SPINDLE-WHORLS. 153 



The Indians of Peru now seldom, if ever, make the elaborate spindles of 

 old, and are content with rude spindles with rough wooden whorls, of which 

 there are several examples in the Peabody Museum, presented by Mr. Alex. 

 Agassiz. These are of interest in comparison with two similar spindles with 

 wooden whorls, which were presented by Mr. John Blake, who took them from 

 an ancient grave in Southern Peru. Though the recent wooden spindles 

 are rudely made, the wooden whorls upon them are of the same forms as 

 in ancient times. Several of them are discoidal and others are conical in 

 shape. They are 1 J to 2 inches in diameter, and from about \ of an inch 

 to 2 inches in thickness. Two of them even have a slight attempt at orna- 

 mentation, inasmuch as four groups of four lines each are cut upon the 

 under surface. 



Turning our attention now to the perforated stones which have been 

 found in various parts of North America, we find that several have been 

 discovered which are similar to those we have mentioned from other parts 

 of the world. 



Mr. C. C. Jones* has given a figure of what is probably a spindle- 

 whorl, found in a stone grave in the Nacoochee Valley, and remarks that 

 it closely resembles the spindle-whorls found at Meilen and other places in 

 Europe, though he is "inclined to the belief that it was probably suspended 

 as an ornament." The specimen figured by Mr Jones is about \\ inches 

 in diameter. 



In the Peabody Museum is a similar article consisting of a flat circular 

 piece of white clay (11492) found by Mr. Charles B. Johnson on his farm 

 in Lee County, Virginia. It is 1^- inches in diameter. The hole through 

 it is countersunk, and is about one- quarter of an inch in diameter. There 

 is a slight groove cut around its periphery as if for a string, though it may 

 be simply an attempt at ornamentation. This disk may have been used 

 as a spindle-whorl, for which it is well adapted by its size and shape. It 

 is, however, no larger than many disks of shell, such as we know are used 

 as beads or ornaments, which are often found by hundreds in the burial- 

 mounds of the Southwestern States. 



Mr. Morgan, in his far-famed volume, " The League of the Iroquois," 



- * Antiquities of the Southern Indians, 1873, p. 235, pi. vi, fig. 11. 



