CERTAIN ABORIGINAL MOUNDS OF THE GEORGIA COAST. 33 



Vessel J, of the ordinary type, also had suffered through the agency of the 

 plow. No human remains were discovered though their former presence can hardly 

 be questioned. 



The method of urn-burial in this mound presented certain points of similarity to, 

 and of divergence from, that of certain other coast mounds, as the reader later on may 

 remark. All these burial urns lay in the southern and eastern parts of the mound, in 

 which they followed the general custom. They contained the uncremated bones of 

 infants in common with the urn-burials of Ossabaw Island (cremation apart), but 

 differed from the mounds of Sapelo Island where skeletal remains of adults exclu- 

 sively were in the urns and of St. Catherine's Island where, with but one exception, 

 adult remains were present in the urns. 



Aboriginal disturbances. — When parts of a skeleton or skeletons were dis- 

 covered disarranged adjoining a grave it was inferred that the construction of the 

 grave was the cause of the disarrangement. Great care was taken to distinguish 

 these disturbances from bunched burials. 



Canine remains. — The skeleton of a dog, in the last stage of decay, was found 

 unassociated with any human remains. The interment of dogs in mounds of the 

 sea-islands will receive special reference in our account of Mound D, Ossabaw Island. 



STONE. 



In the mounds of the Georgia coast stone is not abundant. The mound on 

 Creighton Island proved somewhat of an exception to this rule. 



Hatchets. — Nine hatchets, or " celts," always with skeletons, were present in 

 the mound, the longest somewhat exceeding 7 inches. All were gracefully shaped 

 and tapered into blunt points opposite the cutting edge, a feature characteristic of 

 southern hatchets and still more pronounced in the " celts " of St. Domingo and 

 neighboring islands. The material was mostly volcanic rock, but as mutilation of 

 the specimen is necessary for exact determination, we have not thought it necessary 

 to specify in each case. 



Chisels. — Eighteen chisels from 1.75 to 5.3 inches in length, having a thin 

 longitudinal section, somewhat convex on one side and usually flat on the other, 

 lay at different points with burials. In addition, were five large chisels of graceful 

 design, one a beautiful specimen, of slate, having a length of 12.6 inches, a breadth 

 at the cutting edge of 2 inches, tapering to 1.1 inches at the opposite end. Its 

 maximum thickness is .7 of one inch (Fig. 16). Another chisel, of banded slate, is 

 8.75 inches long; another, 9.8 inches; and two somewhat smaller. 



Discoidal stones} — Twelve cliscoidal stones, as a rule with burials, the largest 

 2.5 inches in diameter, came from the mound. Two were of quartz, ten of volcanic 

 or of sedimentary rocks. One of these, unlike the rest, was a pebble, a portion of 

 whose periphery had been pecked away to confer the circular outline. Certain dis- 

 coidal stones, some of which are considerably larger than any found by us, are 



1 Discoidal stones are treated at length by the late Col. C. C. Jones. 



The latest literature on the subject is to be found in Mr. Gerard Fowke's " Stone Art," Thir- 

 teenth Annual Report, Bureau of Ethnology. 



