306 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 189 



a meaningful understanding of the people represented by these arche- 

 ological data. 



The excavated remains that have been assigned to the Good Soldier 

 Component at site 39LM238 were recovered from the two top strata 

 of a natural mound. Features, of which there were four, consisted of 

 concentrations of worked and/or unworked mammal bone, stone arti- 

 facts, and pottery fragments. One rather interesting feature was a 

 line of cobblestones associated with postholes and a firepit. The 

 inventory of pottery, stone, and bone was indeed meager; of these 

 specimens, only pottery and specifically vessel rims, are diagnostic 

 enough to show relationships between the Good Soldier Component 

 and certain other sites. 



The ceramic collection from the Good Soldier Component includes 

 vessel rims assigned to five pottery types. Each of these types is 

 characterized by globular vessels having constricted necks. The rims 

 are straight, slightly flaring or collared. The trait of simple- 

 stamping the exterior surface of the vessels is common to each of the 

 types. This trait is generally associated with the "farming-hunting 

 villages" of the late prehistoric and historic peoples who lived on the 

 northern and central Great Plains. The earliest date on a simple- 

 stamped pottery occupation in these regions is from the Thomas Riggs 

 site (39HU1), a rectagular house village in Hughes County, S. Dak. 

 A charcoal specimen from this site provided a carbon-14 date of A.D. 

 1228 ±200 years (Missouri Basin Chronology Program, Statement 

 No. 2, Missouri Basin Project, June 15, 1959, Lincoln) . 



A site bearing close artif actual relationships to the Good Soldier 

 Component is the Spain site (39LM301). This small, compact 

 village is located about 1 mile upstream from the mouth of Bull 

 Creek in Lyman County, S. Dak. The creek flows eastward into the 

 Missouri River about 33 miles downstream from the Good Soldier site. 

 Excavations at the Spain site were conducted in 1953 by a field party 

 of the University of Kansas under the direction of Carlyle S. Smith. 



The principal occupation at the Spain site has been designated Com- 

 ponent A and is characterized by a small, prehistoric village situated 

 in the tree-sheltered bottoms of a minor stream course (Smith and 

 Grange, 1958). The remains of two and probably four earth lodges 

 were located on low hummocks or rises. The ecological situation 

 closely duplicates what was found at the Good Soldier site, where the 

 occupational remains were concentrated on a low, natural rise in a 

 narrow stream valley. 



The one completely excavated house at Spain had a basin-shaped 

 floor 29 feet in diameter and an extended entryway 7 feet long and 4 

 feet wide. The entryway faced southeastward toward Bull Creek. 

 Features within the house included a central hearth, a secondary 



