608 PREHISTORIC VILLAGES IN TENNESSEE [eTH. ANN. 41 
These bones showed that the staple food of both these groups was 
the Virginia deer. It constituted fully 85 per cent of all their animal 
food which contained bones. Wild turkeys came next, with about 
10 per cent. Not much of other animal food was used. Very rarely 
indeed a black bear, raccoon, skunk, fox squirrel, or some other of 
the small animals noted above was used for food. These pedple did 
not eat dogs. 
There was a reason for not using some animals which probably 
were plentiful and easy to obtain. Only one or two rabbits were 
found. This probably arose from the well-known belief of the 
southern Indian that the rabbit, being timorous, would impart this 
characteristic to those who ate its flesh. The Cherokees make a 
rabbit soup and endeavor to pour it in the pathway of the competing 
team in their ball play, in order to render their competitors less 
daring. 
No bones of the red squirrel were found. The flesh of the red 
squirrel was supposed by some of the Indians to induce rheumatism, 
because the squirrel runs or sits with his back in an apparently 
uncomfortable curve, as though rheumatic. 
Deer were plentiful and easy to kill. One deer produced a large 
amount of food—so why worry with small animals? 
The Indian did not kill, as we do, for sport, i. e., for the pleasure 
of killing. He killed only to supply his necessities and much of this 
killing was carried out with due and proper rites of propitiation to 
the spirit of the animal slain. 
Apparently land or water birds were rarely eaten. 
It is not unexpected that the remains of only four individual fish 
were found. The Indian was very poorly equipped for catching fish; 
though in some of the mountain streams of Tennessee the author 
discovered evidences of several very ingenious, though simple, fish 
traps which must have caught a considerable number of fish. Here, in 
the mountains, he found more evidences of the use of fish for food. 
A very few mussels (wnio) were eaten. Periwinkles were found 
scattered through the soil which filled some of the graves at the 
Gordon site, where they appear to have been used only as food for 
the journey to the other world. On some other Indian village sites 
in middle Tennessee the author has found large numbers of peri- 
winkle shells on the surface, indicating that they were used as every- 
day food in those villages. 
No Traces or Bison 
The Indians on both the Gordon and Fewkes sites, as well as. on 
many other sites in middle Tennessee, do not appear to have made 
use of the wood bison or buffalo. The author has explored several 
hundred ancient village sites in Tennessee and has never found even 
