b2 SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 



The main objects of the 1938 expedition were, first, to obtain 

 further light on the existence and extension, in the Aleutian Islands, 

 of the pre- Aleut stock, evidences of which were encountered in our 

 excavations in 1936 and 1937 ; second, to determine definitely whether 

 or not the Commander Islands have served as a part of a second, 

 southern, Aleutian chain bridge for the coming of man from Asia ; 

 and third, to reexamine the burial caves found in 1936-37 and to 

 search for several other reported caves of the same nature. 



The first visit was to the rock shelters on Shiprock, in the Unalaska- 

 Umnak Pass, where numerous skeletons and mummies were obtained 

 on the last day of the trip of 1937. The mummy shelter was seen to 

 have been exhausted by us, but a large broken slab, which was cov- 

 ered with dirt last year, had meanwhile been cleaned by rains, reveal- 

 ing several petroglyphs of a peculiar character. And a whale scapula, 

 which originally covered one of the mummies, was found to have been 

 decorated with broad parallel lines in red. Both these features are 

 unique in our experience in these islands. A day's excavation in 

 nearby shelters on the Rock yielded several Aleut skulls and skeletons, 

 three stone lamps of the interesting flat variety found for the first 

 time in 1937, and other objects. 



The next visit was to Sviechnikov Harbor on the south shore of 

 Amlia Island, where in 1937 human remains were found in several 

 rock shelters. Two good days were spent here in reexamination of 

 the shelters, exploration of a despoiled burial cave, and excavation in 

 two sites located in the harbor. 



The third point which it was possible to revisit was the little 

 island of Ilak where we satisfied ourselves there were no burial caves 

 other than the two we had examined the previous year. 



The next stop was on the island of Amchitka. After a stormy night 

 on the little Ariadne we were put off in Constantine Harbor, where 

 there are a couple of small houses recently constructed by the Bureau 

 of Fisheries and four native trapper dwellings, with an attractive little 

 native church. There are no inhabitants on the island in summer. We 

 found here two good sites, largely pre-Aleut, and had 3 weeks of 

 assiduous excavation. This yielded, aside from a variety of cultural 

 objects, several of the oblong-headed pre-Aleut skeletons, and, deep 

 in the deposits, the first specimens found in these parts of the world 

 of well-wrought deep stone pots and dishes. 



From Amchitka in another storm we were taken back some 

 hundreds of miles to the village of Nikolski, on the island of Umnak, 

 where we were kindly given accommodation by the local teachers, 

 Mr. and Mrs. Benson. A short distance south of the school, across a 



