43^ NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Shell pendants. The midcolonial Iroquois used shell pendants 

 of various forms in great numbers. Grave discoveries indicate that 

 these were used mostly on strings of shell wampum. Usually they 

 were shaped in the effigy of some bird, fish or animal. A few take 

 the human form, especially the face, and some resemble the beaks or 

 claws of birds and animals. A few have the form of serpents. The 

 drilling of most specimens indicates that they were made after the 

 coming of the whites, by the aid of steel tools. It is even possible 

 that commercial manufacturers of wampum made some runtees and 

 shell pendants for there is a remarkable similarity and almost 

 mechanical likeness of certain patterns. 



Shell pendants of the kind described have been found in the 

 colonial Onondaga county sites in large numbers, not only in graves 

 but in refuse dumps. Among the Seneca they were used in all the 

 midcolonial and late colonial villages, and numerous specimens have 

 been found on such sites. Large numbers have also been found on 

 Cayuga sites. Good specimens, however, are rather uncommon, 

 since exfoliation gradually has destroyed many that otherwise would 

 have remained. The Heye expedition found shell pendants of 

 unusual form and in a fine state of preservation in a Minsi cemetery 

 in New Jersey. For types found in New York see plate 135. 



Sinew stones. The so-called sinew stone is a pebble or fragment 

 of sandstone having its edges so seamed and worn as to resemble a 

 flat piece of shoemaker's wax. Specimens appear to have been pur- 

 posely shaped by having the incisions sawed in by flint knives. The 

 subsequent smoothing seems to have been done by the rubbing of 

 sinews as in smoothing a bowstring or in sizing sinew thread. Sinew 

 stones are usually of sandstone, though certain harder stones some- 

 times were used. Most sinew stones are broken when found and 

 complete specimens may be considered among the rarer of aboriginal 

 tools. There are instances where a broken celt or even a perfect 

 specimen has been incised as to resemble a sinew stone. The New 

 York State Museum possesses more than a dozen fine specimens of 

 this type of abrading implement. 



It may be seriously quest : oned whether or not sinew stones were 

 used as their names suggest in all cases. An examination of certain 

 types of broad-based projectile points shows that the bases are rub- 

 bed smooth, all the sharp edges being ground down. By taking a 

 broad-based point and sawing the base into a sandstone pebble, 

 grooves in the sandstone similar to those of a s : new stone can be 

 made, and the arrow point base becomes smoothed as in actual 

 ancient specimens. 



