Hoyme and Bass] SKELETAL REMAINS 385 



To the DeBry adaptation of this drawing, Hariot adds the follow- 

 ing description : 



They build a Scaffolde 9. or 10. foot high as is expressed in this figure vnder 

 the tombs of their Weroans, or cheefe lordes which tliey cover with matts, and 

 lai the dead corpses of their weroans theruppon in manner following. First 

 the bowells are talcen forthe. Then laymge down the skinne, they cutt all the 

 flesh cleane from the bones, which they drye in the sun and well dryed they 

 inclose in Matts, and place at their feete. Then their bones (remauiinge still 

 fastened together with the ligaments whole and vncorrupted) are couered 

 agayne with leather, and their carcase fashioned as yf their flesh wear not taken 

 away. They lapp eache corps in his own skinne after the same is thus handled, 

 and lay yt in his order by the corpses of the other cheef lordes. . . . [in Swan- 

 ton, 1946, p. 719.] 



A variant of this procedure was used among the Choctaw in the 



I760's: 



The corpse was first laid on a scaffold near the house along with food and 

 property, the skull being painted red. ... A small bark fire was lighted under 

 the scaffold 4 days in succession. . . . After the flesh was thought to be 

 sufiiciently decayed, the bone picker or "buzzard man" of that particular canton 

 appointed a day, and in the presence of the mourners, who meanwhile sang 

 lugubrious songs, he removed the flesh from the bones and restored the latter 

 to the family, who put them into a chest made of bones and splints or a hamper 

 and took it in procession to the cantonal mortuary house. . . . Some writers 

 say the flesh was buried and some that it was burned — according to one, along 

 with the scaffold on which it rested. . . . After the charnel house had become 

 pretty well filled with boxes of bones, a final disposition was made of 

 them. . . . [Swanton, 1946, pp. 725-726.] 



Elsewhere in the Southeast, the bodies of chiefs were buried for 

 about a year, then exhumed for the removal of the remaining flesh 

 (Swanton, 1946, p. 729). 



Davidson (1935), summarizing early writings on the burial customs 

 of the Indians of the Delmarva peninsula, describes similar customs, 

 all involving the cleaning of the bones. In Virginia,^® the bodies of 

 prominent individuals, at least, were disemboweled, the skin slit up 

 the back and removed, the flesh cut from the bones by priest-officials 

 and dried, the skin replaced and packed with sand to enclose the 

 skeleton. These "mummies" were placed in a mortuary temple, such 

 as White illustrates (Lorant, 1946), and eventually found their way 

 to ossuaries. It would seem that this procedure was carried out not 

 very long after death. A variant of this custom, attributed to the 

 Lenape around Chester, Pennsylvania, was described by Lindstrom in 

 1654. After temporary burial for about a month, the body was ex- 

 humed, and each person present took a knife and proceeded to cut 

 the flesh from the bones. Some two hundred years later, the Lenape 

 custom had changed slightly. Temporary burial was omitted, and 



""After Hariot (1585), Smith (1608), and Strachey (1G12), given iu bibliography of 

 Davidson (1935). 



