hrdliCka] stone industries OF THE ARGENTINE COAST 



145 



coastwise sites and the several specialized varieties of implements of 

 pebble origin belonging with them; the chipped white quartzites of 

 the same localities; and the chipped artifacts of the southern or Rio 

 Negro area. In addition there are the various pecked-abraded 

 domestic utensils and weapons apparently common to the entire 

 region examined. The question is necessarily raised as to whether 



^<^^^5*. 



Fig. 39. Hammer-anvil of qiiartzite, used secondarily as a muller. (; actual size.) Viedma. 



more than one peo})le is represented and the archeologist is called on 

 to point out the bearing of the evidence. 



It may be said that in any area occupied by primitive peoples 

 having a range as great as 400 miles in length of coastal territory, it 

 is to be expected that more than one tribe, possibly more than one 

 linguistic stock, would be found, even at one and the same period. 

 In California a dozen stocks occupy a like extent of coast at the 

 present day. The culture of such contemporaneous tribes is not 



necessarily identi- 

 cal, but on the con- 

 trary is often de- 

 cidedly unlike, and 

 it does not seem 

 unreasonable to 

 suppose that sepa- 

 rate tribes prac- 

 ticing forms of art 

 in chipped stone 

 as distinctive as 

 those enumerated above should have occupied the middle coastal 

 region of Argentina at one and the same time. 



However, comparing the white quartzite work with the coast-peb- 

 ble work, w^e find the artifacts of both groups distributed over 

 exactly the same sites, never apart, and in like relations to the present 

 surface of the country, which is a surface of to-day rather than of any 

 21535°— Bull. .52—12 10 



Fig. 40. 



Leaf-shaped blades of brown jasper, probably rejects of manu. 

 facture. (J actual size.) San Bias. 



