Hoyme and Bass] SKELETAL REMAINS 379 



browridges, are interrupted, and resume their course on the parietals 

 above and behind the ears. Cuts, similar in position, depth and width, 

 but continuing almost completely around the scalp area are to be seen 

 in the skull of a girl 16-18 years old from South Dakota (site 39SL4, 

 USNM 381356). In none of these four cases is there any sign of 

 inflammatory reaction, such as would have been present if the persons 

 had survived for even the few days required for inflammatory changes 

 to begin (Stewart, 1956 ; Hamperl and Laughlin, 1959) .^* This would 

 suggest that the persons had been scalped either just before or shortly 

 after death. Marks elsewhere on the skeleton indicate that the three 

 persons from the Clarksville site were given the usual mortuary treat- 

 ment, to be described later, and then buried in the customary pits. 

 With one of the men (USNM 380850) there were four disk-shaped 

 shell beads; with the woman (USNM 380856) there was the body of 

 a child and a turtle carapace ; and immediately above the other man 

 (USNM 380865) there were a number of unidentifiable burned clay 

 objects. 



The evidence that these persons who were scalped received at least 

 the minimum mortuary rites accorded the other individuals whose 

 remains were buried at the Clarksville site poses a problem : Either, 

 for some reason, the Clarksvillers scalped their own people, or they 

 accorded proper burial to enemies brought to the site, w^ho were 

 scalped and killed there. From the writings of early visitors to the 

 Southeastern United States, summarized by S wanton (1946, pp. 686- 

 701), one gets the impression that scalping was associated almost 

 entirely with warfare. Scalps seem to have been valued trophies of 

 valor, and to have been taken both from those killed in combat and 

 from captives brought back to the village for torture, who were killed 

 and scalped there. The scalps of women and children were partic- 

 ularly prized, as evidence that the takers had penetrated beyond the 

 line of combat into the enemy village. DeBry's pictures, accompany- 

 ing LeMoyne's account of the Florida Indians (Lorant, 1946), show 

 the taking of the scalps and other trophies on the battlefield (picture 

 15), and the ceremonial in the village afterward (picture 16), when 

 these were hung on poles and cursed by the sorcerer, presumably to 

 bring further bad luck to the enemy. 



Friederici (1907), in summarizing the evidence on scalping in 

 America, assumes that the scalp was a substitute for taking the whole 

 head, and a trophy of high importance. In some areas, the dead 

 were dug up to obtain the scalps. If it were impossible to save a friend 

 from the enemy or to carry away his body, then the scalp at least was 



" In addition to summarizing the literature on this custom, Hamperl and Laughlin 

 (1959) describe a protohistorlc Ankara skull In which healing had taken place. 



