8 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 76 



ture, and were apparently used for different purposes. Their con- 

 tents were first determined b}' shallow test holes and several of these 

 mounds were found to be composed wholly of shells. Trial pits dug 

 into these revealed that this type was composed of refuse mollusk 

 shells, mainly oysters, clams, and conchs. These mounds were refuse 

 heaps and were once used as eating places. Their contents are the 

 unintentioned rejects of the cast-ofi: hard parts of the food animals.* 

 Mounds of this type vary in size and shape, probably resulting from 

 the way they were made. It is probable, for instance, that they 

 served various purposes, one of which might have been elevations 

 from which to observe the coming and going of canoes containing 

 either friends or enemies. Mounds of this type are often stratified. 

 Their stratification is uneven, and they are unsymmetrical. 



They yield very little of cultural import as artifacts are rarely 

 found in them, and ordinarily they are destitute of human skeletons. 

 Few whole pieces of pottery occur in shell deposits of this nature ; 

 the archeologist finds in them such broken fragments of implements 

 or utensils as would naturally be dropped and lost in them by those 

 who were using the mounds. The largest of this type of mound at 

 Weeden Island was examined superficially and excavations made 

 from top to base by means of a trench dug in it from periphery to 

 center. This whole mound had the appearance of a central eleva- 

 tion surrounded by a raised wall, which latter, upon examination, 

 proved to be formed by shells mixed with a very small quantity of 

 sand. The periphery of a movmd of this type is difficult to deter- 

 mine, since the top is worn down by erosion. The largest mounds 

 of this type have been leveled on one slope in order to plant a grove 

 of citrus trees, which thrive on soil of shell heaps, probably on account 

 of the decayed organic matter formed by the remains of the feasts. 

 Upon the surface of these shell heaps there is ordinarily a very thin 

 layer of blown sand in which grow small trees or bushes. The 

 appearance of the largest Weeden shell heap would not indicate, in 

 itself, a very great anticjuity, but the extension of the mound over 

 a large area and its height implies a considerable population. 



No artifacts were found in the wide trench dug into the main 

 Weeden mound from circumference to center, although fragments 

 of pottery and of bones of various genera of animals were scattered 

 throughout the mound. A good supply of fresh water is situated at 

 the periphery of this mound, and is now used as a well. 



^ On account of the haphazard way in which these eating mounds were 

 formed and the action of the elements enlarging their peripheries, charts of 

 their outlines are not very valuable. 



