pip. Nof'2l]""' SHEEP ISLAND — OSBORNE, BRYAN, CRABTREE 295 



sites. In plate IV of Osborne's report (1949) are illustrated 38 chipped-stone 

 pieces; there are 26 to 28 that Garth might have used for his figure 41. He 

 appears to have considered the illustration an adequate sample of illustrated 

 artifacts from the two sites. Had he turned to Osborne's page 36 he would 

 have found further data and a statement as to the actual number of points 

 found, together with a brief categorization of them. 



12. It would be of distinct service to workers in the field of Plateau archeol- 

 ogy to know what the rectangular shell lip pendants (not illustrated) are. 

 None of the present authors recognize the artifact. 



The section above was concerned largely with errors or minor 

 criticisms of Garth's presentation. There follows an examination of 

 what seems, at least at the present, the more serious disagreements 

 between him and other workers in the area. No doubt many of these 

 points will have been noted by other readers. 



1. First is the question of exposure "probably on a platform" 

 (p. 41) and painting of the bones with red ocher. None of the bones 

 from the area seen by us mdicate a painting although there is a stain- 

 ing which might well have been due to a liberal sprinkling of red 

 ocher during or before the cremation ceremonies. It hardly need be 

 pointed out that the structures of exposure platforms, red ocher 

 painting, and cremations that Garth has reared will not support its 

 own weight, to say nothing of becoming a foundation for a Sahaptin 

 cremation complex. Later (p. 55), Garth appears to have realized 

 that exposure (probably on platforms?) is out of place in the region, 

 for he suggests a possible Plains origin. This is more possible but 

 is of course far more recent than the cremations that he described on 

 page 41. 



The University of Washington excavations at Kabbit Island, super- 

 intended by Crabtree (Crabtree, MS., 1957) and supported by the 

 National Park Service and Washington State College in 1951 and by 

 the University in 1952, uncovered a cultural and natural stratigraphy : 



1. Extended burials with a crude chipped-stone industry, all gen- 

 erally below a hard calichelike layer; (2) above, with burial pits 

 occasionally partly penetrating the caliche layer, was a later complex 

 of flexed interments accompanied by stone artifacts similar to those 

 usually found with historic or late prehistoric burials. It would 

 be of help to have something more of the burial stratigraphy of 

 Garth's child burial (p. 44), but its slight depth (1.6 feet) and burial 

 in compacted sand indicate that it cannot be associated with the old 

 extended burials as Garth attempted to do. The error of inferring 

 close cultural relationships from an "abundance of red ocher" (p. 44) 

 is an old one in Eastern American archeology. It is not necessary 

 that it be repeated in the West. Too, an abundance of coloring here 

 in the Plateau would be considered only a moderate expression else- 

 where. 



