Plates 22, 23. 
Four pieces of engraved shell are shown on these two plates. Each has two per- 
forations near the edge and probably was suspended on a cord and worn as an 
Ornament around the throat. Burials have been found with engraved shell 
ornaments in this position, An example is the one presently exhibited in the Indian 
Hall of the St. Louis Museum of Science and Natural History. Such ornaments 
are called gorgets because they were worn near the throat. The word gorge 
means the throat, according to Webster’s 20th Century Dictionary. All shown in 
this plate were made by Indians of the Mississippi culture in southeastern United 
States. 
Plate 22 A. 
Plate 22A (Catalog No. 21X66) This gorget is from Gallatin County, Illinois, which 
is in the southeastern part of that state at the junction of the Ohio and Wabash 
Rivers. Shell gorgets similar to this one are illustrated in Holmes, 1883, Plates 
LXXI and LXXII and in Kneberg, 1959, Figures 34 - 38, all from eastern Tennessee. 
Kneberg (pp. 5, 39) states that such gorgets have been found on sites of the Dallas 
culture, a variety of Mississippi culture, and she estimates that they date between 
A.D. 1350 and 1500. 
The design on this gorget and on others like it represent a running or dancing figure 
with along nose. The representations are so stylized that they appear to us to be 
caricatures, though perhaps they were not to the people who made them. Represen- 
tations of a long nosed figure in a variety of forms and materials have been found 
Over a wide area from northern Florida to eastern Texas and as far north as south- 
ern Minnesota. These are believed to represent a mythical character or diety which 
has been called Long Nosed God in a number of archaeological publications. A 
small copper mask of a face with a long nose was found in the Big Mound in St. 
Louis. Big Mound was destroyed in 1869. An interesting account of this is given 
in Williams and Goggin, 1956. 
