278 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 52 



The skeleton cavity exists in an irregular elevation upward of 3 

 yards in diameter and rising to about 18 inches above the surrounding 

 surface. This elevation, due in a slight degree to the earth thrown 

 out at the former digging, is one of the remnants of the earlier plain. 



The cavity is plainly a double or joint grave. There seems to be 

 some possibility of judging of the depth of tliis beneath the old 

 surface. The blackish earth, which, as previously mentioned, was 

 found to form the top of an elevation a few steps from the skeleton 

 cavity, can be interpreted only as a remnant of the former vegetal 

 earth of the plain. Extending toward the skeleton cavity the horizon 

 of the old surface indicated by tliis black earth, and remembering that 

 the uppermost part of the skull of one of the skeletons was somewhat 

 above the surface of the low elevation in the floor of the playa which 

 contained the grave, it is seen that the original vertical distance 

 between the top of the head of one of the buried bodies and the old 

 surface of the ground was only about 1 J or at most 2 feet. It appears 

 therefore that the interment might easily have been a fairly modern 

 burial. 



Amegliino says the Indians of these regions did not bury in graves 

 but made stone piles and that they had nothing to dig with. But 

 the sailor has now parts of two Indian skeletons dug out from graves, 

 with the earth still in and about the bones. Nothing at all was seen 

 or learned of cairns or stone piles in the region; in fact there are 

 nowhere any stones except the tosca and the pebbles near the beach. 

 Burials in the ground were found previously along the coast (Moreno) 

 and constitute the rule in the valley of the Eio Negro and in the sand 

 dunes farther north, toward San Bias. Besides, a large artificially- 

 edged piece of white quartzite, that would serve well for digging in 

 even hard ground, was found farther north by the writer,^ and there 

 were available at all times bones, antlers, and sticks suitable for 

 digging in the friable deposits of the surface. 



No trace of loose or broken tosca, as was said to have existed at one 

 place in the earth covering the skeletons, can be found in the earth 

 remaining from the former digging nor in the cavity itself. But its 

 existence would be no standard of antiquity, for calcareous concre- 

 tions form readily in the Argentine loess. 



In cleaning out the hole in which the human skeletons lay, it is 

 noticed, after the removal of all that had been blown in, that on 

 digging deeper than the first excavation, the earth is still soft, in 

 one place to the depth of about 8 inches. This is possibly earth 

 that had been removed in preparing the grave. It is not a part of 

 the undisturbed deposit which constitutes the flat and which offers 

 wherever exposed in the cavity, much greater resistance. 



1 One quite similar in size, shape, and material but of still better make, from near the left bank of the 

 Rio Neuqen, a short distance from Necoehea, came shortly afterward into the possession of Professor 

 Ameghino through the gardener, Parodi. 



