200 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 179 



reason to go into detailed description. They included projectile points, 

 awls, scrapers, and drills. Although no trade goods of European 

 origin were found in the houses, a few glass beads were uncovered 

 in the midden tests. This is, of course, no proof that the site should 

 be dated by these finds. Later utilization of the terrace could have 

 been responsible for the occurrence of the trade beads. However, the 

 material culture, especially the small projectile points, strongly sug- 

 gests that the site was occupied during the late prehistoric period. 

 Trade beads might have found their way into the area as early as 

 1740 or 1750. Osborne (1953, p. 263) would date the site as early 

 18th century at the latest. 



ECONOMY 



Among the animal bones recovered at 45-BN'-53 were those of 

 deer, elk, rabbit, various birds, dog, fish, and bison (ibid., p. 261). 

 Horse and antelope bones were absent. Fishbones were not as nu- 

 merous as one might have expected, and suckers were more common 

 than salmon. The horse was absent in all precontact sites in this 

 region; it was not found at Techumtas Island (35-UM-17), a site 

 believed to be contemporaneous with 45-BN-53. The economy, there- 

 fore, was apparently identical with that described for site 35-UM-17. 

 Hunting, fishing, and gathering seem to have had nearly equal 

 importance. 



SITE 45-WW-6 (WALLULA) 



The Wallula site (45-VVW-6) was located at the confluence of the 

 Walla Walla and Columbia Rivers, in the southeast corner of the 

 State of Washington. The village was built on a slight elevation 

 about 50 yards from the east bank of the Columbia, and the same 

 distance from the north bank of the Walla Walla. (Map 6.) 



About a mile downstream from the Walla Walla River the Colum- 

 bia flows through a considerable gorge, the result of cutting through 

 the Horse Heaven Hills. Local tradition has it that the hills once 

 dammed a deep lake within what is now a large open valley. Thou- 

 sands of years ago, the water burst the natural dam, cut the gorge 

 and drained the lake, all according to local "authorities." How much 

 of this is based on scientific examination of the geological facts it was 

 not possible to ascertam. At any rate, the broad flat valley is there 

 and supports the small cities of Pasco, Kennewick, and Hanford. 



The site itself was approximately 200 feet long and perhaps 60 to 

 80 feet wide. The subsurface material was coarse river gravel, with 

 a 2- or 3-foot layer of yellowish sand on top of the gravel. The mid- 

 den was about 3 feet in depth near the center of the site, and rested 

 directly on the sterile sand. Toward the edges of the site the ground 

 sloped away gradually, and the midden thinned out proportionally. 



