248 XEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Ripley Site 



For a number of years the writer had known of a site in this 

 locahty, one on the lake shore 2 miles northwest of Ripley, but until 

 1906 had not had occasion to visit it. In 1900 it was reported to 

 Mr. M. R. Harrington and the writer by Prof. W. T. Fenton, when 

 we were assistants on the archeological staff of the American 

 Museum of Natural History, Mr Harrington did some work on 

 the site in 1904 for the Peabody Museum of American Archeology 

 and Ethnology, but because of various obstacles, left the major por- 

 tion untouched. The excavations which he made during his short 

 stay revealed the fact that the site was a most prolific one. In view 

 of the fact that the New York State Museum had few or no speci- 

 mens of the Erie culture, and indeed as very little was known of 

 this culture, the site was chosen as the field for the season's opera- 

 tions and a leasehold obtained. The Ripley site is situated on the 

 William and Mary Young farm in lot 27, Ripley, Chautauqua 

 county. It covers an elevation locally known as " Dewey knoll '' 

 situated on the clififs of Lake Erie. On the east a stream has cut 

 through the shale and eaten down the blufifs to the lake level so that 

 a landing is easily effected from the water. This landing is one of 

 the few between Barcelona harbor and the mouth of Twentymile 

 creek in Pennsylvania, where there is easy access to the land on the 

 bluffs above. The stream has cut the east side of the knoll so that 

 for several hundred feet south from the lake the bank rises steep 

 and in places almost sheer from the creek bed. The place is one, 

 therefore, naturally adapted for a fortified refuge and must have 

 been an attractive spot indeed for the aborigines who built upon it 

 a village, a circular earthwork, and who found in the soft sand a 

 most suitable place for the burial of their dead. 



Surface Feattires of the Site 



The site was found to be mainly on the level top of the knoll, 

 although a number of graves were found on the south and west 

 slopes. The " unoccupied soil " began at the lake bank and ran 

 back inland to the southern slope. The soil bordering the bank line 

 was a light sandy loam heavily intermixed with carbonaceous sub- 

 stances, animal phosphates, vegetable mold and particles of animal 

 bone. Back to the south it was generally a light shifting sand which 

 rested upon a more compact stratum. At places, especially a few 

 feet down the slopes, the clay stratum outcropped. Here the soil 

 was bare or only sparsely covered with grass. (See plate 81.) 



