PREHISTORIC INDIANS

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIV, Issue 10207, 18 February 1919, Page 6

PREHISTORIC INDIANS

RELICS. IN VIRGIN -ISLANDS. The. absorption of tbe Danish Wrat Indies by the United States has resulted in an expedition to collect such pieColumblatf sped mens'-as might-be found upon the islands, and to gather darn which would throw light upon their aboriginal population. Mr Theodoor de Booy has produced an interesting treatise on the results. ’ ’ ’ . He states that, on the -mailer of the’West’lndia’ islands;"the; village sites are located in proximity to’ sheltered bays and inlets "where the aborigines-Lima a sloping beach for the hauling up ot tneir canoes, and .the surrounding waters assured them an unfailing supply of lisa and shell food. , The actual location of the Magcn’s Bay village site on tho St. Thomas, one of the Virgin Islalids, was a difficult matter, a»"kHß' shoTCs i f the bay were covered with dense 'brush. An examination of tho cavity left ( by the roots of a (large ‘Turpentine tree v.hioh had been (bverturned by the destructive hurricane of October 9th, 1916, brought many shells and several large potsherds to light. It was then realised that the entire Magen’s ,Bay valley had. been covered by a two-foot deep deposit of diluvium since the days of the aborigines. After tho brush and trees had been cleared, a mound ten feet high was discovered. This was excavated and the soil carefully searched. While the majority of the artifacts found in the two layers directly ■ under the' diluvial deposit were the fragments of broken vessels, entire vessels were occasionally met - with. Frequently, in fact in the majority of cases., these vessels aocoinpanied„.burial.s, and, in o msequeuoß .haii been , buried.,entire, probably filled with foodstuffs”which wore to servo the departed for his journey to the Gres' Beyond. But sometimes a” vessel would turn 'up' in “tho Magen’s ■ Bay deposits which was unaccompanied ■ by a burial, ancl consequently most have'been either discarded bv its Indian owner owing ip a Haw in the ware, or ©lso liavo accidently been buried under a mound of shells, It was in the original surface ei sea rand some five feet below the surface of then 1 mound "that tho Indians 'sock; to bavo deposited their dead. Tho practice of burials in tho floors of dwellings was not uncommon on many of tho West India islands, as has been proved by tbe researches of other investigators. ' Of tho nine burials that were found on the Magon’s Hay site, seven were - of adults and-two-of children- Six-of the, burials were, accompanied by,, mortuary vessels, bat no other objects were found with the dead. T'ne vessels wove of the plainest construction, without decoration, and were a great contrast to tho elaborately decorated vessels that ai-o found on tho islands to the, westward, Porto Rico and .Santo Domingo. That tho tribe inhabiting St. Thomas either made piratical raids on its neighbours to the west, or else' held commerce with them is proved, beyond a doubt, by some dozen typical Arawak .specimens that were found in the kitchen middens. These specimens differed in both art:and technique from, tho thousands of other specimens found.