one or both sur- 

 faces, and many have a 

 central perforation. Some 

 are formed of hard quartz- 

 ite, three or four inches 

 diameter, and must have 

 required an enormous 

 amount of labour to cut 

 and polish them without 

 a lathe or any of the ap- 

 pliances of the modern 

 lapidary. These were probably used in a game called 

 chungke, practised among some Indian tribes, and resem- 

 bling a combination 

 of bowls and spear- 

 throwing ; and the 

 Creek Indians had 

 chungke yards kept 

 smooth and level on 

 purpose for the game 

 (Fig. 20 c). The sup- 

 posed ceremonial 

 stones have been 

 found from Connecticut to Florida, mostly in mounds, 

 and are of very varied symmetrical forms, and all have a 



VOL. II. r. 



Fig. 21. 



