THE ARCHEOLOGICAL HISTORY OF NEW YORK 3/1 



and many other objects and ornaments as effigies, carvings of faces, 

 dice etc. From the smaller birds and animals the long bones were 

 taken and cut into tubes, tubular beads and other objects. Jaw bones, 

 especially of the deer, were used for many purposes. A complete 

 lower jaw with the teeth, but perhaps the hinge projection cut or 

 broken off, was used as a corn cob scraper. (This fact was first 

 published in Bulletin 144 of the State Museum, and subsequently 

 copied without credit in many other archeological publications.) The 

 toothless anterior portion of deer jaws was cut into beads, pendants, 

 notched ornaments and even awls. Troughlike awls were cut from 

 the bottoms of deer jaws. From the feet of wolves, dogs, foxes, 

 bears, deer and other animals the two larger phalanges were used for 

 parts of games, for cones, ornaments etc. The teeth of various 

 animals were commonly used (see Teeth). Plate 96 shows some 

 of the uses of bone. 



Caches. The term cache is applied to places where implements 

 of aboriginal manufacture have been stored or hidden. Caches are 

 generally found in the ground beneath the surface, under Indian 

 rock piles or in springs. Generally the only articles surviving stor- 

 age are blades of unfinished flint implements, known as blank blades. 

 In many cases they seem to have been covered with a pigment of 

 red iron oxide, which still remains on the specimens when they are 

 uncovered. From three to three hundred blades have been found in 

 New York caches, and so constant are the few simple types that 

 collectors recognize What they term " cache blades." They are usually 

 leaf-shaped, or have the base straight. 



Implements stored or secreted in the bottoms of springs or thrust 

 into the earth above them may have been cached or given to the 

 sp-'rit of the spring as an offering. The finding of numerous articles 

 of flint in springs has some unusual significance. By some authori- 

 ties it is thought that flint and jasper blades were stored in the 

 earth in order that their chipping qualities might not be impaired 

 through loss of " quarry water," that is, the residual moisture. This 

 might account for the storage in springs. In most cases cached 

 blades are neatly piled in regular order, layer on layer. This indicates 

 that time and care were expended in making the deposit. 



The largest caches of flint blades have been discovered in Mis- 

 souri, Arkansas and Ohio. One Missouri cache recently found con- 

 tained innumerable blades of all sizes. The collection w^as literally 

 hauled away in wagon loads. The first great cache recorded by 

 archeologists is that found by Warren K. Moorehead near the Hope- 

 well mounds in Ross county, Ohio. Buried in one heap there were 

 7382 large blank forms. 



