Page:American Anthropologist NS vol. 22.djvu/167

 SHETRONE] CULTURE PROBLEM IN OHIO ARCHAEOLOGY 155

groups having been in contact in the far southland in very early times.

The extensive studies of Iroquoian archaeology by Beauchamp, Parker, and others, and those of the Fort Ancient culture by Moore- head, Mills, and Smith, make possible a very full comparison of the two groups. While such comparison may not indicate definite relationship, it appears to the writer that the number of traits pos- sessed in common and the general similarity of the culture status of the two, is rather marked. Both groups have left behind them numerous and extensive habitation sites, the character of which is strikingly similar. Both practised the building of mounds for mortuary purposes and of earthworks of a defensive nature. Both were extensive potters, and while their respective products differ in some respects, they are strikingly alike in others. The typical earthen pot of the eastern and southern Iroquoian area bearing the rectangular extended rim, is not found in the Fort Ancient area; but, on the other hand, the typical Iroquoian pottery decoration, consisting of parallel incised lines in contiguous triangular fields, is found in the Ohio area, while the Algonquian dental or roulette decoration apparently is found in neither. Both groups utilized bone and antler to a marked extent, and in much the same manner. The triangular unnotched projectile point is characteristic of each, as is the celt, or ungrooved axe, while the grooved axe, the bell- shaped pestle, certain problematical and other forms, are conspic- uously absent.

Whether these resemblances are to be taken as indicating rela- tionship, or even a considerable diffusion of culture traits, from proximity and vicinage ; or whether merely a rather marked instance of similar independent development, must be decided by a more careful and detailed comparative study of the two groups.

THE HOPEWELL CULTURE

In practically all the earlier literature in fact, down until very recent years the mounds and earthworks of the Hopewell prehistoric culture so monopolized discussion as to be practically a synonym for mound-building, and so striking are their character-

�� �