Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-07-20
Or. HrdIicka Seeks Artifacts
Left by Indians of
10000 Years ago.
ETHN0L0GY ASSISTANT
EXCAVATING ON ISLAND
Henry Collins Approaches Hrdlicka
Problem From Opposite End
in Ivory Culture Studies.

Seeking the route of human migration
into the North American continent, DR..
Ales Hrdlicka, curator of physical an
thropology at the National Museum, now
is pushing his way up the practically
UNEMPLOYED Kuskokwim River in Alaska,
according to letters received by muse
UNI associates.
The Kuskokwim runs practically par
allel to the Yukon along nearly half It's
course, but ends in the foothills of
Mount Mckinley. At its headquarters
are the mysterious "far-away people"
of early Russian explorers, believed to
be small Indian tribe which may have
entirely disappeared.
DR.. Hrdlicka in three other expedi-
tons has explored the banks of the
Yukon from mouth to source in search
OF skeletal remains and artifacts. in the
belief that this was the natural path
southwark of the Ivory age" people
who crossed Boring Strait from Kam-
chatka from 10000 to 10000 years ago,
gradually worked their way west and
south, and became the ancestors of the
Eskimos and the Indians.
Many Migrations Confuse Trail.
His explorations have tended to con-
firm this view, since physical measure
mentS OF both races and observations
of their culture show that they shade
into each other. The Yukon trail the
DRY has not proved entirely satisfactory,
partly because wave after wave of mi
grafton have passed this way, each COW
ering up the records Of the one pre-
vious.
An alternate route was along the
Kuskokwin, AlaSka's second largest
river, which is difficult of access, runs
through much unexplored territory and
has never been studied by psychologists.
DR.. Hrdlicka was able to reach the Kus-
kokwim by portage about 100 miles from
the Yukon.
AS he goes up the river, the Wash
ington scientist is attracting the Indi-
ans and EskimoS in large numbers by
holding free medical clinics. They are
combing the surrounding country for
buried artifacts for him. He finds him.
self still in the land of the painted
graveyards," where the dead are placed
IN deliberately painted wooded boxes and
left above ground.
The native population along this
route was almost depopulated by the
1918 influenza epidemic. The Indians
belong to the Sikmiut and Kuskwogamiut
tribes, both little known to ethnologists.
There may be other surviving people in
the vast interior watered by the Kus-
kokwirn which will yield valuable infor-
nation on the Indian-Eskimo transition.
Ivory Culture Highly Developed.
curator of ethnology at the Museum, is
making another effort to solve the mys-
terry of the highly developed ivory cul-
ture found on st. Lawrence Island,
where he already has excavated for two
Summers. On his way there, Mr.. Col
Inns writes, he stopped at one of the
Aleutian islands and dug up 40 human
skeletons, which will be brought to
Washington. The excavation work is
especially difficult, because of the short
season in which it is possible to dig and
because of the difficulties of transport
tation
Hundreds Of miles apart, both DR..
Hrdlicka and Mr.. Collins are working
on two ends of the same puzzle. The
ivory carvers were very ancient and ap-
parently had reached a high degree of
artistic and mechanical development.
but aside from the st. Lawrence Island
graves very few of their artifactS have
been recovered.
Stirling Leaves for West.
Mathew w. Stirling, chief of the
Bureau of American Ethnology, left
Washington this week for an archeo-
logical reconnaissance in Texas and Ne
vada. He hopes to locate old village
sites for future excavation. Both States
have remained practically untouched by
scientists. but some sensational accounts
of buried cultures have been received
from local Psychologists.
Frank H. Roberts, jr., of the Bureau of
Ethnology, according to reports he has
sent here, has started excavations of a
basketmaker village in New Mexico
which is expected to illustrate the rural
life of these people. Sites excavatsd
hitherto have been those of large set &s
ments. analogous to cities, where AG
Indians had come together for pre- =
ton. They were essentially an agriclS~.
tural people and probably develop2
most of their cultures in very sm3.3
framing villages. -
j. N. B. Hewitt is making anothR
study this Summer on the 56,00O-ac.A
reservation of the Six Nations near
Brantford, Canada, where he is Sepe-
cially interested in collecting texts in
Onondago. Mohawk and Cayuga dia-
lects concerning the sixteenth century
league of nations" of the Iroquois,
which was, according to some authori-
ties, the origin of the American Con-
stitution. There we're no written records,
so that Mr.. Hewitt must obtain every
thing from the few old men and women
who still remember the tribal histories.