MyER] GORDON TOWN SITE Dd 
added to the warmth of the interior, and aided in keeping out surface 
water. This ring has worn down with the lapse of time. 
This left a raised platform or banquette, 4 feet wide, around the 
inside of the wall of the house. In this banquette upright posts had 
probably been fixed, supporting shelves or bunks of woven cane 
stems. These supporting posts were about 2 to 214 feet in height, 
and the shelves were used as seats by day and as beds by night. The 
hairy hides of large animals, like deer and bear, were spread on these 
bunks for mattress and cover. The space underneath was used for 
storage. At a point where the banquette met the floor were found 
several objects which either had been stored under the edge of these 
beds or had become covered with débris. 
The following account of the Omaha structures of the middle of 
the nineteenth ceatury may throw some light on those of Gordon 
site. 
The earth lodge [pl. 101, 6] was a circular dwelling, having walls about | 8 feet 
high and a dome-shaped roof, with a central opening for the escape “of smoke 
1.243 FOUND HERE 
ple fi LA 
Fic. 130.—Diagram showing depth of the remains in circle No. 3 
and the admission of light. The task of building an earth lodge was shared by 
men and women. The marking out of the site and the cutting of the heavy logs 
were done by the men. When the location was chosen, a stick was thrust in 
the spot where the fireplace was to be, one end of a rawhide rope was fastened 
to the stick and a circle 20 to 60 feet in diameter was drawn on the earth to mark 
where the wall was to be erected. The sod within the circle was removed, the 
ground excavated about a foot in depth, and the earth thrown around the circle 
like an embankment. Small crotched posts about 10 feet high were set 8 or 10 
feet apart and 114 feet within the circle, and on these were laid beams. Outside 
this frame split posts were set close together, having one end braced against the 
beams, thus forming a wall of timber. The opening generally, though not always, 
faced the east. Midway between the central fireplace and the wall were planted 
4 to 8 large crotched posts about 10 feet in height, on which heavy beams rested, 
these serving to support the roof. This was made of long, slender, tapering trees 
stripped of their bark. These were tied at their large ends with cords (made 
from the inner bark of the linden) to the beams at the top of the stockade and at 
the middle to those resting in the crotches of the large posts forming the inner 
circle about the fireplace. The slender ends were cut so as to form the circular 
opening for the smoke, the edges being woven together with elm twine, so as to be 
firm. Outside the woodwork of the walls and roof, branches of willow were laid 
crosswise and bound tight to each slab and pole. Over the willows a heavy 
thatch of coarse grass was arranged so as to shed water. On the grass was 
placed a thick coating of sod. The sods were cut to lap and be laid like shingles. 
Fletcher and La Flesche, ‘“‘The Omaha Tribe,’ Twenty-seventh Ann. Rept. Bur. Amer. Ethn., 
pp. 97-99, Washington, 191]. 
