538 PREHISTORIC VILLAGES IN TENNESSEE (ETH. ANN. 41 
At many points in Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, Missouri, and 
Arkansas, wherever the people probably kindred to those of the Gor- 
don site in Tennessee have dwelt, objects of stone, copper, shell, and 
pottery, decorated with these sacred four world-quarter crosses and 
sun symbols, have been found. 
A Cherokee doctor in some of the treatments of a patient makes 
a circle around him, halting at the east, south, north, and west in 
this exact order. At the east he prays to the red spirits who dwell 
on high in the east—the land of the dawn. At the south he prays 
to the white spirits who dwell on high in the gentle south. At the 
north he prays to the blue spirits who dwell on high in the cold and 
forbidding north. And then he turns to the west and prays to the 
black spirits dwell- 
soled # ing on high in the 
west, the mysterious, 
darkening land of the 
sunset and night. 
BurraL AT CoRNER 
or Grave 
On the exterior of 
the stone-slab grave, 
Fic. 151.—Restoration of pot from top of grave E E, Figure 150, but 
adjoining the northeast corner of it, was a compact mass of small 
human bones, occupying a space of about 6 by 5 inches, which had 
been buried after decay of the flesh. Many of the bones had been 
placed within the brain cavity in order to make the heap as small as 
possible. This child was between 2 and 3 years of age. 
This small heap was covered by the fragments of a little vessel 
334 inches in height and 414 inches in diameter at its widest part 
(pl. 116). About one-fourth of it was missing. This vessel had 
probably been “killed” in order that its soul might be for the child’s 
use in the land of spirits. The decorations on this pot represent a 
. highly conventionalized human mouth, nostrils, eyes, ears, and other 
body openings. 
PotTrery 
In the layer of pottery fragments between the stone slabs forming 
the top of the grave, Figure 150, £, were found portions of a fine, 
large, red domestic vessel with conventionalized human features 
shown in Plate 117,a. It is 7 inches in diameter at the rim, 11 
inches in diameter at its widest point, and 81% inches in height. 
The incised decoration on this pot is not very common. It appears 
on the rims of possibly three or four vessels found on this site. A 
few specimens with similar incised rim decorations have been found 
on other sites within a radius of 15 miles from Nashville. Thruston’s 
