The Coolidge examiner., 1930-04-04
EXCAVAT|NC AT THE
CASA CRANDE RUINS
Continued from last week.
(BY IRWIN HAYDEN)

Recently l saw statement that
camels and horses went from
America to Asia, via Bering straits,
and that elephants and man came
to America by the same route. 1t
was no doubt fair exchange; but
the statement is not wholly one of
established fact. 1t is partially a
statement of an interesting hypohe-
sis and may or may not be proven
by such evidences as may come to
light.
Poincare, the great French math-
ematician, in the introduction to
his book, Science and Hypothe-
SIS" says that the hypothesis are
necessary to the advancement of
science but that it is very necessa-
ry that they be not made uncon-
sciously.
Every forward movement in ev-
cry science is made on a bridge
thrust out into the unknown; a
bridge builded of constructive i'm
aginings. These bridges do not al
ways hold When they fail they are
abandoned and the failure is label
ed experience" and filed for fu-
ture reference.
If an early form of elephant
crossed to Alaska from Siberia,
with man in hot pursuit, as one
student postulates, hypothecates or
thinks { guess by any name is
still a guess), how many milleni-
ums passed before the descendants
of the elephant hunters settled
here in the central ella river val
ley and established themselves as
| somewhat civilized farmers? When
/ the primitive future Americans
crossed Bering strait the bow and
arrow were unknown, it is thought.
| Agriculture was undreamed Of; no
animals had been domesticated, ex-
cept perhaps the dog.
Did the Mongoloids, those nomad-
ic huntsmen who were like the
Mongols (the Amerind of their de-
scendant) belong to the Old Stone
! age or the New Stone age, when
they crossed the straits; / think
that Kroeber says that if they had
come over in the Neolithic period
they would have brought domestic
animals with them and the fact
that they did not bring horse or
COW or sheep or goat or camel or
yak with them makes it quite GER
tain that they did not cross in Neo-
lihic times. On the other hand, if
the crossing was made in Paleolith-
ic times, we should have found typ
ical Old Stone age stone imple-
ments in the river deposits some
where.
At any rate, the notion that they
chased or followed the elephant
or his forbeads across from Siberia
supplies valid excuse for the in
vasion of the Americas.
Pottery Plain
We have progressed sufficiently
with our digging to have gained
some degree Of interest in pottery
decoration. BY far the greater part
of the pottery is plain or feature
less. Some Of the vessels must have
been enormous; some were thumb
pots" such as are made for chill
dren's toys. We have no reason to
suspect that any method of manu-
facture other tim that of coiling
was used. This was and is the pre-
vailing method in the Americas. No
potter's wheel was used by ,Ameri-
can Indians in the fashioning of
their earthenware. In order to bring
the successive parts within easy
reach, large vessels were at times
built up on shallow baskets and
/ slowly turned. This was by no
means the principle of the potter's
wheel.
| In Gautemaula, it is said, the La
candones supported their pottery
on block which was turned by the
feet of the potter. This again was
merely to bring the parts of the
surface conveniently to hand and
in no sense involved the principles
of the potter's wheel.
Method of Pottery Making
The coil method, so universal in
America, was simply this: Slender
ropes or rods of clay were rolled
out into handy lengths and coiled
spirally. AS the bottom and sides Of
the vessel grew, the surfaces were
scraped and smoothed by "wiping"
or Sweeping" until the required
form was perfected and the desired
thinness obtained. At one time in
the great pueblo area, in the south
western states, the outside surfaces