(le Laguna] ARCHEOLOGY, YAKUT AT BAY AREA, ALASKA 29 



at what would appear to be the confluence of the Ustay and a western 

 tributary, but it is so inaccurate that no rehancc can be pkced upon it. 



According to our informants, Gusex had originally been an Atlia- 

 baskan Tluk'^axAdi settlement before the THngit Tl'uknaxAdi built 

 houses here. The names of five houses were mentioned, and the posts 

 of one were said to have been visible 40 or 50 years ago. It was from 

 this town that the Tl'uknaxAdi sent war parties against the Tlaxayik- 

 Teqwedi on Situk River and Yakutat Bay, and to it they brought the 

 Russian cannon and other treasures taken from their defeated enemies. 

 The town was abandoned about the middle of the last century, after 

 many of the men from it were drowned in Lituya Bay when going 

 to make war on the Chilkat. 



According to one native infonnant, this site was located about 4 

 miles (on a direct hne) from the coast (see above) ; another placed it 

 at the entrance to a former channel some distance down the Akwe and 

 about 2 miles (on a direct line) from the shore. The latter described 

 this place as having four or five house pits and one earth-covered house. 

 The only site which it was possible for Riddell and Lane to reach was 

 still farther downstream. 



27. This was a site in a clearing on the west bank of the Akwe, 

 opposite its (present) confluence with the Ustay River. There are 

 several pits which may indicate former houses or caches, but digging 

 failed to expose any cultural deposits. 



Tebenkov's "Farther Village," is located farther upstream, on the 

 west bank near the junction of the Tanis and Gines. Natives re- 

 ported a site on Gines ("Williams") Creek. 



28. A modern settlement was near the mouth of Stuhinuk Creek 

 on the west side of Dry Bay. Here were native houses, some built 

 as recently as 1909 or 1910, and the remains of a cannery, built and 

 abandoned between 1901 and 1912. Moser's map (1901, pi. xliii) 

 indicates a village here in 1901. 



About half a mile northeast of Kakanhini Creek and 2 miles north- 

 w^est of Dry Bay, aerial photographs indicate an almost circular 

 pattern in the heavy forest growth, according to Don J. Miller (letter, 

 Oct. 30, 1957). "The photographs give the impression that trees 

 were cut down around the circumference of a circle about 1, 200 feet 

 in diameter, but were left untouched or only partly thinned out 

 within the circle." Miller did not visit this locahty, nor did our 

 party, so we do not know what this might be, although it is suggestive 

 of a fortified town. 



29. Other sites reported in the Dry Bay area are on the north shore 

 of the bay on the west bank of the Alsek, and a town farther down- 

 stream caUed "It repeatedl}^ shakes" (Tlingit). There were also 

 settlements on Easting River, or possibly on Dohn River, streams 



