FEWKES] ABSENCE OF CAUCASIAN EVIDENCES 741 
No object made of metal was found at Sikyatki, nor is there any evi- 
dence that the ancient people of that pueblo ever saw the Spaniards or 
used any implement of their manufacture. While negative evidence 
can hardiy be regarded as a safe guide to follow, so far as knowledge of 
copper is concerned, it is possible that the people of ancient Tusayan 
pueblos, in their trading expeditions to southern Arizona, may have 
met races who owned small copper bells and trinkets of metal. TI can 
hardly believe, however, that the Tusayan Indians were familiar with 
the art of tempering copper, and even if objects showing this treatment 
Shall be found hereafter in the ruins of this province it will have to be 
proved that they were made in that region, and not brought from the 
far south. 
No glazed pottery showing Spanish influence was found at Sikyatki, 
but there can hardly be a doubt that the art of glazing pottery was 
practiced by the ancestors of the Tusayan people. The modern potters 
of the Hast Mesa never glaze their pottery, and no fragment of glazed 
ware was obtained from the necropolis of Sikyatki. 
PERISHABLE CONTENTS OF MORTUARY FOOD BOWLS 
It is the habit of the modern Tusayan Indians to deposit food of 
various kinds on the graves of their dead. The basins used for that 
purpose are heaped up with paper-bread, stews, and various delicacies 
for the breath-body of the deceased. Naturally from its exposed posi- 
tion much of this food is devoured by animals or disappears in other 
ways. There appears excellent evidence, however, that the mortuary 
food offerings of the ancient Sikyatkians were deposited with the body 
and covered with soil and sometimes stones. 
The lapse of time since these burials took place has of course caused 
the destruction of the perishable food substances, which are found to be 
simple where any sign of their former presence remains. Thin films 
of interlacing rootlets often formed a delicate network over the whole 
inner surface of the bowl. Certain of the contents of these basins in 
the shape of seeds still remain; but these seeds have not germinated, 
possibly on account of previous high temperatures to which they have 
been submitted. A considerable quantity of these contents of mor- 
tuary bowls were collected and submitted to an expert, the result of 
whose examination is set forth in the accompaning letter: 
U. 8. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, Division or Botany, 
Washington, D. C., March 25, 1896. 
DEAR Dr FEWKEs: Having made a cursory examination of the samples of sup- 
posed vegetable material sent by you day before yesterday, collected at Sikyatki, 
Arizona, in supposed prehistoric burial places, I have the following preliminary 
report to make: 
No. 156247. A green resinous substance. I am unable to say whether or not this 
is of vegetable origin. 
No. 156248. A mass of fibrous material intermixed with sand, the fibers consisting 
in part of slender roots, in part of the hair of some animal. 
