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THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

A SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

PREHISTORIC INDIAN VILLAGE AND CEMETERY

IN OCEANA COUNTY, MICHIGAN

GEORGE I. QUIMBY

University of Itdnois
APR 22 1968

FIELDIANA: ANTHROPOLOGY

VOLUME 56, NUMBER 1

Published by

FIELD MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY

DECEMBER 9, 1966

1 ' ! ;

Drawing by distal Dais

THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

A SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

PREHISTORIC INDIAN VILLAGE AND CEMETERY

IN OCEANA COUNTY, MICHIGAN

GEORGE I. QUIMRY

Curator oj Ethnology, Thomas Burke Washington State Museum

Professor of Anthropology, University of Washington

Research Associate, North American Archaeology and Ethnology,

Field Museum of Natural History

FIELDIANA: ANTHROPOLOGY

VOLUME 56, NUMBER 1

Published by

FIELD MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY

DECEMBER 9, 1966

Published with the Assistance of the Harry W. Getz Memorial Fund.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 66-28392

PRINTED IX' THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
BY FIELD MUSEUM PRESS

CONTENTS

PAGE

List of Illustrations 5

I. Introduction and History of the Site 7

II. The Burials and the Faunal Remains 12

III. Artifacts of Stone and Bone 20

IV. Artifacts of Copper and Shell 36

V. Tobacco Pipes and Animal Skins 51

VI. Pottery from the Dumaw Creek Site 64

VII. Vegetal Remains and Textiles 73

VIII. Dating the Site 80

IX. A Reconstruction of Dumaw Creek Culture 83

X. Tribal Affiliations 87

References 90

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIOx\S

Frontispiece

PAGE

1. Two views of skull of burial no. 1 13

2. Two views of skull of burial no. 2 16

3. Two views of skull of burial no. 2 17

4. Upper torso and jaw of child and fragment of bearskin from burial no. 3 . . . 18

5. Triangular arrowheads of chipped flint 21

6. Triangular arrowheads and stemmed knives or arrowheads of chipped flint . 23

7. Triangular arrowheads of chipped flint 26

8. Knives of chipped flint . . ' 29

9. Flint drills or knives and scraping tools 31

10. Stone axes 33

1 1 . Artifacts of bone 34

12. Copper hair pipes 37

13. Drawing of Dumaw Creek Indian wearing copper hair pipes and shell beads

as head ornaments 38

14. Copper beads 40

15. Copper beads and shell beads 41

16. Ornaments of shell and copper 43

17. Pendants and beads of shell 45

18. Shell beads 47

19. Marginella beads 48

20. Stone pipes 50

21. Effigy pipes of stone 53

22. Pieces of animal skin 55

23. Drawing of Dumaw Creek Indian in beaver robe with painted decoration . . 56

24. Bag probably of beaver skin 58

25. Bag of weasel skin 59

26. Skin bag and sections of leather or sinew cords 60

27. Small fringed leather bag and mass of folded leather 61

28. Piece of sewn leather, probably part of a bag 62

29. Pottery vessel with scalloped lip 65

30. Pottery vessel 66

31. Pottery sherds 68

32. Pumpkin seeds and fragments of woven bag 73

33. Twined bag 74

34. Woven mat and detail of weave in twined bag 78

INTRODUCTION

A few miles northeast of Pentwater in western Michigan there is a for-
mer Indian village and adjacent burial ground used in the last decades of
the sixteenth century or the qarly decades of the seventeenth century. This
archaeological site is important because it is one of very few now known
which manifest Woodland Indian culture in the Upper Great Lakes re-
gion of the period just prior to the arrival of European explorers, traders,
and missionaries.

The Dumaw Creek site, as it is called, is located in section 5 of Weare
township (T 16 N, R 17 W), Oceana County, Michigan, on a sandy, undu-
lating plain bordering the northwest side of Dumaw Creek, a small trib-
utary of the north branch of the Pentwater River. The creek is shallow,
clear, and swift-running in a wooded V-shaped valley, the bottom of which
is about 30 feet (as measured by hand-level) beneath the plain. This creek
is not now navigable by canoe and may not have been at the time of occu-
pancy by Indians, although a canoe could be floated to within a mile or
two of the site both then and now. If Dumaw Creek was navigable by
canoe in the period of occupancy, the site probably was at the head of
navigation.

When the Indians lived along Dumaw Creek the uneven sandy plains
were covered by forests in which white pine was the most common, if not
the dominant, species. This pine was cut by lumbermen in the years be-
tween 1 870 and 1 880 and the stump-land left by the cutting was eventually
taken over by farmers. Large pine stumps were still being pulled out as
late as 1916 and the land remained in agricultural use until about 1930.
In the 1940's oil was discovered in this part of western Michigan and by
1960 the Dumaw Creek site was a drab wasteland of sand blows, low sand
dunes, odoriferous oil wells, pumps, and pipes, and a few rotting pine
stumps, where once there had been Indians and magnificent forests.

History of the Dumaw Creek Finds

Although the Dumaw Creek site was discovered and excavated in
1915-1916, the finds made then and their significance were lost to archae-

8 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

ological science. It was as if the site had never been dvig. In ail the years
I was training in archaeology at the University of Michigan I had never
heard of an archaeological find such as this one in any part of the upper
Great Lakes region. Yet, as I was later to find, the essential clues that
led to the re-discovery of the site were at the University.

In the autumn oi 1959 the Department of Anthropology at Field
Museum of Natural History received from the Museum's Department of
Zoology an undocumented collection of archaeological materials. These
archaeological specimens had been included in a collection of shells ob-
tained by the Department of Zoology from the estate of Mr. Charles D.
Nelson, a retired schoolteacher of Grand Rapids, Michigan. These speci-
mens included a skull with scalp and hair intact and ornamented with cop-
per hair pipes; another skull wrapped in animal skins; copper beads;
copper hair pipes; some pottery sherds of distinctive style; shell beads; tri-
angular arrowheads of chipped flint, and a number of other artifacts which
will be described in greater detail elsewhere in this report. What is im-
portant here is that Field Museum's Department of Anthropology had
acquired a collection of interesting archaeological materials that looked
as if they all might be part of one relatively recent cultural complex, but
there was no accompanying documentation, except one possible clue that
proved to be incorrect, and the man who might have been able to supply
the necessary information was dead. The collection was without scientific
value unless it could be demonstrated that the artifacts were from spe-
cific sites or, better yet, one specific site and that the site could be located.

There were two clues with which to start. The previous owner of the
collection had lived in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and one of the boxes con-
taining the artifacts had a penciled notation reading "Newaygo County,
Michigan." I learned from friends in Grand Rapids that the skeletal ma-
terial and artifacts had been sold to Mr. Nelson by a dealer in stamps,
coins, and Indian relics, named H. E. Sargent. Mr. Nelson's collection
had been part of a larger collection that Mr. Sargent had offered for sale
in the late 1920's or early 1930's. At that time Mr. Sargent claimed that
the entire collection had been dug from "mounds near Whitehall, Mich-
igan" in Muskegon County. I doubted that this provenience was correct
because I was thoroughly familiar with the area round Whitehall. Hav-
ing spent summers there from 1914 to 1936, I felt certain that I would
have heard some news of this find if it had really taken place in the vicinity
of Whitehall. At about this point in my investigations, I recalled that the
late Dr. Wilbert B. Hinsdale of the University of Michigan had main-
tained a file of newspaper accounts of finds of Indian remains in Michigan.
Accordingly, I traveled to the University's Museum of Anthropology and
obtained access to Dr. Hinsdale's old files.

INTRODUCTION 9

These files consisted of three or four scrapbooks in which were pasted
newspaper chppings dating between about 1900 and 1935. There was
no particular arrangement to this collection of clippings, so it was neces-
sary to examine them all, book by book — a somewhat laborious process.
Eventually my efTorts were rewarded. I found an undated article that
obviously referred to the collections I was attempting to document. The
pertinent parts of this article are as follows:

UNEARTHS RELICS OF AGE LONG PAST
MASON COUNTY FARMER'S DISCOVERY DATES BACK OF INDIANS

Pentwatcr, Mich., March 6. — Buried evidently at a period far remote from the time
of the earliest explorations of this country by Europeans, a collection of antiquities
has been unearthed in this vicinity which seems to prove the theory that the .'\ztecs
of Mexico once inhabited what is now the northern part of the United States.

This find was unearthed by Carl Schrumpf, a farmer, of Summit township, four
miles from here, while he was digging up a pine stump 30 inches in diameter. . . .
Imbedded at the taproot of the stump Mr. Schrumpf found a skeleton in a fair state
of preservation. Subsequently he found 1 8 other skeletons with their accompani-
ment of articles of utility and adornment. All the bodies had faced the east, and had
been buried in a sitting position, the knees drawn up against the chest.

Among the relics found . . . were a skull to which is still attached considerable
hair, elaborately dressed with copper beads, the strands of hair being drawn through
the beads, which are approximately 2^^ inches long, and knotted to prevent the
beads from slipping. To the other side of the skull cling remnants of a war bonnet
showing traces of hide and also of textile, apparently made of vegetable fiber.

A pipe made of stone, stem and bowl in one piece, the latter elaborately and
artistically carved in the semblance of a bird's head. The basic material is flintlike
and very highly polished.

A snake of copper, six inches in length, forming a pendant, found on the breast
of a child. Pipe bowls formed of pottery. . . . Needle believed to have been made
of beaver bone. . . . Miscellaneous assortments of arrow and spear heads; also quan-
tities of broken pottery. Granite spheres. . . . Wampum [shell beads] and copper
beads.

With the evidence gleaned from this old newspaper article, I now knew
that the artifacts recently obtained by Field Museum came from some-
where near Pentwater and that they had been dug up by Carl Schrumpf.
But I still didn't know when they had been found nor did I know whether
the site from which they came was in northern Oceana County or in south-
ern Mason County. In an effort to settle these questions I next directed
my attention to the files of Dr. Hinsdale's correspondence preserved in the
archives of the Museum of Anthropology at the University of Michigan.

In Dr. Hinsdale's old files I eventually found a communication from
Carl Schrumpf dated 1932 in which he stated, "The collection that I
found several years ago I sold to a man from Grand Rapids by the name

10 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

of Sargent. . . ." Mr. Schrumpf also disclosed in his correspondence that
he would be 80 years old on May 17, 1933 and that his address was
Route 2, Hart, Michigan. I now had corroborative evidence indicating
that the collection in question, or major parts of it, had been sold by Mr.
Schrumpf to the Grand Rapids dealer named H. E. Sargent who, in turn,
had sold a large portion of it to Mr. Nelson, the schoolteacher, from whose
estate Field Museum had received his part of this collection. I also was
certain that Mr. Carl Schrumpf, aged 80 in 1933, was dead by 1960, the
year in which I read his correspondence to the late Dr. Hinsdale.

I continued my search by looking through the University of Michigan
Museum's site files covering Mason and Oceana Counties, watching par-
ticularly for the name of Schrumpf. In the Oceana County file I hit "pay
dirt." I not only found a site reported by Carl Schrumpf but I also found
a picture of Mr. Schrumpf displaying the specimens he had found. These
included the diagnostic objects, such as the skull with scalp and hair intact
with attached hair pipes of copper, a number of the specimens that were
now in the possession of Field Museum, and many additional objects that
I was able to trace subsequently. But most important, I now knew that the
site was in Section 5 of Weare Township, Oceana County, Michigan. In
additional files dealing with Oceana County I learned that Mr. Carl
Schrumpf had dug up these specimens in 1915 and 1916 and that, under
the direction of Dr. Hinsdale, Mr. F. M. Vrieland had made an inventory
of Schrumpf's collection for the Museum of Anthropology in 1924. At
this point I had found abundant evidence to document the archaeological
collection that Field Museum had obtained from Mr. Nelson's estate. But
there remained one thing yet to do: to inspect the site personally.

In the summers of 1960-1962 I occasionally visited the Dumaw Creek
site studying the topography and general situation of the site and making
surface collections. There I found fragments of pottery with the same
unusual characteristics that were typical of sherds in Mr. Schrumpf s col-
lection and arrowheads of chipped flint that were identical in style and
treatment to those excavated by Mr. Schrumpf. By 1961 there was no
shadow of doubt whatever. The collection of Indian artifacts and skeletal
material that Field Museum had obtained from the estate of Mr. Charles
D. Nelson had come to him from the dealer Sargent who had purchased
them from Carl Schrumpf sometime after the summer of 1924. The
Museum's collection was now documented and well worth study and anal-
ysis. Moreover, there was information available on other specimens from
the Dumaw Creek site that were not in the Museum's collection. There
was also the possibility of locating additional Dumaw Creek artifacts in
the possession of other institutions and individuals.

INTRODUCTION 1 1

I did locate some additional Dumaw Creek artifacts in other collec-
tions. At the Museum of Anthropology of the University of Michigan
there were fragments of Dumaw Creek pottery that had been donated by
Mr. Carl Schrumpf. Two Dumaw Creek pottery vessels were obtained
by Field Museum from the Coffinberry Chapter of the Michigan Archaeo-
logical Society. Although these vessels were listed as having come from
a mound at Whitehall, Michigan, they were illustrated in the above-men-
tioned photograph of Mr. Schrumpf and his Dumaw Creek site specimens.
In Grand Rapids Dr. Ruth Herrick kindly allowed me to examine and
photograph a gorget of shell. Although this gorget was cataloged as hav-
ing been found in a mound near Whitehall, I recognized it from a drawing
Vrieland had made when he inventoried Schrumpfs Dumaw Creek col-
lection in the summer of 1924. Furthermore, both this gorget and the two
pottery vessels previously mentioned were directly traceable to the dealer
Sargent who had bought them from Carl Schrumpf. A similarly docu-
mented collection of about one dozen important specimens from the
Dumaw Creek site was found to be owned by Mr. Carl L. Adams of
Grand Rapids, Michigan. I examined this group of artifacts in 1962 and
1964. However, the largest privately-held collection of Dumaw Creek
cultural materials turned up in the possession of Mr. Seymour R. Rider
who has a farm near Hart, Oceana County, Michigan.

Mr. Rider had been collecting Indian relics in Oceana County since
1908 and he dug up several burials from the Dumaw Creek site shortly
after Schrumpf made his findings in 1915 and 1916. Most of Mr. Rider's
collection from this site was picked from eroded surfaces of dwelling areas
or excavated with burials that had been partly exposed by erosional forces.
A few of his specimens he obtained from Mr. Carl Schrumpf, whom he
knew personally. I had learned of Mr. Rider's collection from friends in
Pentwater, Michigan, and in the summers of 1961, 1962, and 1963 I de-
voted some time to photographing and studying his materials from the
Dumaw Creek site.

By the summer of 1964 I had obtained a large body of data from which
I could make a useful reconstruction of the culture that was manifested
at Dumaw Creek. I was personally familiar with the site and its history
since Mr. Schrumpf first dug there and I knew that Dumaw Creek culture
was an exceedingly young variety of the Late Woodland complex of cul-
tures in the Upper Great Lakes region. Although this important site had
not been dug into by any professionally-trained archaeologist, it was, none-
theless, now possible to analyze and interpret the data in somewhat the
same way as if I had excavated the site myself and to make my ideas and
interpretations known to others.

THE BURIALS AND THE FAUNAE REMAINS

There were at least nineteen burials removed from graves at the Du-
maw Creek site in 1915-1916 by Mr. Carl Schrumpf. However, the 1924
inventory of Schrumpfs collection made by Vrieland for the University
of Michigan Museum of Anthropology suggests that 55 skeletons were
taken from the site by Schrumpf between 1915 and 1924. In this same
period there were some additional burials removed from the site by col-
lectors from Ludington, Hart, and perhaps other towns in the area. The
only statement about burial position is in the undated newspaper article
from the files of the late Dr. W. Hinsdale m Ann Arbor (see p. 9). Ac-
cording to this account, "all the bodies had faced the east, and had been
buried in a sitting position, the knees drawn up against the chest." My
own experience with Late Woodland burials elsewhere in western Mich-
igan leads me to believe that what Schrumpf meant by "sitting position"
was, in reality, a bvirial in a tightly flexed position with the corpse on its
back or its side. Vrieland's 1924 inventory adds the information that
sometimes there were two skeletons in the same grave pit.

In the Field Mviseum of Natural History collection from the Dumaw
Creek site there are the partial remains of 14 burials consisting of ten
adults, three sub-adults, and one child. The adults and sub-adults were
represented by skulls, some of which had varying amounts of skin and
hair adhering to them. The child remains were parts of the upper torso
and lower head in an excellent state of preservation. In July of 1964,
Mr. James MacDonald, then a graduate student in physical anthropology
at the University of Toronto, made a number of useful observations and
comments regarding these human remains which I have summarized here.
Of the ten adult skulls, four were most probably male, two probably were
female. No attempt was made to sex the remains of the three. sub-adults
and child. The skulls of adult males and females were gracile with small
mastoid processes and brow ridges that were not developed. They did,
however, have prominent chins. One female was particularly brachy-
cranial, the remaining females tended to be brachycranial and the males
more or less mesocranial.

f i^'n' ^'. J^'' ""'^"^^ °'"'''"" of burial no. 1 : rear of skull and right side too- front
of skull and left side, bottom. ^ ' P'

14 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

The skull of burial no. 1 (catalog no. 26811 7), most probably an adult
male, had skin and hair attached to it (fig. 1). The hair was colored with
powdered red ocher and ornamented with hair pipes^copper tubes held
in position by tresses of hair inserted through the tubes and tied with knots
larger than the diameter of the tubes. When found, this skull had a piece
of beaver fur and a textile fragment, probably remnants of burial wrap-
pings, adhering to one side of it. The skull itself is 1 8.5 cm. in length from
glabella to opisthocranion and has a maximum width of 14.5 cm. The
lower jaw is missing and the face is in very poor condition, probably the
result of handling and lack of specialized care at the time of excavation
and during subsequent storage.

Fortunately, the skull from burial no. 2 reached the Museum with its
wrappings intact. In January, 1959, 1 carefully removed these wrappings,
layer by layer. The outermost wrapping was raccoon skin folded two or
more times so that the fur side was largely out or enclosed in the inner
folds. Next was a section of skin and fur of the black bear and beneath
this were the remnants of a layer of elk skin with hair intact. Between the
combined elk and bear skin layer and a large section of textile there were
the following objects: a triangular arrowhead of chipped flint (catalog
no. 268123); an ovate knife of chipped flint (catalog no. 268131); a small
woven bag (catalog no. 268184) of pumpkin or squash seeds (catalog
no. 268183); a sturdy thorn probably used as a needle or awl (catalog no.
268182); a short section of wooden rod such as part of an arrowshaft (cata-
log no. 268181); six culmens from the beaks of large hawks (catalog no.
268186); two fragments of a feathered tail of a bird, probably a hawk
(catalog no. 268187); some dried leaf fragments, one of which was a spe-
cies of fern (catalog no. 268188); the seed of a wild grape {Vitis sp.) (cata-
log no. 268189); an unworked mussel shell {Fusconaia flava), probably
used as a spoon (catalog no. 268180); a leather bag (catalog no. 268105)
with a repaired area showing aboriginal sewing; a narrow bag made of
a weasel skin (catalog no. 268106); a flattened mass of folded leather and
leather thongs (catalog no. 268159); fragments of leather cords and thongs
(catalog nos. 268157 and 268158); a section of braided grass (catalog no.
268160); two fragments of white pine (catalog no. 268178); a piece of
folded leather with remnants of sewn stitches (catalog no. 268104); a frag-
ment of sewn beaver skin (catalog no. 268108); and a small fringed bag
or pouch of leather (catalog no. 268103).

The large section of textile mentioned previously proved to be a large
flat bag woven of spun buffalo hair and leather thongs by means of a twin-
ing technique. This bag and other artifacts found in the wrappings re-
moved from the skull of burial no. 2 are described elsewhere in this report.

THE BURIALS AND THE FAUNAL REMAINS 15

Beneath the woven bag was another large bag (catalog no. 268107) made
of beaver skin with the fur side on the interior. Possibly this bag had been
turned inside out. In any case, it lay directly against the skull of burial
no. 2.

This skull (catalog no. 2681 1 3) was badly warped laterally — flattened
from side to side by pressure of the earth over the grave pit (see figs.
2 and 3). In this condition it is about 20.6 cm. long from glabella to
opisthocranion and 11.7 cm. in maximum width. The face is missing,
but the right mastoid process and part of the right zygoma are still intact.
Probably this skull is that of a male. Most, if not all, of the hair is still
attached to a thin layer of well-preserved skin adhering to the top and
back portions of the skull. The hair is colored with powdered red ocher.
Running lengthwise along the crest of the skull there was a double band
of rawhide, seemingly part of a headdress, possibly a kind of roach (cata-
log no. 268116). Over the lower back portion of the skull there was a
rectangular plaque of large tubular beads of copper held in position by
leather thongs (figs. 2, top; 3, bottom).

Burial no. 3 in the collection (catalog no. 268185) is that of a child less
than two years of age and probably only one year old. The remains con-
sist of a fragmentary lower jaw and a section of the upper part of the torso
and the lower part of the head, including skin, hair, and some bones
(fig. 4). The torso-head section is about 13 cm. high and 14.3 cm. wide
at the shoulders. On the skin of the left chest there is the partial imprint
and greenish stain of a copper snake effigy pendant that accompanied this
child burial in the grave. Other artifacts found with this burial were nine
or more small tubular beads of shell and seven or more small tubular
beads of copper. Some of the shell beads were still on their cord which
was made of two strands of bast fiber showing a right-to-left twist. Most
of the copper beads were still on a leather thong, although one such bead
had a fragment of bast fiber cord with a right-to-left twist. There was also
a section, 15 cm. by 6 cm., of bear skin with fur intact (catalog no. 268155)
which may have been part of a robe or burial wrapping (fig. 4, bottom).
Thus this child, when laid in its grave, probably was wrapped in the skin
of a black bear and was adorned with a copper pendant in the form of a
snake, a string of shell beads, and two strings of copper beads. These and
other artifacts are described in more detail in subsequent portions of this
report.

Most of the artifacts from the Dumaw Creek site were found in graves
where they had been deposited as burial furniture, but unfortunately, ex-
cept as noted above, the data on specific associations and relationships
have been lost over the years or may not have been recorded in the first

Fig. 2. Two views of skull of burial no. 2 : right side of skull, top; left side of skull,
bottom.

Fig. 3. Two views of skull of burial no. 2 : top section of skull, top; rear portion
of skull, bottom.

Fig. 4. Upper torso and jaw of child and fragment of bearskin from burial no. 3.

THE BURIALS AND THE FAUNAL REMAINS 19

place. Undoubtedly, some of the artifacts that lack specific provenience
were found with some of the burials represented by the skulls in the Field
Museum collection from the Dumaw Creek site. Four of these skulls have
characteristic greenish stains showing that they had been buried in asso-
ciation with copper artifacts which were relatively abundant in the graves
at this site.

In the Dumaw Creek collection owned by Mr. Carl L. Adams of
Grand Rapids, Michigan, there is an object which probably was once
part of one of the burials excavated from the site in 1915-16 by Carl
Schrumpf. It is a hank of human hair tied in the middle with a leather
thong that had been carefully wrapped around the hair nine times. The
distal end of the hank was doubled back so that it lay over the tied part.
The proximal portion was colored with red ocher. This queue-like relic
is about 7 cm. long and 2.5 cm. in diameter.

In the collection of Mr. Seymour R. Rider of Hart, Michigan, there
were large numbers of human teeth from the Dumaw Creek site. These
represent burials in that they are remains of skulls that were fragmented
in the course of excavation. Most of Mr. Rider's collection of artifacts
were found as burial furniture.

The Faunal Remains

The faunal remains from the Dumaw Creek site that are in the pos-
session of Field Museum of Natural History were kindly identified for me
by the following members of the museum's Department of Zoology : Joseph
Curtis Moore, Curator, Mammals; Philip Hershkovitz, Research Curator,
Mammals; Emmet R. Blake, Curator, Birds; Fritz Haas, Curator Emeritus,
Lower Invertebrates; and Alan Solem, Curator, Lower Invertebrates.
The kinds of animals present at the site were manifested by skins and furs,
bones, teeth, etc., which, for the most part, were artifactual remains. Be-
cause of the nature of the collections, frequencies of given animal remains
are of little significance and are not given here. The animal remains found
at the Dumaw Creek site were those of bear (Ursus americanus), beaver
{Castor canadensis), buff'alo {Bison bison), deer {Odocoileus virgianus), elk
{Cervus canadensis) , raccoon {Procyon lotor), weasel {Mustela sp.), hawk (prob.
Buteo sp.), and mussel {Fusconaia flava) . All of these remains, except pos-
sibly buff'alo, were of animal forms native to the region. And buffalo were
less than 200 miles south of the site in the prairies or oak openings of south-
western Michigan. The exotic remains, such as marginella shells {Gla-
bella or Prunum apicina) and conchs, were undoubtedly imported through
channels of trade, a tradition going back some thousands of years in the
eastern United States.

Ill

ARTIFACTS OF STONE AND BONE

Stone

The Dumaw Creek Indians made arrowheads, knives, and scraping
tools of chipped flint and ungrooved axes of hard, granular stone. The
flint seems to have been derived from pebbles and small cobbles of the
kind found in glacial deposits or in stream beds or along lake shores. It
was variable in color and texture. Some observers might call this mate-
rial chert, but, since I cannot accurately distinguish between flint and
chert, I am here using the term flint for stone that breaks with a con-
choidal fracture and can be chipped and flaked as if it were glass. The
flint arrowheads seem to have been made somewhat carelessly or at least
with a minimum of eff"ort, yet I have no doubt that they were perfectly
functional. Some of the knives and scrapers seem to have been made with
greater care and more completely finished.

The ungrooved axes were made, in this instance, of diabase. Evidence
from elsewhere suggests that axes such as these were hafted through sockets
cut into hardwood handles. All of the stone artifacts from the Dumaw
Creek site are described in the following pages.

Arrowheads

More than a thousand flint arrowheads have been found at the Dumaw
Creek site both in the village debris and as part of the burial off'erings in
graves. At least 99 per cent of these are small triangular arrowheads of
chipped flint ranging in length from 1.5 cm. to 3.5 cm. In the collections
of Field Museum there are some 135 triangular arrowheads from the
Dumaw Creek site. These are presented by selected groupings in the
following pages.

The first group (fig. 5) consists of 26 arrowheads that were found,
according to Carl Schrumpf, near the right hand of one of the buried
skeletons. These triangular arrowheads (catalog no. 268124) range in
length from 2.0 to 2.9 cm., in width from 1.4 to 2.1 cm., and in thickness
from 0.3 to 0.6 cm. Twenty of these arrowheads are chipped bifacially
and six show chipping on only one face. Sixteen of these points have

ARTIFACTS OF STONE AND BONE

AlAii

Fig. 5. Triangular arrowheads of chipped flint found with one burial.

Straight bases and ten have slightly curved bases. One arrowhead is cov-
ered with powdered red ocher, the others range from white to gray, the
natural color of the flint. Measurements of arrowheads in this group
follow :

SOME MEASUREMENTS AND OBSERVATIONS

(Measurements in cm.)

No.

Length

Width

Thickness

Characteristics

2.0

1.8

bifacial, curved base

2.0

1.4

bifacial, straight base

2.4

1.6

bifacial, straight base

2.9

1.5

bifacial, straight base

2.5

1.4

unifacial, straight base

2.8

2.0

bifacial, curved base

2.5

1.6

bifacial, straight base

2.5

1.7

bifacial, curved base

2.5

1.5

bifacial, curved base

2.3

1.6

unifacial, straight base

2.5

1.6

unifacial, straight base

2.3

1.5

bifacial, curved base

22 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

No.

Length

Width

Thickness

Characteristics

2.8

2.1

unifacial, straight base

2.2

1.7

bifacial, curved base

2.4

1.4

bifacial, curved base

2.5

1.6

bifacial, straight base

2.0

1.5

bifacial, straight base

2.5

1.8

bifacial, curved base

2.6

2.0

bifacial, straight base

2.0

1.5

bifacial, straight base

2.2

1.5

bifacial, straight base

2.6

1.8

bifacial, straight base

2.4

1.8

bifacial, straight base

2.4

1.7

unifacial, curved base

2.3

1.7

bifacial, straight base

2.6

1.6

unifacial, curved base

A group of 27 somewhat larger, triangular points (catalog no. 268125)
lacks information about specific provenience within the Dumaw Creek
site. These arrowheads (some of which may be knives) could have been
part of the village debris, burial finds, or a mixture of both. They range
in length from 2.4 to 3.5 cm., in width from 1.3 to 2.3 cm., and in maxi-
mum thickness from 0.4 to 0.7 cm. Twenty-three of these points were
chipped on both faces and four had unifacial chipping. Sixteen points
had straight bases, ten points had curved bases, and one point had a
broken base. The color of the flint ranged from white to gray or tan.
Some of these arrowheads are illustrated in Figure 6 ; upper 4 rows, and
measurements follow :

SOME MEASUREMENTS AND OBSERVATIONS

(Measurements in cm.)

No.

Length

Width

Thickness

Characteristics

3.4

1.9

bifacial, straight base

3.1

1.3

bifacial, straight base

3.1

2.3

bifacial, curved base

2.4

1.9

bifacial, curved base

3.0

1.8

bifacial, curved base

2.8

2.2

unifacial, straight base

3.0

1.9

unifacial, straight base

2.6

2.3

bifacial, curved base

2.7

1.7

bifacial, curved base

3.0

2.3

bifacial, curved base

3.3

1.8

bifacial, curved base

3.5

1.9

bifacial, straight base

2.7

1.8

bifacial, broken base

3.5

1.8

bifacial, curved base

2.7

1.6

bifacial, straight base

2.8

2.0

unifacial, straight base

3.0

2.1

bifacial, straight base

3.3

2.0

bifacial, straight base

3.4

1.9

bifacial, straight base

2.9

1.9

bifacial, curved base

2.8

2.2

bifacial, straight base

3.2

1.7

unifacial, straight base

3.4

1.8

bifacial, straight base

ARTIFACTS OF STONE AND BONE

1 ii 1 # f

AA A i A

i AAAA^4
A JkiiA AA

A A ^ A A A A

Ai^ Ai A AaA

^Uf^

M A •«.

^. :a 44

Fig. 6. Triangular arrowheads and stemmed knives or arrowheads of chipped flint.

No. Length Width Thickness Characteristics

24 3.5 2.0 .5 bifacial, straight base

25 2.9 1.6 .5 bifacial, straight base

26 3.1 1.8 .4 bifacial, curved base

27 3.5 2.0 .6 bifacial, straight base

Another group consists of thirty-eight triangular arrowheads (catalog
no. 268126) that range in length from 1.7 to 2.9 cm., in maximum width

24 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

from 1 .2 to 1 .9 cm., and in maximum thickness from 0.3 to 0.6 cm. These
arrowheads do not have specific proveniences, but all of them are from
the Dumaw Creek site and it seems likely from written statements by
Mr. Schrumpf and others that most of these points were found in graves
as part of the burial furniture. One of these arrowheads is chipped on
one face only, the remaining 37 of them show bifacial chipping. Thirty-
one of the points have straight bases, five have slightly incurved bases, one
has a base that is excurvate, and on one broken point the base is missing.
The color of the flint generally ranges from white to dark gray, but there
are a few reddish pieces and several that are mottled. Some of these
arrowheads are shown in Figure 7, upper 3 i-ows, and their measurements
are as given below.

SOME MEASUREMENTS AND OBSERVATIONS

(Measurements in cm.)
No. Length Width Thickness Characteristics

1 2.7 1.5 .5 bifacial, straight base

2 2.4 1.5 .4 bifacial, straight base

3 2.1 1.6 .4 bifacial, straight base

4 2.3 1.6 .4 bifacial, straight base

5 2.2 1.3 .3 bifacial, straight base

6 2.1 1.5 .4 bifacial, straight base

7 2.5 1.5 .4 bifacial, straight base

8 2.5 1.7 .5 bifacial, straight base

9 2.6 1.7 .6 bifacial, straight base

10 2.2 1.9 .4 bifacial, straight base

11 2.5 1.7 .4 bifacial, straight base

12 2.8 1.4 .4 bifacial, straight base

13 2.7 1.7 .4 bifacial, straight base

14 2.5 1.8 .5 unifacial, curved base

15 2.3 1.5 .5 bifacial, curved base

16 2.0 1.5 .4 bifacial, straight base

17 2.5 1.2 .5 bifacial, excurvated base

18 2.9 1.4 .5 bifacial, straight base

19 2.7 1.5 .4 bifacial, diagonal straight base

20 2.8 1.7 .4 bifacial, straight base

21 2.5 1.5 .4 bifacial, curved base

22 2.0 1.4 .5 bifacial, straight base

23 2.4 1.8 .6 bifacial, straight base

24 2.5 1.8 .4 bifacial, straight base

25 2.0 1.3 .3 bifacial, broken at base

26 2.1 1.9 .4 bifacial, straight base

27 2.1 1.6 .4 bifacial, straight base

28 2.6 1.5 .5 bifacial, straight base

29 1.9 1.4 .4 bifacial, straight base

30 2.1 1.7 .5 bifacial, curved base

31 1.9 1.6 .4 bifacial, straight base

32 2.5 1.5 .4 bifacial, straight base

33 2.5 1.5 .5 bifacial, curved base

34 1.7 1.6 .4 bifacial, straight base

35 2.2 1.2 .3 bifacial, straight base

36 2.2 1.4 .4 bifacial, straight base

37 2.2 1.5 .4 bifacial, straight base

38 2.4 1.7 .5 bifacial, straight base

ARTIFACTS OF STONE AND BONE 25

Still another group (catalog no. 268127) consists of nineteen triangular
arrowheads that are without specific proveniences within the Dumaw
Creek site. They range in length from 1 .9 to 2.8 cm., in maximum width
from 1.4 to 1.9 cm., and in maximum thickness from 0.3 to 0.5 cm. Six-
teen of these points are completely chipped on one face only and the
remaining three arrowheads are chipped bifacially. Seventeen of them
have straight bases and two have bases that curve inwardly. Their colors
range from white to dark gray, except for one brown point. Some of these
arrowheads are illustrated in Figure 6, bottom 4 rows. The individual
measurements and some observations are listed below in tabular form.

SOME MEASUREMENTS AND OBSERVATIONS

(Measurements in cm.)

No.

Length

Width

Thickness

Characteristics

2.2

1.6

unifacial, straight base

2.4

1.7

unifacial, straight base

2.5

1.8

unifacial, straight base

2.7

1.8

unifacial, straight base

1.9

1.6

bifacial, straight base

2.3

1.7

unifacial, curved base

2.2

1.7

unifacial, straight base

2.3

1.7

unifacial, straight base

2.4

1.8

unifacial, straight base

2.5

1.8

unifacial, straight base

2.1

1.6

unifacial, straight base

2.1

1.5

unifacial, straight base

2.5

1.9

bifacial, curved base

2.3

1.7

unifacial, straight base

2.7

1.5

bifacial, straight base

2.8

1.7

unifacial, straight base

2.7

1.6

unifacial, straight base

2.1

1.4

unifacial, straight base

2.1

1.8

unifacial, straight base

The last large group of triangular arrowheads to be described here in
any detail consists of seventeen points (catalog no. 268128). They, too,
are lacking data on specific provenience within the Dumaw Creek site and
could have been found either with burials or with village debris or both.
These arrowheads, some of which are shown in Figure 7, bottom 2 rows,
range in length from 1 .6 to 2.9 cm., in maximum width from 1 .3 to 1 .9 cm.,
and in maximum thickness from 0.3 to 0.5 cm. Twelve of these points are
chipped bifacially and five are chipped unifacially. Fourteen of these
arrowheads have straight bases. The remaining three have bases that
are curved slightly inward. The color of the flint used in the manufacture
of these triangular points ranges from whitish to dark gray. Measure-
ments and some observations on individual arrowheads in this group are
provided below.

26 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

A4^A4AAAi

Fig. 7. Triangular arrowheads^of chipped flint.

SOME MEASUREMENTS AND OBSERVATIONS

(Measurements in cm.)
No. Length Width Thickness Characteristics

1 1.6 1.3 .4 bifacial, curved base

2 2.1 1.4 .3 unifacial, straight base

3 2.3 1.3 .3 bifacial, straight base

4 1.8 1.5 .4 bifacial, straight base

5 1.6 1.6 .4 bifacial, curved base

6 2.1 1.6 .4 bifacial, straight base

7 2.4 1.6 .3 unifacial, straight base

8 2.8 1.4 .4 bifacial, straight base

9 2.7 1.5 .3 unifacial, straight base

10 2.0 1.5 .4 unifacial, straight base

11 2.3 1.9 .4 bifacial, straight base

12 2.5 1.8 .5 bifacial, straight base

13 2.6 1.5 .4 bifacial, curved base

14 2.9 1.8 .5 bifacial, straight base

15 2.5 1.6 .4 unifacial, straight base

16 2.6 1.6 .5 bifacial, straight base

17 2.2 1.6 .4 bifacial, straight base

One triangular arrowhead (catalog no. 268123) was found with other
objects between the inner layers of fabric and animal skins wrapped around
skull number 2 when I removed these layers in the Museum laboratory in
January, 1959. This point is 2.2 cm. long, 1.5 cm. wide, and 0.3 cm. thick.

ARTIFACTS OF STONE AND BONE 27

It is made of brownish-gray flint, is triangular in outline, and has a straight
base. The flake from which it was made is chipped on most of the surface
of one side, but the reverse side is chipped only at the edges, thus producing
a imifacial arrowhead like those of this class already described.

One triangular arrowhead (catalog no. 268221) that I collected from
the surface of the Dumaw Creek site in the summer of 1961 is made of a
dark gray flint flake that is lightly chipped along the edges and the base
only. It is 2.1 cm. long, 2.0 cm. wide, and between 0.2 and 0.3 cm. thick.
The base is straight. I found two additional triangular points on the sur-
face of the site in the summer of 1962. One of these (catalog no. 268222)
is unifacially chipped from a light gray flake of flint. It has a straight base
and is 2.5 cm. long, 1.6 cm. wide, and 0.4 cm. in maximum thickness.
The other point (catalog no. 268223) is bifacially chipped from a dark
gray flint flake and has a slightly curved base. It is 1.8 cm. long, 1.5 cm.
wide, and 0.4 cm. thick. Three fragmentary triangular arrowheads (cata-
log no. 268224) which I found on the surface of the Dumaw Creek site in
the summer of 1960 are bifacially chipped. One of these is the distal half
of an arrowhead, another is the proximal half of a triangular point with a
slightly curved base, and the last is a narrow, triangular arrowhead with
a broken tip and a straight base. These fragmentary points are illustrated
in Figure 6, bottom row, at right.

One small triangular point (catalog no. 268122) is entirely covered
with powdered red ocher. Although it was found in one of the graves at
the Dumaw Creek site, more specific details are lacking. This bifacially-
chipped point appears to have been made of whitish flint and has a straight
base. The maximum length is 2.0 cm., greatest width is 1 .4 cm., and max-
imum thickness is 0.5 cm.

There were about 1,155 triangular arrowheads from the Dumaw Creek
site in the collection of Mr. Seymour R. Rider. I examined these arrow-
heads at different intervals in the summers of 1961 and 1962. All of
Mr. Rider's triangular arrowheads were practically identical to those in
the possession of Field Museum of Natural History which I have described
in the preceding pages.

Probable Knives or Spearheads

Two rather crudely chipped triangular points may be either arrow-
heads or knives or spearheads. They (catalog nos. 268129-1 and 268129-2)
are from the Dumaw Creek site but otherwise lack specific provenience.
One of these points, made of whitish flint, is 3.1 cm. long, 1.4 cm. wide at
the base which is straight diagonal, and 0.7 cm. at its thickest part. The
chipping is bifacial. The other point is also bifacially chipped and made

28 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

of grayish flint. It has a straight base. On one side there is a relatively
large nodular inclusion that has been somewhat rounded by chipping.
This point is 3.0 cm. long, 1.7 cm. wide, and 1.3 cm. thick at the center of
the nodular inclusion. Were it not for this inclusion the point would \ ave
been about 0.7 cm. in maximum thickness.

In the Museum's collection from the Dumaw Creek site there are only
two stemmed objects of chipped flint (catalog nos. 268130-1 and 268130-2).
These are possibly arrowheads, but more likely spearheads or knives. They
have an "ace of spades" outline (fig. 6, top row, right) with slightly flaring
stem, receding shoulders, and an ovate-triangular blade or point. One of
them, bifacially chipped of whitish flint, is 4.1 cm. long, has a greatest
width of 2.3 cm., and is 0.6 cm. in maximum thickness. The other, bi-
facially chipped of dark gray flint, is 3.4 cm. long, 1.9 cm. wide at the
shoulders, and has a maximum thickness of 0.7 cm. in the area of the stem.

Three triangular blades or points found with burials at the Dumaw
Creek site seem too large for arrowheads and thus probably are knives or
spearheads (catalog no. 268132-1-3 . All three are bifacially chipped
and have straight bases (fig. 8, second row from bottom, left). The first
one, made of gray flint, is 3.7 cm. long, 2.1 cm. wide, and 0.6 cm. thick.
The second, also of gray flint, is 4.0 cm. long, 2.2 cm. wide, and 0.5 cm.
thick. The third blade is made of dark brown flint. It is 3.5 cm. long,
2.2 cm. wide, and 0.7 cm. thick.

Knives

A number of flint objects which I believe were knives have been found
with burials and with village debris at the Dumaw Creek site. These ob-
jects vary in outline, but all of them are bifacially chipped and have good
cutting edges, some of which show signs of use.

One knife (catalog no. 268131) was found with other objects, including
a typical triangular arrowhead, between the inner layers of fabric and ani-
mal skins wrapped around skull number 2 when the skull was being pre-
pared for analysis in the Museum laboratory in January, 1959. This knife
is bifacially chipped and oval in outline (fig. 8, top row, left). It is made
of a whitish flint and is 5.7 cm. long, 3.0 cm. in maximum width, and
0.8 cm. in maximum thickness.

Two knives (catalog no. 268133-1 and 2) are ovate in outline and have
straight bases (fig. 8, top row, center). They are bifacially chipped of gray
flint. One is 4.3 cm. long, 2.5 cm. in maximum width, and is 0.6 cm. in
maximum thickness. The other is 5.1 cm. long, 2.6 cm. in maximum
width, and 0.6 cm. in maximum thickness. This knife was found in one
of the graves.

^v5^!»~!H.i*ll,*4.J^<*'

Fig. 8. Knives of chipped flint.
29

30 THE DUMAW GREEK SITE

Three leaf-shaped knives (catalog no. 268134-1-3) were found in a
grave or graves at the site. They are made of gray flint, bifacially chipped,
lenticular in cross-section, and pointed at each end (fig. 8, second row
from top, left). The first one is 4.6 cm. long, 2.3 cm. wide, and 0.6 cm.
thick. The second is 5.0 cm. long, 2.3 cm. wide, and 0.7 cm. thick. The
third of these knives is 5.2 cm. long, 2.4 cm. wide, and 0.7 cm. in maxi-
mum thickness.

Another knife from this site (catalog no. 268135) has a narrow, ellip-
soidal outline and a thin, lenticular section (fig. 8, second row from top,
right). It is bifacially chipped of gray flint and is 4.3 cm. long, 1.8 cm.
wide and 0.4 cm. thick.

Two additional leaf-shaped knives (catalog nos. 268136-1 and 2) were
found with the burials at the Dumaw Creek site. These knives, bifacially
chipped, of gray flint, are pointed at each end and have lenticular cross-
sections (fig. 8, top row, right and 3rd row, right). The first one is 5.9 cm.
long, 2.3 cm. wide, and 0.6 cm. thick. The second is 7.7 cm. long, 2.7 cm.
wide, and 0.7 cm. thick.

Another leaf-shaped blade (catalog no. 268137) probably came from
one of the graves. It differs from the other leaf-shaped forms in that the
basal half contracts to a point more abruptly than the half with the cutting
edges (fig. 8, bottom row, left). This knife is made of gray flint and bi-
facially chipped with a lenticular cross-section. It is 5.0 cm. long, has a
maximum width of 2.3 cm. at the cutting end, and is 0.7 cm. in maximum
thickness.

Three knives found with burials (catalog nos. 268138-1-3) are rhom-
boidal in outline and lenticular in cross-section (fig. 8, bottom row, right) .
They are bifacially chipped of gray flint. These and the leaf-shaped knife
(catalog no. 268137) probably were hafted in wooden handles with sockets
cut into them. The first of these rhomboidal knives is made of light gray
flint. It is 4.6 cm. long, 2.4 cm. wide, and 0.7 cm. thick. The second is
made of gray flint and is 4.3 cm. long, 2.1 cm. wide, and 0.7 cm. thick.
The third knife in this group is also made of gray flint. It is 4.4 cm. long,
2.1 cm. wide, and 0.6 cm. thick.

In the collection of Mr. Seymour R. Rider of Hart, Michigan, there
were two or three flint knives of rhomboidal form and there were ten or
more of the leaf-shaped knives of chipped flint. Both classes of knives in
the Rider collection were the same as those in the Field Museum collection.

Narrow Knives or Drills

Three knives or drills (fig. 9, top row, right) found at the Dumaw Creek
site by Carl Schrumpf are now in the Museum collection (catalog nos.

ARTIFACTS OF STONE AND BONE

Fig. 9. Flint drills or knives and scraping tools.

268144-1 to 3). One of them is narrow, ellipsoidal in outline and is 0.6 cm.
long with a maximum width of 1.7 cm. and a maximum thickness of
0.7 cm. It is made of gray flint. Another, also of narrow, ellipsoidal
form, is 6.1 cm. long with a maximum width of 1.4 cm. and a maximum
thickness of 0.7 cm. It is made of mottled gray and brown flint. The
third knife or drill is of narrow, trianguloid outline and made of gray flint.
It is 5.7 cm. long, has a maximum thickness of 0.5 cm. and is 2.1 cm. wide
at its maximum.

Worked Flakes and Scraping Tools

Out of some four hundred or more fragments of flint or chert that I
collected from the surface of the Dumaw Creek site, 38 were worked flakes
that probably served as knives and 25 were scraping tools. Of the 38
"knives," 31 (catalog no. 268225) were merely irregular flakes that exhib-
ited a cutting edge produced either by use or light pressure chipping.
Four of them (catalog no. 268226) tended toward an ovoid form and three
(catalog no. 268227) were micro-blades. Like the irregular flakes, the
ovoids and the micro-blades also had cutting edges resulting from use or

32 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

light pressure chipping. The scraping tools included six snub-nosed scrapers
(catalog no. 268228) of the "thumbnail" variety, five bi-polar cores (cata-
log no. 268229) that had been used as scrapers, and 1 4 thick flakes (catalog
no. 268230) with scraping edges).

Similar worked flakes and scraping tools found at the site by Carl
Schrumpf in 1915-16 consisted of two quadrilateral flakes (catalog no.
268139) with chipped edges for cutting (fig. 9, bottom row, center), three
snub-nosed scrapers (catalog no. 268140) of the "thumbnail" variety
(fig. 9, vertical row at left), and one ovoid scraper (catalog no. 268143)
possibly made from a broken flint knife (fig. 9, bottom right). In the
collection of Mr. Seymour R. Rider, there were about 15 snub-nosed
scrapers and about 50 thick flakes with scraping edges chipped into them.
Both classes were similar to those described above.

All of the worked flakes and scraping tools are small. Flake lengths
ranged from 1.8 to 3.7 cm. and widths from 0.5 to 2.0 cm. Probably the
Indian artisan kept a supply of flakes suited for special cutting activities
and used them as the need arose. Scraping tools ranged in length from
1 .7 to 4.9 cm. and in width from 1 .2 to 2.7 cm. The "thumbnail" variety
of snub-nosed scraper was carefully made, but the other forms were merely
scraping blades chipped into a core or flake.

Bi-POLAR Cores and Flint Knapping

In addition to the bi-polar cores that had been used as scraping tools,
there were eight other bi-polar cores manifesting a particular flint-knap-
ping technique, the presence of which has been noted in the Lake Mich-
igan area only recently (see Binford and Quimby, 1963). This technique
is very distinctive and is characterized by the production of small nuclei
that have varying combinations of opposing ridges, points, or areas of per-
cussion, caused by the placing of small pebbles on an anvil and directing
a blow parallel to the vertical axis of the pebble. This blow to a pebble
on an anvil produces a massive primary shatter consisting of relatively
large flint or chert fragments exhibiting major cortical surfaces and in-
ternal cleavage faces of an unsystematic and cubical nature. The internal
cleavage planes frequently follow along inclusions or old cracks and lack
bulbs of percussion. A considerable number of such shatter fragments
that were included in the surface collections I obtained at the Dumaw
Creek site constitute additional evidence of the use of the bi-polar tech-
nique of flint knapping.

Although it is a somewhat crude and poorly controlled method of work-
ing stone, the bi-polar technique probably represents an efficient and easy
way of utilizing small pebbles. Such pebbles used for bi-polar flint knap-

ARTIFACTS OF STONE AND BONE 33

ping at the Dumaw Creek site were 0.4 to 0.6 cm. long and probably were
obtained from stream and river beds or from erosional cuts in gravelly,
glacial deposits. They could have been collected from the shore of Lake
Michigan, but the previously mentioned sources of pebbles were much
closer to the site and I would expect proximity to have been the determin-
ing factor in the collecting of raw materials for flint knapping. Whether
or not the bi-polar flint-knapping technique was the only one used at the
Creek site is not now known. Certainly, the bi-polar core scrapers found
at the site manifest this technique and the other kinds of scrapers, as well
as arrowheads and knives, could have been made from flakes produced by
bi-polar flint knapping.

Some other classes of stone artifacts from the Dumaw Creek site were
made of granular rocks by techniques that involved pecking, grinding,
and polishing.

Shaft Smoothers

Five shaft smoothers of sandstone were found with burials at the site
in 1915-16 and were still in the possession of Carl Schrumpf aslate as 1924.

Fig. 10. Stone axes.

THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

Fig. 1 1 . Artifacts of bone.

These smoothers were small tablets of sandstone, grooved along the mid-
line, and used in pairs to sand the wooden shafts of arrows and spears.

Axes

Two celts, or ungrooved axes, of ground and polished stone were found
with burials at the Dumaw Creek site. One of these (catalog no. 268141)
is ovate-oblong in outline and rectanguloid in cross-section, with a flat-
tened poll and an excuravate bit or blade (fig. 10, right). It is made of a
dark greenish-gray diabase. The other ungrooved axe (catalog no. 268142)
is trianguloid in outline and rectanguloid in cross-section, with a rounded
poll and a straight blade or bit (fig. 10, left). It is also made of diabase
but is of gray color. The sides of this celt have not been polished and show
the roughened surface characteristic of the pecking technique by which
this artifact was made. It is 7.5 cm. long, 4.0 cm. wide, and 1 .7 cm. thick.

Hammerstones

A number of hammerstones have been found at the site. These are
glacial cobbles of granite, gabbro, and diabase. One of them which I found
on the surface with village debris was made of greenish-gray diabase (cata-
log no. 268233). It fits the hand well and is considerably scarred and

ARTIFACTS OF STONE AND BONE 35

pecked at the larger or distal end. This hammerstone is 8.7 cm. long,
7.6 cm. wide, and 5.1 cm. thick.

Mineral Paint

Quantities of powdered red ocher (hematite) were found in some of
the graves at the Dumaw Creek site and on the hair of skulls 1 and 2. In
one of the graves excavated in 1915-16 by Carl Schrumpf there was a
lump of red ocher (catalog no. 268191) about 2.8 cm. long, 2.6 cm. wide,
and 2.1 cm. thick. This lump had two major facets and two minor facets
produced by grinding the lump against a hard stone to obtain the red
powder for use as paint or ceremonial coloring.

Artifacts of Bone

Bone artifacts were relatively scarce at the Dumaw Creek site. Since
the conditions for preservation of bone were good and since the few bone
artifacts found there are in excellent shape, I can only conclude that very
few bone artifacts were placed with burials and that possibly bone artifacts
were not used extensively by Dumaw Creek Indians.

Awls

Two bone awls were found by Carl Schrumpf in graves at the Dumaw
Creek site. One awl (catalog no. 268161) was made of one-half of the
lower jawbone of a deer (fig. 11, lower left). It is 9.5 cm. long, sharply
pointed at one end and still has four teeth naturally in place at the opposite
or basal end. The pointed end of this awl shows a high degree of polish.
Another awl (catalog no. 268162) is 16 cm. long and made from a narrow,
thin, longbone, probably from the leg of a deer (fig. 11, top).

Spear or Arrow Points

One conical spear or arrow point of antler (fig. 1 1 , center left) was
found with a burial at the Dumaw Creek site by Carl Schrumpf when he
excavated there during World War I. It (catalog no. 268163) is 7.7 cm.
long and 1.3 cm. in diameter at the base. It is very sharply pointed and
has a basal socket 2.7 cm. deep.

Chisels

Four large beaver incisors (catalog no. 268164), now in fragmentary
condition, were among an undisclosed number of beaver teeth found by
Mr. Schrumpf in graves at the Dumaw Creek site. These incisors prob-
ably were used as chisels. Three of them are shown in Figure 11, right.

ARTIFACTS OF COPPER AND SHELL

Copper

There was a considerable number of copper artifacts found at the
Dumaw Creek site. Many of them were in the collection obtained by
Carl Schrumpf in 1915-16, now in Field Museum of Natural History.
Others are in private collections and some that have disappeared over the
years are known only from drawings or photographs made prior to 1927.
In this section I shall first describe by class those copper objects in Field
Museum and then add what information I have gleaned from private col-
lections and documentary sources.

Hair Pipes

Large bead-like tubes of copper called hair pipes were worn on the
head as hair ornaments. Each hair pipe was held in position by tresses
of hair that had been pulled through the tube and knotted (figs. 12 and
13). There are still 27 hair pipes attached to knotted tresses of hair on
skull no. 1 (fig. 1). An additional 27 hair pipes with tresses remaining in
them (catalog nos. 268120 and 268121) are now detached, but undoubt-
edly once were part of the ornamentation of the hair on skull no. 1.
Another group of ten hair pipes (catalog nos. 268118 and 268119) have
traces of human hair inside them and probably were also attached to the
hair of skull no. 1 . Thus, at the time of burial, the Indian represented
by this skull had hair ornaments that included 64 or more copper hair
pipes. These hair pipes were made of native copper hammered into thin
rectanguloid sheets which were then pounded into tubular shape over a
round stick or similar cylindrical object of suitable diameter. The fin-
ished pipes range in length from 3.5 to about 7.5 cm. and in diameter from
0.5 to 0.8 cm. The walls of the pipe, consisting of one layer of sheet copper
or two layers in the area of overlap, vary in thickness from one-half milli-
meter to 1 3^ mm.

Another skull with hair and copper hair pipes similar to skull no. 1
was excavated from the Dumaw Creek site by Mr. William Fitch of

a
a
o
U

THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

Fig. 13. Drawing by Gustaf Dalstrom of Dumaw Creek Indian wearing copper
hair pipes and shell beads as head ornaments.

Ludington, Michigan. According to the notes of Dr. W. B. Hinsdale,
who examined Mr. Fitch's collection in July, 1927, this skull had a large
mass of hair matted with red ocher and ornamented with "copper beads
of long variety, small tubes," which certainly are hair pipes. Hinsdale
went on to say that this skull with its hair pipes, a number of rimsherds,
and an "animal skin folded like a large purse" were found by Fitch at the
site of a large village in section 5 of Weare Township, Oceana County.
This was the Dumaw Creek site and Dr. Hinsdale toured the site in the
company of Mr. Fitch in July of 1927. In July, 1962, Mr. Seymour Rider
of Hart, Michigan, informed me that he personally had known of Fitch's
collection and that it had been destroyed when Fitch's house burned down
some time after 1927. The available evidence thus indicates that there
was a second skull from the Dumaw Creek site similar in all respects to
skull no. 1 in the possession of Field Museum. In all likelihood the second

ARTIFACTS OF COPPER AND SHELL 39

skull had at least 50 copper hair pipes associated with it. A single hair
pipe with a knotted tress of hair still in it is in the possession of Mr. Carl L.
Adams of Grand Rapids, Michigan. This hair pipe, about 4.1 cm. long,
was once part of the collection sold by Schrumpf to Sargent and is, there-
fore, from the Dumaw Creek site.

Large Beads Similar to Hair Pipes

There was an ornamental plaque, about 9.5 by 9 cm., on top of the
hair over the occipital portion of skull no. 2 in the Field Museum collec-
tions. This plaque is composed of 26 large tubular beads (catalog nos.
268114 and 268115) paired in 13 conjoined rows that form a solidly-
beaded plat of rectangular outline (figs. 2 and 3). The individual beads
are held in position in the plaque by leather thongs which are single
strand where they pass through the beads but become double strands with
a clockwise twist where they emerge from beneath the plaque. The copper
beads range in length from 4.3 to 4.7 cm. and range in diameter from
0.7 to 0.8 cm. They are made in the same manner as the hair pipes and
cannot be distinguished from the hair pipes except in terms of function
which can be observed, as in the present instance, under ideal conditions
of preservation.

Twenty similar large beads in the possession of Mr. Seymour R. Rider
were found in a trianguloid, purse-like container made of animal skin.
This purse-like container, about 13 to 15 cm. long, was first opened in
1963, although it had been excavated from the Dumaw Creek site many
years ago.

Other Beads

The other copper beads from the Dumaw Creek site are also similar
to the hair pipes, but are generally smaller. They range in length from
0.9 to 4 cm. and in diameter from 0.3 to 0.7 cm. Like the hair pipes, these
beads are tubes made of beaten native copper about /^ to ^ mm. thick.
Small rectanguloid sheets of this copper were shaped into tubes by ham-
mering them over a round stick or similar cylindrical form of desired
diameter. The beads thus made had walls, including areas of overlapping
sheet copper, that were 1 to 1 3^ mm. in thickness.

One group of eight beads (catalog no. 268147) still had in them sec-
tions of leather thongs (fig. 1 4, upper 2 rows) that were so similar as to
suggest that they had been one piece and, thus, the eight beads were part
of the same necklace. These beads range in length from 2.8 to 4 cm.
and in diameter from 0.4 to 0.6 cm. Another group consisting of 12 cop-
per beads (catalog no. 268148) probably were from one necklace because

ARTIFACTS OF COPPER AND SHELL

Fig. 15. Copper beads and shell beads.

the sections of leather thong, still in the hollows of these beads, were
knotted at each end of each bead (fig. 14, middle 2 rows). This seems
indicative of a necklace of copper beads strung on a leather thong with a
knot tied between each bead. The beads of this particular group range in
length from 2.2 to 4 cm. and from 0.4 to 0.7 cm. in diameter. Analysis
of a group of seven beads and segments of leather thongs still fastened to
them (catalog no. 268149) suggests that these beads were strung in some
kind of conjoined fashion (fig. 14, next to bottom row) or were part of a
beaded plaque. These beads range in length from 1.5 to 4 cm. and are
0.4 cm. to 0.7 cm. in diameter. A group of nine beads (catalog no. 2681 50)
consists of assorted copper tubes (fig. 14, bottom 2 rows) that were not
associated with remnants of leather thongs. These beads are from 2.4 to
3.5 cm. long and from 0.4 to 0.6 cm. in diameter. Another group of seven
copper beads (catalog no. 268151) seems to be part of one necklace found
with the burial of an infant. One bead is still strung on a section of leather
thong 5 cm. long and six beads are in their original positions on a segment
of leather thong that is 11 cm. long. These small tubular beads (fig. 15,
bottom) range in length from 0.9 to 1.7 cm. and are from 0.3 to 0.4 cm.
in diameter.

There were seven fragments of broken copper beads and five small rec-
tanguloid sheets of copper (catalog no. 268152) that probably were blanks
for the manufacture of tubular beads. Thus there are nearly 50 copper
beads found with burials at the Dumaw Creek site in the Museum col-

42 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

lection. Another ten or so copper beads are in the collection of Mr. Sey-
mour R. Rider of Hart, Michigan, and an additional 26 copper beads
from the Dumaw Creek site are in the collection of Mr. Carl L. Adams
of Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Tinkling Cones

Cone-shaped objects of flattened copper, made in the same manner as
the beads of copper, were used in various ways as ornaments on fringes.
When set in motion these cones made a bell-like tinkling sound as they
struck one another. A long narrow tinkler (catalog no. 268153) in the
Field Museum was found with a burial at the Dumaw Creek site. It is
3.3 cm. long and 0.2 to 0.5 cm. in diameter with a fragment of a leather
thong at the narrow end and remnants of counter-clockwise, twisted, fiber
strands at the broad end. A fragment of copper stained leather thong of
conical shape (catalog no. 268154) probably is the mold or remnant of an-
other tinkling cone which would have been about 2.5 cm. long and 0.7 cm.
in diameter at the broad end. In the Carl L. Adams collection which
I examined in July, 1964 there were four tinkling cones of copper from
the Dumaw Creek site. One of them was 4 cm. long and 1 .2 cm. in diam-
eter at the broad end, another was 4 cm. long and 1.3 cm. in maximum
basal diameter, still another was 3.5 cm. long and 1.5 cm. in basal diam-
eter, and the last was 3 cm. long and 1.2 cm. in greatest diameter. Each
of the four tinkling cones still had sizable segments of leather thong, 4 to
8 cm. long, still fastened through the point of the cone, thus there can be
no doubt about the function of these artifacts. Also, they are similar in
every way to tinkling cones made from kettle brass by Indians of more
recent times. It should also be noted that in some instances this type of
copper artifact has been identified erroneously as a conical arrowhead.

Other Ornaments of Copper

A snake effigy about 13 cm. long, made of flattened copper (fig. 16),
was found with the burial of a child at the Dumaw Creek site. Although
I have never seen this particular specimen, it is described in a newspaper
article ca. 1917, appears in a photograph probably taken around the time
of the newspaper story, and is listed on an inventory made for the Uni-
versity of Michigan in 1924. Moreover, a copper-stained impression of
part of this snake effigy still can be seen on the preserved skin in the left
chest area of the remains of the child burial (fig. 4), which is now in
Field Museum. Five similar snake effigies of flattened copper were found
in different burials at the Anker site in southeastern Cook County, Illinois
along the Little Calumet River (Bluhm and Liss, 1961, pp. 126-127).
One of the burials was that of a child, the other four were those of adults.

ARTIFACTS OF COPPER AND SHELL

Source of Copper

With the late date of the Dumaw Creek site, I considered the possibil-
ity that the copper might have come from European sources. This most
definitely was not the case. Analysis with the X-ray spectrometer (Olsen,

Fig. 16. Ornaments of shell and copper.

1962, table 1 and p. 237) of one hair pipe, one standard bead, and one
large bead from the rectangular plaque indicated that these artifacts were
made of native copper. This was confirmed by additional tests employing
neutron activation techniques made at Argonne National Laboratory by
Dr. A. M. Friedman. The copper used by the Dumaw Creek Indians
had not been smelted and probably came from deposits in northern Mich-
igan. It definitely was not one of the European metals found in the trade
kettles of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Shell

There were many artifacts of shell taken from the Dumaw Creek site.
With one minor exception these were all ornaments: either beads or pend-
ants. Sources of shell included local fauna and marine shell from the
coasts of the southeastern United States.

Pendants

A mask-like gorget or pendant with an incised weeping eye motif and
five perforations (fig. 16) was found with a burial at the Dumaw Creek
site by Carl Schrumpf in 1915-16. It is now in the collection of Dr. Ruth
Herrick of Grand Rapids, Michigan. This weeping eye gorget or pendant

44 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

is about 11.7 cm. long and 10 cm. wide, ovoid in ovitline, and made of
marine conch shell from the southeastern United States.

In the collection of Mr. Seymour Rider there are two pendants, prob-
ably made of local mussel shell, each with a large perforation. One is
circular (fig. 16, upper left) and is 4.5 cm. in diameter. The other is ovoid
(fig. 16, lower left) and is 4.5 cm. long. Two similar pendants are in the
Museum's collection (catalog no. 268145) from the Dumaw Creek site.
One of them is ovoid (fig. 17, top, left), 3.5 cm. long, 0.3 cm. thick, and
has a slightly countersunk perforation 0.5 cm. in diameter at its center.
The other is circular, although part is broken off (fig. 17, top, left). It is
3.7 cm. in diameter, 0.3 cm. thick, and has a slightly countersunk per-
foration 0.3 cm. in diameter at its center. Both of these pendants probably
are made of local mussel shell. There are three shell pendants carved in
the form of animal or bird claws, or possibly bird beaks (fig. 17, top, right)
in the collection at Field Museum (catalog no. 268146). They range in
length from 2.7 to 3.8 cm., in maximum width from 1.4 to 1.9 cm., and in
maximum thickness from 0.3 to 0.4 cm. The two shorter pendants had
slightly countersunk perforations 0.5 cm. in diameter at their broad ends.
The larger is broken at the broad end and only a trace of the perforation
is present. All three of these effigy pendants probably are made of mussel
shell obtained from nearby sources.

Beads

Evidence from the Dumaw Creek site indicates that beads made of
shell were used as hair ornaments, as well as in necklaces, and there is
some possibility that beads were used on fringes or grouped in solid panels
on cloth or leather. There are three beads from the site in the collection
of Mr. Carl L. Adams of Grand Rapids, Michigan. They range in length
from 1 to 1.4 cm., are proportionately thick and wide, and more or less
tubular in form. Two of them are still in their original positions on a seg-
ment of knotted thong and the third is on another piece of thong that also
has a simple overhand knot tied in it.

There are similar beads in the Field Museum collection. For in-
stance, 23 large tubular beads made of marine shell, some of which are
illustrated in Figure 18, top row, were found with a burial or burials at
the Dumaw Creek site by Mr. Carl Schrumpf in 1916-17. Eighteen of
these beads (catalog no. 268165) are complete, or nearly so, and range
from 1.1 cm. long and 0.7 cm. in diameter to 1.9 cm. long and 0.7 cm. in
diameter. Five of these beads are fragmentary (catalog no. 268166) and
range from 1.5 cm. long and 0.7 cm. in diameter to 1.8 cm. long and
0.7 cm. in diameter. Another group of 60 medium-sized tubular beads

46 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

of marine shell, some of which are shown in Figure 18 (2nd, 3rd, and 4th
rows from top), were also found with a burial or burials at the site by
Mr. Schrumpf. Fifty-six of these beads are complete or nearly so (catalog
no. 268167) and range in size from 0.8 cm. long and 0.5 cm. in diameter
to 1.5 cm. long and 0.6 cm. in diameter. The remaining four beads of
this group (catalog no. 268168) are in fragmentary condition.

A necklace of shell beads of small-to-medium size were found with the
infant or child remains which have been described previously. There are
11 tubular beads made of marine shell (fig. 15, top 23^ rows) in the Mu-
seum collection (catalog no. 268169). With the exception of one frag-
mentary piece, these beads range in length from 0.7 cm. to 1 .2 cm. and are
0.4 cm. to 0.6 cm. in diameter. Eight of the beads have remnants of a
bast fiber cord inside of them. Three of these beads are still strung to-
gether (fig. 15, top, right) and one of them has a large enough piece of
cord (fig. 15, right) to show that the cord was of two strands wound to-
gether with a right-to-left twist. Three similar beads (fig. 17, middle,
right) look as if they might have belonged to the necklace described above,
but the fiber cord upon which they were strung is different. This cord
is composed of two strands wound together with a left-to-right twist and
each of these strands is itself composed of two smaller strands wound to-
gether with a left-to-right twist. Thus, these three tubular beads of marine
shell (catalog no. 268170) were probably found with some Dumaw Creek
burial other than that of the child or infant. The fiber cords in two in-
stances are knotted. One section of cord has two beads on it, one bead
1 cm. long and 0.4 cm. in diameter and the other bead 0.8 cm. long and
0.5 cm. in diameter. The third bead is 1 cm. long and 0.5 cm. in diameter.

Six very large tubular beads, four of which are illustrated in Figure 1 8
(bottom row, center) were found with a burial or burials at the site. They
(catalog no. 268171) are made of marine shell. One rather long bead or
pendant (catalog no. 268172) is made of marine shell, possibly the centrum
of a conch. It is cylindrical, 4.5 cm. in length, and ranges from 0.8 to
1.1 cm. in diameter. There is a groove, perhaps natural, almost the entire
length of the specimen except at one end where there is a small counter-
sunk perforation.

In addition to the tubular beads made of marine shell, there were a
number of more or less spheroidal beads also made of marine shell. There
were 22 rather large beads of this class (fig. 18, next to bottom row) found
with a burial or burials at the site by Mr. Carl Schrumpf during World
War I. These beads (catalog no. 268173) range in size from 1.2 cm. long
and 1 cm. in diameter to 1 .9 cm. long and 1 .6 cm. in diameter. The cross-
sections are variable — some rovmd, others trianguloid, and still others ellip-

ARTIFACTS OF COPPER AND SHELL

f I I I t I I 1 I II

ill I I til I I

, li IK 1 1 1 1 r iM

(L K ^ it

II B «

ii ^ t i I ■ ^ tt
i P I I i< i « W

Fig. 18. Various shapes and sizes of shell beads.

soidal. Two beads (catalog no. 268175) have remnants of leather thongs
in them (fig. 17, middle row, left), suggesting they had been part of a neck-
lace. One of these beads is 0.9 cm. long and 0.7 cm. in maximum diam-
eter, the other is 1.1 cm. long and 1.1 cm. in maximum diameter. They
were found by Schrumpf with a burial or burials at the site. Four large
beads of this class (catalog no. 268177) are remarkable in that they still
have tresses of human hair inserted through their hollow centers (fig. 17,

ARTIFACTS OF COPPER AND SHELL 49

bottom row, left). In one instance, the hair is knotted to hold the bead
in position. The beads range in size from 1.1 cm. long and 1.1 cm. in
diameter to 1 .5 cm. long and 1 .4 cm. in diameter. These specimens show
that the large spheroidal beads of marine shell were not only used on neck-
laces, but were also worn on the head fastened to tresses of hair pulled
through the line hole and knotted to hold them in place. Three addi-
tional beads that might have been used as hair ornaments are illustrated
in Figure 17 (middle row, second |bead from left and bottom row, two beads
at right). They (catalog no. 268179) are made of marine shell and range
in size from 0.9 cm. long and 0.8 cm. in diameter to 1.4 cm. long and
1 .3 cm. in diameter. The smallest of these beads has a greenish stain from
copper salts, and, thus, was once associated with one of the burials that
was accompanied by copper artifacts.

There are 32 small spheroidal beads (catalog no. 268176) which were
found with a burial or burials at the site by farmer Schrumpf. These
beads range in size from 0.6 cm. long and 0.7 cm. in diameter to 1 cm.
long and 1.5 cm. in diameter. Some of them are shown in Figure 18, third
and fourth rows from bottom. A large group of small beads (fig. 19) found
with one burial at the site consisted of 3,206 shells of marginella {Glabella
or Prunum apicina), each with a small hole in the left shoulder area made
by grinding obliquely across that portion of the shell with a flat stone. One
of the 3,206 beads has a greenish stain from copper salts and thus was in
a context that contained copper artifacts. Beads such as these could be
strung as necklaces or perhaps were sewn to clothing in solid panels of
design. They (catalog no. 268174) range in length from 0.8 to 1.1 cm.
and, like the marine shells from which other beads were made, must have
come from the coasts of the southeastern United States. Most likely these
beads were obtained from intermediate tribes through regular channels
of trade.

Other Objects

A local mussel shell (Fusconaia flava), somewhat eroded (catalog no.
268180) probably was used as a spoon. It is about 6 cm. long and was
found among the wrappings incasing skull no. 2. On some parts of the
shell there are the greenish stains indicative of contact with copper salts
which in this case came from the plaque of copper beads associated with
skull no. 2.

Fig. 20. Stone pipes — obverse and reverse (upper half is obverse, lower is reverse).

TOBACCO PIPES AND ANIMAL SKINS

Tobacco Pipes

Several styles of tobacco pipes made of stone and fired clay were found
with burials at the Dumaw Creek site. An effigy pipe excavated by Mr.
Schrumpf in 1915-16 is described in an old newspaper article as "a pipe
. . . stem and bowl in one piece . . . the latter in the semblance of a bird's
head." This pipe is shown in a photograph in the files of the Museum of
Anthropology of the University of Michigan. It is an elbow pipe about
20 cm. long of fired clay with the bowl in the form of a gaping bird mouth.
The eyes of the bird are indicated by shallow holes and short vertical in-
dentations on the stem side of the bowl may indicate a bird's crest or head
feathers. This style of pipe belongs to the class of open-mouth bird effigies
and is somewhat similar to Iroquoian pipes of this class (see Wray, 1964,
Plate 7, bottom right).

Two other pipes shown in the above-mentioned photograph are vase-
shaped style with straight sides, conoidal bottoms, and collared or markedly
everted lips. The larger is about 8 cm. high and made of gray fossiliferous
stone that has been carefully smoothed. The smaller is about 6 cm. high
and made of a light-colored stone, probably limestone. Pipes such as these
required the addition of a wooden stem in order to smoke them. Both of
these pipes were carried on the inventory of Mr. Schrumpf s finds at the
Dumaw Creek site made for the Museum of Anthropology of the Univer-
sity of Michigan in 1924. On that inventory there was listed another pipe
of coral stone similar to the two just described.

In the collection of Mr. Seymour Rider of Hart, Michigan, there are
eight, or possibly more, pipes from the Dumaw Creek site. A vase-like
pipe (fig. 20, top row, center) of stone with a pointed bottom is 5 cm. high.
Another vase-like pipe of stone (fig. 20, top row, right) has a rounded bot-
tom and is 4.7 cm. high. It is decorated with engraved lines. A wedge-
shaped pipe with flat surfaces (fig. 20, bottom row, left) is 5 cm. high. It
has three arrows engraved on one face and three snake-like lines and two
X's on the reverse. At the bottom of the pipe there is a small perforation
through which a cord could be passed to help fasten the stone bowl to a

52 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

wooden stem. This pipe, like the vasiform examples, had a separate stem
of wood or hard reed pushed into a stem hole at the side. A stone elbow
pipe (fig. 20, top row, left) with a squarish bowl is 6 cm. in length. Al-
though it could have been smoked without an added stem, it probably
had one. Another elbow pipe of stone (fig. 20, bottom row, right) is pe-
culiar in that the stem hole is on the outside of the basal part of the bowl.
What appears to be the stem portion of the elbow form is something else,
possibly a handle by which to hold the pipe while it was being smoked
through a wooden stem inserted into the opposite end. The designs en-
graved on either side of this pipe are unusual, if not unbelievable, but I
have no reason to think that they are not a product of Dumaw Creek
Indians.

An elaborate stone pipe carved in the effigy of a perched bird, prob-
ably a woodpecker or a kingfisher (fig. 21, left), is 11.5 cm. high. The
hole drilled through the locus of the claw or perch was most likely used to
tie the pipe to a wooden stem that would have been inserted into the stem-
hole located in the middle-back at the bottom of the pipe bowl. The bird
(depicted in effigy) is characterized by a long straight beak, a crest, three
engraved bars on the neck, and three engraved ellipses and seven dots on
the wing area. The reverse side is practically identical. Similar pipes
have been found both east and west of the Dumaw Creek site. For in-
stance, a pipe of this class was found in Dodge County, Wisconsin in 1854
(West, 1905, pp. 106-107, fig. 83). In size and form it closely approxi-
mates the Dumaw Creek specimen. Another very similar specimen of
larger size (7 ^/^ inches) came from the Oneida River area of New York
(see Beauchamp, 1897, p. 48 and fig. 103). A number of somewhat sim-
ilar forms of perched-bird effigy pipes (see Beauchamp 1897, fig. 117;
Laidlaw, 1902 and later reports by the same author) have not been con-
sidered here because the birds so represented are owls, eagles, ravens, etc.,
that lack crests and straight, pointed beaks.

Another stone effigy pipe from the Dumaw Creek site in the collection
of Seymour Rider is shaped like a half disk with a turtle-like head project-
ing from the upper portion of the carved side (fig. 21, center). It is 6 cm.
in maximum height. Both the obverse and reverse of the half disk bear
the same engraved design — consisting of a cross whose bars terminate in
drilled dots centered in a smooth area bordered by a row of short, straight,
nearly parallel lines around the periphery of the half disk. The bowl of
the pipe is at the top of the half disk behind the turtle-like head and the
stem-hole is near the bottom on the straight side of the half disk. To smoke
this pipe one would use a stem of reed or wood attached at the stem-hole.

Fig. 21. Effigy pipes of stone, obverse and reverse (upper half is obverse, lower is
reverse).

54 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

A decorated vase-like pipe (fig. 21, right), also in Mr. Rider's collec-
tion from the Dumaw Creek site, is shaped like a quadrant of an ellipsoid.
It is made of sedimentary stone with a smooth ground surface and is 8.5 cm.
high. The engraved design, which is the same on obverse and reverse,
consists of wavy lines above a crescent and beneath a rectangle with at-
tached lines and angles. The stein-hole is in the middle of the straight
side and at the upper part of the opposite side there is a stylized face indi-
cated by dots and engraved lines.

Two bird eflfigy pipes of fired clay that probably were products of
Dumaw Creek culture were found by Carl Schrumpf in the spring of 1932.
These pipes were not from the Dumaw Creek site. They were found in a
grave in Oceana County (section 4 of Golden Township) about eight miles
southwest of the Dumaw Creek site. Both of these pipes had long stems
and bowls in the shape of a bird's head. One of these, according to rec-
ords in the Museum of Anthropology at the University of Michigan, is
21 cm. long and the effigy bowl represents a duck-like bird with a large
beak projecting beyond the bowl in a more or less horizontal plane. The
other is about 23.5 cm. long and the effigy bowl also represents a duck-like
bird with the beak projecting beyond the bowl and upward at a 45 degree
angle from the horizontal plane of the long stem. Traces of what appear
to be black paint are on the effigy portion of the pipe. The eyes and nos-
trils of the bird are indicated by shallow holes and the upper and lower
beaks are separated by an incised or engraved line. This pipe is in the
Museum of Anthropology at the University of Michigan.

Animal Skins

Fragments of animal skins found with burials at the Dumaw Creek site
are in an unusually good state of preservation. The collection of Field
Museum of Natural History includes the following examples. A fragment
of raccoon skin (catalog no. 268112) measuring about 35 by 20 cm. (fig. 22,
bottom) was in direct association with skull no. 2. A piece of skin of a
black bear (catalog no. 268111) about 23 by 20 cm. (fig. 22, top, left); a
fragment of beaver skin (catalog no. 268110) about 18 by 13 cm. (fig. 22,
top, right); and a small portion of elk skin (catalog no. 268109) about 11
by 9 cm. (fig. 22, middle, right) were also directly associated with skull
no. 2. Probably these fragmentary skins were the remains of fur robes that
had been wrapped around the corpse of the individual Indian of whom
skull no. 2 was a part.

In the collection of Mr. Seymour Rider of Hart, Michigan, there was
a section of beaver skin about 60 cm. long and 40 cm. wide, consisting of
fragments of two skins that had been sewn together with a leather thong

TOBACCO PIPES AND ANIMAL SKINS

Fig. 22. Pieces of animal skin.

in a variety of cross-stitch. On the unfurred side of the skins there was a
painted design the color of red ocher which consisted of solid bands and
circles in a curvilinear arrangement. These fragments most likely are the
remains of a robe made of beaver skins ornamented with painted designs in
red on the smooth side of the robe. A reconstruction of this robe is illus-
trated in Figure 23.

Fig. 23. Drawing by Gustaf Dalstrom of Dumaw Creek Indian in beaver robe with
painted decoration.

TOBACCO PIPES AND ANIMAL SKINS 57

What may be a small part of a somewhat similar robe of beaver skin
is in the Field Museum collection (catalog no. 268108). This specimen,
7 cm. long and 4 cm. wide, consists of two fragments of beaver skin sewn
together with a leather thong in an overcast stitch. However, there is no
evidence of any painted design. This artifact was associated with skull
no. 2 and may be a portion of the beaver skin (catalog no. 268110) pre-
viously described.

A section of the skin and fur of a black bear (fig. 4, bottom) was found
with the burial of an infant by Carl Schrumpf in the course of his excava-
tions of the Dumaw Creek site during the first World War. This specimen
(catalog no. 268155) is 15 cm. long and 6 cm. in maximum width. It was
found in position around the neck of the infant as if it were part of a fur
collar or the remnants of a robe.

Some miscellaneous small fragments of skin and fur (catalog no. 268156)
from the Dumaw Creek site are in the collections. These small fragments
are from larger sections of animal skins which have been already described.

Among those Dumaw Creek-site specimens owned by Mr. Carl L.
Adams of Grand Rapids, Michigan, there is a trianguloid piece of beaver
skin, with fur intact, measuring about 12 cm. in maximum length and
12 cm. in maximum width. There is a fragment of textile (described in
Chapter 7) adhering to the fur side of this piece. Mr. Adams told me, in
July of 1964, that when he purchased this section of beaver fur from
H. E. Sargent it was said to have been associated with burial no. 1 .

There are several bags made of animal skins in Field Museum's col-
lection from the Dumaw Creek site. They were all associated with burial
no. 2. One of them (catalog no. 268107) is a rectangular bag about 30 cm.
long (or high) and 15 cm. wide, made probably of beaver skin (fig. 24).
The fur side of the skin was the interior surface of the bag. The long edge
of the bag had a row of sewing awl or needle punctures spaced 0.4 to
0.6 cm. apart and one of the shorter edges, presumably the bottom of the
bag, had similar punctures 0.5 to 0.6 cm. apart. There were still frag-
ments of leather thong in place, showing that the sewing had consisted of
a simple running (over-and-under) stitch. The opposite, short, side of the
bag does not seem to have been stitched, thus suggesting that the long
dimension was vertical and that the bag was thus 30 cm. high and 15 cm.
wide. Moreover, the bag can thus be seen to have been made from a
piece of skin 30 cm. square. When folded in half and sewn at one side
and bottom, the skin was transformed into a bag of the dimensions I have
already given. Why the fur was on the inside, I do not know, but it is pos-
sible that the bag was turned inside out especially for burial with the dead.

Another of the bags found with burial no. 2 was made of the skin of a
weasel (fig. 25). This specimen (catalog no. 268106) is 20 cm. long (or

Fig. 24. Bag probably of beaver skin.

Fig. 25. Bag made of skin of weasel.
59

TOBACCO PIPES AND ANIMAL SKINS

Fig. 27. Small leather bag with fringe and mass of folded leather.

high), 7 cm. wide at the top or open end, and 3.5 to 4 cm. wide at the bot-
tom. Patches of fur still adhere to the exterior surfaces. Apparently this
bag, when new, consisted simply of the major portion of a weasel skin
stripped from its carcass. Such a skin could be used as a bag without the
necessity of sewing or other means of joining.

The major portions of a rectangular leather bag (fig. 26, left) were also
found with burial no. 2. This specimen (catalog no. 268105) is now in
two pieces, but when first observed by me, in the process of removing the
wrappings from skull no. 2, the two pieces were joined at a fold. The
remnants are indicative of a bag at least 26 cm. long and 11.5 cm. wide.
Since the leather is folded along the long axis I assume that this axis is
vertical. How the opposite side and bottom of the bag were joined is un-
certain, but probably they were sewn with leather thongs by means of a
running stitch (see catalog no. 268104). On the face of the larger piece
there is a tear or gap 2.5 cm. long that has been mended by sewing with a
leather thong in a kind of 8-shaped overcast stitch.

A rectanguloid piece of leather (catalog no. 268104) found with skull
no. 2 may be a part of the bag (catalog no. 268105) described above, or
may be part of a similar bag, or may even be a piece of a leather garment.
It is 24 cm. long and 8 cm. in maximum width. There are remnants of a

j:>^:;-^^<^..'v.:;;-';M

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■/;^<;^iki::i ■:•;/. ■.•■•\

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TOBACCO PIPES AND ANIMAL SKINS 63

leather thong sewn in a running stitch 1 cm. inside the margin of one of
of the long sides. The awl or needle holes are 0.2 to 0.5 cm. apart. The
leather seems to have been folded over for about one-third of the length
of this seam and at the very edge there is additional sewing or remnants
of a fringe made of thongs inserted through awl or needle holes. If these
particular thong remnants were those of a fringe they are of a kind that
might once have had copper tinkling cones attached to them. When
found among the wrappings surrounding skull no. 2 this specimen was
crumpled into an oval mass (fig. 27, right), but when wetted and gently
unfolded, it proved to be of rectanguloid form (fig. 28).

A small bladder-shaped object with fringe-like thongs at one end (fig. 27,
left) was also among the finds in the wrappings of skull no. 2. This speci-
men (catalog no. 268103) is made of leather and is 6.5 cm. long with a
fringe of thongs 3 to 7 cm. long and is 2.8 cm. in maximum width. A small
seam at the base of the fringe seems to have been sewn with a leather thong
by means of an overcast stitch. I would guess that this object is a small bag
or else part of the previously described specimen (catalog no. 268104).

There are a number of fragments of thongs and leather cords (fig. 26,
right), some of which are knotted (catalog no. 268157). Three of these
have simple over-hand knots tied in them and six are without knots. They
range from 4 to 1 3 cm. in length. Two fragments of leather cord are com-
posed of four thin leather thongs wound together in right-to-left twist
(catalog no. 268158). One unusual object (fig. 26, right) consists of a
mass of leather thongs either fastened to or lying on a mass of folded leather
(catalog no. 268159). It is 14 cm. in maximum length, 8 cm. in maximum
width, and 2 cm. in maximum thickness. This specimen was found in the
wrappings that enclosed the skull of burial no. 2.

POTTERY FROM THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

The pottery from the Dumaw Creek site either was found in graves
were it had been placed as burial offerings for the deceased or was found
in the habitation areas. The complete vessels and very large sherds came
from the graves, but, in general, the small sherds came from habitation
areas of the site and represented common refuse produced by breakage of
pots in everyday use.

Whole Vessels

Two complete vessels were found with Burial I. The smaller of the
two jars was nested inside the larger one. Both of these vessels have round
bottoms, globular bodies, broad orifices, and slightly flaring rims termi-
nated by rounded and flattened lips that have been scalloped or crimped.

Both jars were made of clay tempered with small particles of granitic
stone and both have their exterior surfaces entirely covered with impres-
sions of what at first glance seems to have been a cord-wrapped paddle,
but what on closer observation appears to have been a fabric-wrapped
object used while the clay was still plastic.

To test this last observation, I made a rubber mold of nearly one-half
of each vessel from base to lip. The rubber mold provides a positive im-
pression of at least a part of the object used to make the negative impres-
sions on the vessel surfaces.

An examination of the rubber positive suggests a coarse, tightly woven
fabric or possibly a piece of basketry. The weaving technique is difficult
to identify because only part of the weave is registered in the impression,
but it seems to be twining.

The larger vessel (catalog no. 268053) is 20.5 cm. high with a maxi-
mum body diameter of 21 cm. and a mouth 18.5 cm. in diameter (see
fig. 29). The thickness of the rim is 0.9 cm. and the thickness of the body
at the line of maximum diameter is 0.5 cm. The top of the rim or lip is
scalloped. The directions and positions of minute striations and eversions
indicate that the scalloping was done by the potter's fingers and the lip

POTTERY FROM THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

Fig. 29. Pottery vessel with scalloped lip.

reshaped to more or less uniform thickness subsequent to the scalloping.
The color of this jar is tan or gray except in areas that are smoke black-
ened. The paste is rather soft (hardness 2-2.5) and tempering of small-
to-medium particles of granitic rock is abundant.

The smaller vessel (catalog no. 268054) is 14.5 cm. high with a maxi-
mum body diameter of 15 cm. and a mouth that is 13.8 cm. in diameter
(see fig. 30). The thickness of the rim ranges from 0.3 to 0.5 cm. and the
thickness of the body at the line of maximum diameter is 0.3 cm.

THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

Fig. 30. Pottery vessel.

The top of the rim or hp is sHghtly scalloped, somewhat in the manner
of the crimping of the outer edge of a modern pie crust. The impressions
along the lip indicate that the scalloping was produced by pinching the
upper rim between thumb and edge of forefinger while the clay was still
plastic.

The color of this vessel is reddish-tan except in areas that are smoke
blackened. The paste is somewhat soft (hardness 2-2.5) and contains
rather abundant tempering of small-to-medium particles of granitic stone
most of which are rounded.

POTTERY FROM THE DUMAW CREEK SITE 67

Sherds

Five large rim sherds from the Dumaw Creek site were obtained by
Field Museum from Mr. Seymour R. Rider in 1961. Mr. Rider had
gotten these sherds from Carl Schrumpf who had removed them from
Dumaw Creek graves in 1916. Each of these sherds, for analytical pur-
poses, is almost as good as a whole pot because each contains large parts
of the rim and shoulder curves and has an intact lip. Exterior paste hard-
ness of all five sherds is 2 to 2.5. The first sherd (fig. 31, top, left) is tem-
pered with small particles of granitic stone and is light brown or smoke
gray in color. The exterior surface has been roughly smoothed after hav-
ing been malleated by cord-wrapped or fabric-wrapped paddle. The in-
terior surface is smooth. This sherd (catalog no. 268234) came from a
vessel that had a wide mouth, about 22 cm. in diameter, a slightly flaring
rim, and an everted, thickened lip with scallops about 1.3 cm. wide made
by the impressing of a finger. The thickness of the shoulder is 0.7 cm.;
that of the rim, 0.7 cm.; and that of the lip is 1 cm. The height of this
sherd is 10.5 cm.

The second large sherd (fig. 31, top, right) is similarly grit-tempered,
brown or smoke gray in color, and has a smooth interior. The exterior,
however, bears the impressions of a fabric or a cord-wrapped paddle. This
sherd (catalog no. 268235) came from a vessel that had a broad mouth,
about 19 cm. in diameter, a flaring rim, and a thickened lip notched at its
outer edge by a rod-like object about the size of a finger. The shoulder is
0.5 cm. thick, the rim is 0.5 cm. thick, and the lip is 0.9 cm. thick. This
sherd is 13.3 cm. wide and 8.3 cm. high.

The third sherd (fig. 31, bottom, left) is the largest. It is 12 cm. high,
13.5 cm. wide, 0.7 cm. thick at the shoulder, 0.8 cm. thick in the rim, and
has a lip about 1 cm. thick. Like the others, it is tempered with particles
of granitic stone. The color is smoke gray or reddish brown, the interior
surface is smooth, and the exterior surface is smoothed over cord or fabric
marking. This sherd (catalog no. 268236) came from a vessel that had a
wide orifice, about 19 cm. in diameter, a slightly flaring rim, and a slightly
thickened, markedly scalloped lip. This particular scallop was produced
by an Indian who placed her right forefinger on the inside of the lip and
then crimped the lip between her right thumb and the side of her fore-
finger while the clay was still plastic.

Sherd number four (fig. 31, middle, right) has an unthickened lip
pinched at close intervals between the thumb and forefinger of the potter's
right hand while the clay was plastic. This sherd (catalog no. 268237)
is 10 cm. high, 9 cm. wide, 1 cm. thick at the shoulder and tapers to a
thickness of 0.6 or 0.7 cm. in the upper rim and lip. It is light brown or

THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

fM^'

Fig. 31. Large sherds of pottery.

smoke black in color and rather sparsely tempered with small granitic
particles. The interior surface is smooth and the exterior surface smooth
in the rim area but shoulder and probably body areas have been coarsely
smoothed, but not enough to hide the cord or fabric marking that preceded
the smoothing. This sherd came from a vessel that had a broad mouth,
about 18 cm. in diameter, and a flaring rim.

POTTERY FROM THE DUMAW CREEK SITE 69

The fifth and last of these large sherds (fig. 31, bottom, right) is abun-
dantly tempered with particles of granitic rock and is of reddish-brown and
gray color. The interior is smooth and the exterior exhibits cord or fabric-
wrapped paddle malleations which have been slightly smoothed, probably
by means of the potter's bare hand. This sherd (catalog no. 268238) is
9 cm. high, 8.5 cm. wide, 1 cm. thick at the shoulder, 0.6 cm. thick in the
rim area, and 1 cm. thick at the lip. It came from a vessel with a broad
opening, probably about 22 cm. in diameter, a slightly flaring rim, and a
thickened and slightly castellated lip. The lip was thickened by adding
large fillets of clay that produced a band about 1 to 1 .5 cm. high, then the
exterior of this lip band was notched by pinching the clay between thumb
and forefinger.

Two rim sherds collected from the site in 1915 or 1916 by Mr. Carl
Schrumpf have curves indicative of a broad-mouthed jar with a slightly
flaring rim. Both sherds (catalog no. 268192) are tempered with small
particles of granitic rock.

One is reddish-tan in color and has the impression of a fabric, probably
twined, on its exterior surface. The outer half of the everted lip is scal-
loped and crimped.

The other sherd is yellowish-tan and light gray with a smooth exterior
surface. The outer half of a flattened lip and adjoining portion of upper
rim are decorated with rectanguloid notches or punctates.

In the Museum of Anthropology at the University of Michigan is a
collection of 1 46 sherds from the Dumaw Creek site donated by Mr. Carl
Schrumpf some time prior to 1925. All of these sherds are tempered with
small particles of granitic stone in varying degrees of abundance. The
tempering material is similar to and could have been obtained from the
exotic granitic rocks, many of them fire-cracked, that are still found on the
surface of the Dumaw Creek site. The colors of these sherds are variable
and include reddish-tan, buff", light gray, dark gray, and black. Basilar
sherds ranged in thickness from 8 cm. to 1.2 cm. and rim sherds ranged
from 0.5 to 1 cm.

Five body sherds and five rim sherds had exterior surfaces bearing im-
prints of a coarse fabric that may have been closely twined or of a fine
matting of some other weave. Eleven body sherds and two rim sherds
had surfaces bearing impressions made with a paddle-like object wrapped
with cord composed of two strands twisted together counter-clockwise.
Thirty-nine body sherds and seven rim sherds exhibited surfaces that had
been roughly smoothed subsequent to malleations made either by cord or
fabric impressing. On most of these sherds the subsequent smoothing did

70 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

not completely obliterate the earlier surface treatment. Twenty-seven
body sherds and five rim sherds have smooth exterior surfaces.

Forty-five small sherds are split or eroded so that the exterior surfaces
are lacking. Several of these split sherds show impressions of fabric or
cord on the inside segment revealed by the splitting.

The 19 rim sherds and some near rims, all of which have been included
in the counts of the categories described above, conform to the vessel shape
suggested by whole vessels and large sherds from graves. Thirteen of the
rims had lips that were flattened or flattened with rounded edges. Three
rims had rounded and flattened lips that were everted outward, another
such rim had a band or rim fillet made probably by pushing an everted
lip into the wall of the upper rim, and two sherds had narrowed and
rounded lips. Nine of these rim sherds were not decorated, although the
lips showed striations and impressions of the potter's fingers. Seven sherds
showed minor scalloping or crimping by the potter's fingers, and one sherd
with an everted lip was obviously scalloped. This sherd also had a row
of vertical punctate impressions around the rim. Two rim sherds were
decorated with rounded notches pressed by a dowel-like object into the
outer edge of the lip and adjoining part of upper rim.

A collection of 129 sherds (catalog nos. 268239 and 268240) was ob-
tained from the surface of the northwest habitation area of the Dumaw
Creek site by a Museum field party in the summer of 1960. All sherds
are tempered with small particles of granitic rock. These rock particles are
rounded or angular and both varieties may be found in the same sherd
and in varying degrees of abundance. The color of the fired clay is usually
reddish-tan or gray or a mixture of both on the same sherd. A few sherds
are buff.

Twenty-one body sherds and one rim sherd had surface impressions of
what appears to have been fabric. Twenty-one of these impressions sug-
gest a closely-twined fabric or mat and one looks as if the fabric had been
plain-plaited. Eight sherds had surface impressions made with a paddle-
like object wrapped with cord consisting of two strands twisted together
counter-clockwise. Another group consisting of ten sherds had surface
impressions that were made either with fabric or a cord-wrapped paddle.
On none of these was I able to decide which was which. Thirty-seven
body sherds and five rim sherds had surfaces that had been roughly
smoothed subsequent to treatment with either a cord-wrapped paddle or a
fabric. There are spots where the smoothing did not completely obliterate
the original surface treatment on at least half of the sherds in this category.
Nine body sherds and three rim sherds have surfaces that have been well
smoothed so that there is no sign of any possible previous surface treatment.

POTTERY FROM THE DUMAW CREEK SITE 71

Thirty-two body sherds and one rim sherd were spUt or eroded so that
their original exterior surfaces were missing. But four of these sherds had
cord or fabric impressions on the interior segment revealed by the splitting
away of the outer layer of clay. This indicates that paddling with a cord
or fabric-wrapped tool was part of the method of constructing the pottery
jars and that when a vessel wall became too thin as it was being paddled a
piece of wet clay was added at the weak point and paddled into place.

Ten rim sherds, as well as some near rim pieces that have been in-
cluded in categories described above, indicate that the vessels, when whole,
had slightly flaring rims and broad orifices. All of the ten rim sherds had
lips that were rounded and flattened. Four were slightly scalloped, an
ornamental treatment produced by crimping the plastic clay between the
potter's thumb and forefinger. Two sherds were decorated with rounded
notches impressed by a dowel-like object into the outer edge of lip and
adjoining portion of rim. And one sherd had rows of rather closely spaced
indentations made probably by the potter's fingernail along the outer and
inner portions of the lip.

The largest single collection of sherds from the Dumaw Creek site was
discovered in the possession of Mr. Seymour R. Rider of Hart, Michigan.
He had 491 rim sherds. All of these sherds were from vessels with broad
mouths and flaring or slightly flaring rims. All were grit-tempered and
color ranges included gray, buff, brown, reddish-brown, smoke gray, and
smoke black. All had smooth interior surfaces but about 90 per cent had
exteriors showing cord or fabric-wrapped paddle malleations, or such mal-
leations roughly smoothed, but still plainly visible. About 10 per cent of
these rim sherds had smooth exteriors. About 97 or 98 per cent of all of
these rims sherds showed some kind of special treatment of the lip, such as
scalloping and/or crimping or pinching between thumb and forefinger;
notching outer edge of lip or top of lip with finger or with rod-like object
or stick with rectanguloid cross-section; and impressing lip with fingernail
or thumbnail. Some of the rims with these styles of lip treatment were
castellated, but such sherds were not common.

Pottery Type

The brief analysis of the sherds and whole vessels from the Dumaw
Creek site provides criteria for the possible formulation of from one to four
pottery types, depending on the classifier's point of view concerning the
variations in surface treatment and lip shape. Whatever else they were,
all possible types would be grit-tempered, globular jars with broad orifices
and flaring or slightly flaring rims. In addition to these characteristics,
the most popular type would possess a roughly smoothed surface that pre-

72 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

viously had been malleated by a cord or fabric-wrapped paddle and prob-
ably a crimped or scalloped lip. The lip treatment seems most significant,
and will be treated as a mode.

Modes

The term "mode," according to Rouse (1960, p. 313), means "any
standard, concept, or custom which governs the behavior of the artisans
of a community, which they hand down from generation to generation,
and which may spread from community to community over considerable
distances. . . ."

A characteristic that seems to have been a procedural mode of the In-
dian potters of Dumaw Creek site is the use of fingers in decorating the
lips of pottery vessels. The conceptual modes, or diagnostic attributes
from which the procedural mode is inferred, include scalloping and/or
crimping between thumb and forefinger, notching outer edge of lip and
adjacent upper rim with side of forefinger or little finger, and stamping or
punctating lip with fingernail or thumbnail. An additional conceptual
mode is the lip decoration produced by impressing a dowel-like instrument
or a narrow, rectangular stamp into the outer edge of the lip and adjacent
portion of the rim.

These conceptual modes and the procedural mode involving use of
potters' fingers in lip decoration seem to be horizon markers indicative of
protohistoric times, a hoi'izon that logically should end with the arrival
of the first Europeans, but which probably persisted a brief time into the
period of French contact with Indians in the western part of the Upper
Great Lakes region.

VII

VEGETAL REMAINS AND TEXTILES

Vegetal Remains

Except for some fragments of bast fiber and cordage, all of the vegetal
remains in the Field Museum of Natural History collection from the
Dumaw Creek site were found in the wrappings that enclosed the skull
of burial no. 2. These remains, unless otherwise noted, have been identi-
fied by members of the Museum's Department of Botany.

There are several fragments of dried leaves, one of which was some
kind of fern, and two fragments of wood (catalog no. 268178) identified
as white pine (Pinus strobus). One fragment is 19 cm. long, 2.7 cm. wide,
and 1 cm. thick, whereas the other is 20.5 cm. long with a maximum width
of 6.5 cm. and is 1 cm. thick. A smooth, cylindrical piece of wood 5.7 cm.
long and 0.8 cm. in diameter (catalog no. 268181) may be a fragment of
an arrowshaft. Although it has a somewhat soft center, it is a dicot and
not one of the monocots, such as bulrush, cattail, bamboo, or cane. A
sturdy thorn 4.5 cm. long (catalog no. 268182 from either a honey locust
{Gleditsia triacanthos) or a hawthorn {Crataegus mollis) was probably used
as a sewing awl or a pin. Under magnification the point shows wear and
polish.

Remains of vegetal foods consisted of the seed of a wild grape {Vitis sp.)
and more than one hundred pumpkin seeds (catalog no. 268183). The
pumpkin seeds were identified by Dr. Hugh Cutler of Missouri Botanical
Garden, St. Louis, Missouri, who stated, "The seeds are Cucurbita pepo and
probably are from a form of summer squash (like summer crookneck or
summer prolific) or from a small pumpkin [smaller than Small Sugar or
Connecticut Field but larger than Mandan]." Most of these seeds were
contained in a small bag of woven fiber (fig. 32), enclosed among the wrap-
pings around the skull of burial no. 2, but a few were loose in the wrappings
themselves.

Textile Remains

Three textile relics from the Dumaw Creek site were in the possession
of Mr. Carl L. Adams of Grand Rapids, Michigan, who kindly allowed me

VEGETAL REMAINS AND TEXTILES

to examine them in the summer of 1964. They were part of a collection
purchased by Mr. Adams from Mr. H. E. Sargent, who had bought them
from Carl Schrumpf, the original excavator of the Dumaw Creek site.

Fig. 32. Pumpkin seeds and fragments of woven bag.

One of these relics is a small portion, 6.5 cm. by 4 cm., of loosely woven
stuff adhering to a trianguloid section of beaver fur that probably was
associated with burial no. 1 . The weave is a simple over-and-under type
with flat, untwisted weft elements and two-strand warp elements that have
a left-to-right twist in them. The material of both weft and warp elements
seems to be some kind of bast fiber.

The second textile relic in the Adams collection was a woolen belt-like
object about 85 cm. long and 1 .7 cm. wide. Made by means of a braiding
technique, it was separated at each end into four smaller, flat braids, each

VEGETAL REMAINS AND TEXTILES 75

composed of six elements, each of which in turn was separated into two
braids made up of three elements. This textile relic is thus composed of
twenty-four elements. Each element appears to be a yarn made of buffalo
hair spun with a left-to-right twist. I suspect that this woven artifact is a
"hair-tie." In size and shape it closely resembles the more recent beaded
hair-ties used in the late nineteenth century by the women of such Great
Lakes tribes as Sauk, Fox, Potawatomi and Winnebago. If this braided
woolen artifact is indeed a hair-tie, it should have been associated with the
burial of a female in the Dumaw Creek site. Unfortunately, the specific
burial association of this woven artifact is not known to me.

The third textile remnant owned by Mr. Adams is a small fragment of
woven material, about 5 cm. long and 3 cm. wide, adhering to a non-
descript piece of beaver fur of the same dimensions. Although this partic-
ular remnant is in poor shape and difficult to identify, it appears to be two
layers of material woven by some sort of open or spaced twining technique.

Two textile specimens in the Field Museum collection from the Dumaw
Creek site were discovered in the wrappings on the skull of burial no. 2.
The first of these (catalog no. 268184) was a small bag containing pumpkin
seeds. Remnants of this bag indicate that it measured at least 6 cm. high,
5 cm. wide, and 3 cm. thick. The bag was net-like in that it had triangu-
lar openings about 0.5 cm. wide and 1 cm. long produced by a twining
technique (fig. 32) . The elements of the weave were flat, untwisted vegetal
fiber about 1 mm. wide and a fraction of a millimeter in thickness. There
seem to be three weft elements, one of which is twisted from left to right
around warp elements in groups of two. The other two weft elements are
used as simple, under-and-over weave. However, it looks as if different
weft elements play a different role at each crossing of the warp. For in-
stance, the element that is twisted around the warp at one crossing merely
goes over or under at the adjacent crossing and a different weft element is
in turn twisted around the warp. Moreover, the paired warp strands seem
to separate at alternate crossings of the weft to produce the triangular
openings or bisected diamond pattern of this open-mesh bag. Unfortu-
nately, its fragmentary condition makes analysis of this particular textile
artifact difficult and uncertain.

The second textile in the Museum's collection (catalog no. 268100) is
a woven bag (fig. 33) that also was found among the wrappings on the
skull of Burial no. 2. This bag is about 28 or 29 cm. high and perhaps
17 to 22 cm. wide. Portions of the periphery of this specimen are missing,
thereby making both measurement and identification somewhat uncer-
tain. However, the reasons I think this textile is a bag are: It is made by
means of a twining technique and, in a general way, resembles the twined

Fig. 33. Twined bag.

VEGETAL REMAINS AND TEXTILES 77

bags made in the nineteenth century by Sauk and Fox, Potawatomi, and
Menomini which I have examined in the Field Museum collections. It
consists of two facing layers of cloth still joined together at one extremity.
I not only assume that this specimen is a bag but I also assume that the
warp elements are vertical. The reasons for the latter belief are as follows :
the warp elements were vertical and the weft elements horizontal in the
ethnological examples that I examined. Also some simple experiments
involving weight and pressure suggest that in such twined bags there is
greater strength and closer positioning of all elements if the warp is ver-
tical and the weft horizontal than would be the case if warp and weft were
reversed. If my assumptions are correct, the Dumaw Creek textile is a
bag, greater in height than in width, and the previously mentioned ex-
tremity where the two layers of cloth are joined is the bottom of the bag.
The warp elements consist of cords made of spun buffalo hair and the
weft elements are either buffalo hair cords or leather thongs. The cords,
about 3 or 4 mm. in diameter are made of two strands of buffalo yarn com-
bined with a left-to-right twist. Each strand of yarn is composed of about
20 buffalo hairs combined in a somewhat loose, right-to-left twist. The
weft elements sometimes are similar cords but usually consist of leather
thongs ranging from 3^ to 3 mm. in width and 3^ to 1 mm. in thickness.
All of the weft elements, in pairs, are twined across the warp elements with
a left-to-right twist. These warp elements are adjacent to one another and
held in position by the weft elements which cross them at intervals usually
1.5 cm. apart (fig. 34, right), but the distance between weft elements
ranges from about 1.3 to 2 cm. These paired weft elements are twisted
around individual warp members or paired warp members in what ap-
pears to be an unsystematic manner. For instance, on the obverse of the
bag there is one section where a whole course of weft elements is twisted
around single warp elements and the courses on either side of it are
twisted around paired warp elements. There is another area where the
same course of weft elements is twisted around paired warp elements for
7 or 8 cm. but otherwise twisted around single warp elements. In these
and several other instances this variation in the twining technique does not
seem to make any difference. The warp cords are held parallel and close
together no matter if one or two are held by the paired weft elements
used in this twining. There definitely is no indication of the diamond or
half-diamond shaped open twining achieved by zigzagging or crossing
some warp elements and using alternate courses of weft elements to hold
single and paired warp elements. I can only conclude that the maker of
this bag became impatient at various times during the weaving or else
was so skillful that she knew how to save weaving time without signifi-
cantly changing the strength and form of her end product.

VEGETAL REMAINS AND TEXTILES 79

As I interpret the evidence, the bag from the Duinaw Creek site was
made by selecting enough buffalo hair warp cords to produce the width
desired. These cords were long enough so that when doubled they pro-
vided the desired height for the bag. Then the weft elements were twined
around the warp elements, each course of paired weft elements completely
encircling the bag at intervals of about 1 .5 cm. The top or open part of
the bag probably was finished with a selvage of braided leather thongs.
There are six sections of braided leather thongs (catalog no. 268102) rang-
ing in length from 3 to 5 cm. Four are tapered from a basal configuration
that embraces fragments of spun buffalo hair yarn and two are more or
less untapered, although they also include fragments of buffalo hair yarn
in their basilar structures. Each of these braids, at least in its terminal
half, consists of three elements of leather thong. I would have expected
four elements because I assume that the tapered braids are a joining of two
pairs of weft elements that have been twined across all the warp elements
and are back at their starting point. In some experiments I made in an
effort to weave a twined bag, I found it practical to tie and braid the weft
elements at the end of each course. Moreover, I could make the braids
taper by dropping one of the four elements and tightening the braid in its
terminal half. I suspect that this is the explanation of these particular
relics of tapered braids from the large twined bag found with burial no. 2
at the Dumaw Creek site.

Another woven artifact found in the wrappings of skull no. 2 was a
section of braided grass (catalog no. 268160) or similar vegetal fiber. It
is 7 cm. long and consists of three flat strands or stems of grass braided
together.

In the collection of Mr. Seymour R. Rider there is a rather large frag-
ment of a woven mat (fig. 34, left). This fragment is about 20 cm. long
and 15 cm. wide. The warp elements consist of flattened rushes and the
weft elements are bast fiber cords of two strands wound together with a
right-to-left twist. The weave is a simple over-and-under technique, but
as closely woven as possible. Probably the rush warp elements were sus-
pended and the weft elements woven across them as tightly as possible.
The courses of weft elements, too, are as close together as feasible. This
compresses the warp elements into diamond shapes, widest where they are
above a weft element and narrow where they go under weft elements.
With this type of weave the obverse and reverse of the mat have the same
appearance. The mat, of which only a fragment remains, was part of the
burial furniture in one of the graves at the Dumaw Creek site.

VIII

DATING THE SITE

Although Dumaw Creek culture is recognizably recent on the basis of
comparative typology alone, a more precise dating has been achieved by
other means. First, there was a stump of white pine 30 inches in diameter
on top of the area from which the burials were excavated. A stump of
that diameter is indicative of a fully mature or old tree which, in the in-
stance of white pine (according to information accompanying botanical
exhibits in Field Museum), would suggest an age of 250 to 300 years. The
trees in this particular part of Michigan were cut by lumbermen in the
1870's, therefore the burials beneath them were in position some 250 to
300 years prior to 1880 or a date between a.d. 1580-1630. Of course, the
burials could have been in position an undetermined number of years
prior to the birth of the particular tree that grew above them and thus
could be older than the date given above. However, this was not the case;
one of the burials was radiocarbon dated at a.d. 1680 ± 75 years by the
University of Michigan Radiocarbon Laboratory.

This date (M-1070, Crane and Griffin, 1961, p. 110) was based on a
radiocarbon measurement of organic material associated with skull no. 2.
The organic material was a witches' brew of fur and hair from raccoon,
beaver, elk, bear, and buflfalo, plus human hair and fragments of human
and animal tissue — all of which were in direct association with skull no. 2.
This radiocarbon date is published as 280 ±150 years ago (M-1070,
Crane and Griffin, 1961, p. 110). The measurement was made in 1960,
thus the date may be expressed as 1960 minus 280 years or a.d. 1680.
The error quoted is twice the standard deviation (see Crane and Griffin,
1964, p. 1), therefore, to bring this date into conformity with established
procedure, it should be expressed as a.d. 1680 ± 75 years, as published
by Yarnell (1964, p. 118). The radiocarbon date thus obtained, 1680 ±75
years, means that if the material measured was not contaminated, there
are two chances out of three that the true date of this particular burial is
some time between a.d. 1605 and 1755. The lack of any trade goods or
other evidence of contact with Europeans at the Dumaw Creek site indi-
cates that any date after 1680 is impossible and any date after about 1620
is highly improbable. The modified radiocarbon date then becomes some

DATING THE SITE 81

temporal unit between a.d. 1605 and 1620 and matches the chronological
estimate based on the age of the white pine stump discussed previously.
Moreover, this late date is confirmed, in part at least, by the remarkable
state of preservation of human skin and hair and animal skins, hair, and
fur, and other ordinarily perishable items found on or with burials at the
Dumaw Creek site. On the basis of all of the temporal evidence, I would
conclude that the Dumaw Creek Indians were occupying their village site
and using their burial ground in the period of a.d. 1605 to 1620 even
though they may also have been occupying the area at a somewhat earlier
time.

I would further estimate that the burial of which skull no. 2 was a
part occurred in September, October or November of some year between
A.D. 1605 and 1620. My reasons for this supposition are as follows: Be-
tween the layers of skin wrappings that covered skull no. 2 there were a
number of pumpkin seeds {Cucurbita pepo), a seed of the wild grape {Vitis
sp.), and the remnants of wild ferns. In this area the ferns are not devel-
oped until late spring or early summer and they persist well into the
autumn. The wild grapes ripen in September and early October. When
not harvested by humans they are utilized by local or migratory fauna.
The pumpkin, of course, ripens in the autumn. I would thus surmise that
the wild grape seed and ferns were accidental inclusions acquired from
the surface of the ground while one of the skin robes was being wrapped
around the burial. The pumpkin seeds must have been intentionally
placed with the deceased and seem most indicative of autumn. The
burial would have taken place before the ground was frozen in winter
and some time after the ripening of the pumpkin and wild grape, but be-
fore the disappearance of the ferns. Inasmuch as I have progressed this
far in the realm of controlled conjecture, I will add my opinion that the
burial took place during the hours of daylight. The date of the Dumaw
Creek site, however assessed, is recent enough to suggest cultural conti-
nuity into the historic period even if the details are not known. And
ethnohistoric accounts of burials in individual graves by Indians who oc-
cupied the upper Great Lakes in the historic period indicate that such
burials were made during the daytime. It seems probable to me that the
Dumaw Creek Indians would have shared this tradition. Thus, it seems
that a dead Dumaw Creek Indian man was buried in a sandy grave in
western Michigan on some autumn day of one of the years between
A.D. 1605 and 1620.

Regardless of the specific date of the Dvmiaw Creek site, it seems obvi-
ous that the site and its associated cultural materials are very late. In fact,
I don't know of any other site in Michigan that is prehistoric and yet so

82 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

recent. Dumaw Creek culture, summarized in the next section of this
report, is therefore the youngest of the Late Woodland cultures known in
Michigan and also the entire upper Great Lakes region, if we exclude the
few Woodland sites that have Early Historic Period components.

A RECONSTRUCTION OF DUMAW CREEK CULTURE

Culture consists of material objects such as tools, weapons, utensils,
houses, and the like, as well as acts, beliefs, attitudes, customs, rituals,
ideas, and just about anything else which is the product of learned be-
havior dependent upon communication by symbols and transmitted from
one person to another and from one generation to another. All human
life is dependent on culture; for it is the means by which man gets his food,
obtains shelter from the elements, defends himself against his enemies, and
reproduces his kind.

Although the Indians who lived at the Dumaw Creek site in the early
seventeenth century have long been extinct, their culture can be recon-
structed to a considerable degree by using data and inferences derived
from their material remains, as well as analogies from historical and eth-
nological sources. Dumaw Creek culture was manifested by Indians who
obtained their food from farming, hunting, and gathering. They probably
raised corn, pumpkins, beans, and sunflowers. There is direct evidence
of pumpkins or squashes and the probable presence of corn, sunflowers,
and beans is suggested by comparisons with other sites of similar age and
environment in the Upper Great Lakes region (see Channen and Clarke,
1965, p. 13; Yarnell, 1964, pp. 116-117). These Indians hunted with
wooden bows and arrows tipped with small triangular points of chipped
stone. Among the animals taken were deer, elk, bison, beaver, bear, rac-
coon, and weasel, all of which, except perhaps bison, could be found in
the locality of the Dumaw Creek site. The nearest habitats of bison were
in the prairies or oak openings of southwestern Michigan, less than 200
miles away.

The Dumaw Creek village was inland, not easily accessible by canoe.
It was located on relatively level, sandy land adjacent to a steep-sided
valley through which ran a small stream that provided an abundant sup-
ply of fresh water. The situation of this village seems analogous to those
of contemporary villages in Huronia south of Lake Huron's Georgian Bay.
Since those villages were visually fortified, I am inclined to believe that
the Dumaw Creek village was similarly surrounded by a palisade of up-

84 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

right posts probably eight to twelve inches in diameter and perhaps fifteen
feet high. House types are not known, but certainly were constructed of
sapling poles and covered by bark or mats as were all proto-historic and
early historic Indian dwellings in the Upper Great Lakes region. Data
from elsewhere in the region lead me to suspect that Dumaw Creek houses
were dome-shaped wigwams of oval ground plan. The Dumaw Creek
village probably was occupied in the spring, summer, and autumn. This
is suggested by evidence of agriculture as well as locality. Clues from one
of the burials indicates that the Indians were still at the site in late autumn.
But in the winter months they probably went hunting in the surrounding
forests where there were deer, elk, bear, and beaver or into the prairies to
the south and west where there were buffalos and other animals.

Dumaw Creek clothing was made of dressed animal skins. Evidence
from one of the burials indicates that these Indians made robes of beaver
skins sewn together. The fur was present on one side and the opposite
side was painted with curvilinear designs in red ocher. Other robes or
blankets were made of elk, bear, and possibly raccoon skins. A belt or
hair-tie of woven buffalo hair yarn was also found with a burial. Direct
evidence of other clothing is lacking, but considerations of the environ-
mental requirements and a knowledge of Indians who lived in the region
at a slightly later time suggest that the Dumaw Creek people had mocca-
sins, shirts, skirts, and leggings made of prepared animal skins.

These Indians had various kinds of hair ornaments, pendants, and
necklaces for personal adornment. There were copper hair pipes, large
shell beads strung on tresses of hair, a plaque of large tubular copper
beads worn on the head, a probable reached headdress, and clusters of
feathers. Necklaces consisted of strings of tubular and spheroidal beads
made of marine shell or of small marine snail shells perforated for use as
beads or of small tubular beads of copper. It is likely that some of the
spheroidal and tubular beads of shell were attached to garments and bags
in solid panels of design, instead of being strung into necklaces. In addi-
tion to a snake effigy pendant of copper and a mask-like pendant of marine
shell with a weeping eye motif engraved upon it, there were shell pendants
in the shape of animal or bird claws and circular shell pendants with cen-
tral perforations. And, finally, there were conical tinkling cones made of
copper. These were fastened to leather fringes, probably on garments or
ornamented bags.

Household equipment included hearths, cooking vessels, bedding, stor-
age facilities, tools, and utensils. Bedding consisted of furs and woven
mats. There undoubtedly were wooden bowls and ladles for the serving
of food. Probably unworked mussel shells were used as spoons. Food

A RECONSTRUCTION OF DUMAW CREEK CULTURE 85

was cooked over hearths, some of it, at least, in pottery vessels supported
on stones. The pottery was made of fired clay tempered with small par-
ticles of granitic stone. Typical vessels were broad-mouth jars with round
bottoms, short globular bodies, a constriction between rim and body, and
slightly flaring rims with scalloped or a pinched "pie-crust" treatment of
the lips. Vessel surfaces were covered with impressions of a fabric or cord-
wrapped paddle applied while the clay was still plastic. On some vessels
the fabric or cord roughening was smoothed prior to the time of firing.
The natural color of the fired pottery ranged in tans and grays. Most
jars were from four to ten inches tall and had maximum diameters equal
to their height, but there were also some much larger vessels in use.

Various sizes of woven bags or bags made of animal skins served as
storage containers and possibly there were box-like containers made of
bark or rawhide. Knives were of several kinds. Leaf-shaped, oval, and
rhomboidal knives of flint were neatly chipped on both sides and edges.
Smaller and cruder knives were merely thin flakes of flint with finely
chipped cutting edges. Scraping tools included bi-polar cores with scrap-
ing blades, thumbnail-shaped, snub-nosed scrapers of chipped flint, and
side and end scrapers made of thick flint flakes. Sharply pointed awls,
probably used for sewing, were made of animal bone. Others were nat-
ural thorns of wood. Chipping tools were made of antler and hammers
consisted of naturally shaped cobbles of granite, gabbro, or diabase of suit-
able form. Grooved tablets of sandstone, used in pairs, served as tools for
smoothing the wooden shafts of arrows and spears. Axes or hatchets con-
sisted of ungrooved heads (celts) of trianguloid outline made of hard stone,
such as diabase, by pecking and grinding techniques. These heads were
hafted through sockets cut into hardwood handles.

Dumaw Creek culture included the use and manufacture of smoking
pipes of stone and fired clay. Unusual pipes were effigy forms of several
kinds. There was one elbow pipe of fired clay with a long stem and the
bowl in the form of a bird's head with a wide-open mouth. A similar
long-stemmed pipe had a simple design painted on it. A stone pipe bowl
in the shape of a half-disk with a turtle's neck and head projecting from
the upper portion was decorated with an engraved cruciform design. This
and subsequently mentioned pipes required the addition of a wooden stem
or reed inserted into a hole drilled into the base of the pipe bowl. Another
effigy pipe of ground and polished stone was in the form of a perched bird,
probably a woodpecker or kingfisher. Most Dumaw Creek pipes, how-
ever, were small elbow forms or vase-shapes of stone. Some of these were
ornamented with engravings of snakes, beetles, arrows, and geometric
forms that must have possessed symbolic meanings for the maker and /or
the user. Probably, but not necessarily, tobacco was smoked in these

86 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

pipes. Tobacco could have been grown in the area and definitely was
grown in great abundance in parts of Ontario at this time. However, the
leaves and /or bark of at least 27 other plants (see Yarnell, 1964, pp. 180-
182) are known to have been smoked by later Indians of the Upper Great
Lakes region, consequently the mere presence of pipes is no guarantee of
the use of tobacco.

The Dumaw Creek Indians wove mats, bags, belts, and probably other
things. Nicely finished mats were made of prepared rushes and spun bast
fiber by means of a simple over-and-under weaving technique. Some-
what elaborate bags were woven of buffalo hair yarn and thin thongs of
leather by means of a twining technique in which paired leather thongs
were twisted around cords of buff'alo hair. Small net-like bags made of
flat, narrow strips of unspun bast fiber were also woven by use of a twin-
ing technique.

Burial customs of the Dumaw Creek Indians were an important part
of their culture. The dead were interred in graves dug into sandy soil on
the plain above the creek bed about a half mile from the village site.
Usually there was only one corpse to a grave pit, but sometimes there
were two. The bodies were placed in a flexed position oriented approxi-
mately along an east-west axis. In preparation for burial, the dead were
dressed in all of their finery. Their hair was liberally sprinkled with pow-
dered red ocher and possibly the whole corpse was thusly colored red.
Then the bodies, wrapped in robes of animal skins, were placed in the
grave pits, along with tools, weapons, utensils, food, and other burial fur-
niture that were believed to be of use to them on their ghostly journeys to
the realm of the dead.

Considerations of the time and the place of the Dumaw Creek culture
make virtually certain that the Dumaw Creek Indians spoke an Algon-
kian language. Which Algonkian language they used is most uncertain,
but early Sauk or early Potawatomi are good possibilities. By the same
token, it seems likely that the social and ideological aspects of Dumaw
Creek culture were similar to those of Sauk, Fox, Miami, and Potawatomi
of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.

TRIBAL AFFILIATIONS

Who were the Indians who manifested Dumaw Creek culture in the
early part of the seventeenth century in western Michigan? Surely, at
such a late date they must have represented one of the ethnic units seen
by or reported to Europeans at the dawn of the historic period in the upper
Great Lakes region. To approach this problem, I shall first list the ethnic
groups known to have lived in the region in the early part of the historic
period and then eliminate from consideration the tribes or bands that are
correlated with specific cultures which do not closely resemble Dumaw
Creek. In this manner I can determine which tribes were not carriers of
Dumaw Creek culture and thereby narrow the field of inquiry.

On the eastern periphery of the upper Great Lakes region there lived
the Huron and the Petun or Tobacco Huron and south of them the Neu-
trals. All of these tribes consisted of groups of Iroquoian-speaking Indians
who lived in large palisaded towns and obtained their livelihood by agri-
culture. Their cultures, as they existed in the seventeenth century, are
known archaeologically (cf. Emerson, 1961; Kidd, 1952, 1953; and Rid-
ley, 1952, 1961). A comparison of these cultures and Dumaw Creek shows
that although there are some similarities between Dumaw Creek culture
and those representative of the Huron, Petun, and Neutral, the dissimi-
larities, particularly in ceramic traits, are so great as to eliminate these
cultures from further consideration. I therefore am certain that Dumaw
Creek culture is not that of the Huron, Petun, or Neutral.

By the same token, I am certain that Dumaw Creek culture was not
that of the seventeenth century Winnebago who were Siouan-speaking
Indians resident in the Green Bay and Lake Winnebago areas of Wiscon-
sin. Although early historic Winnebago culture and its antecedents are not
as well known as those of the Hurons, they are nonetheless well enough
recognized (see Hall, 1962) to establish the point I have made here. Win-
nebago culture is not like Dumaw Creek culture.

In the seventeenth century, and even earlier, various bands of Chip-
pewa or Ojibwa Indians lived in the northern parts of the upper Great
Lakes. I have examined cultural remains from Chippewa and probable
Chippewa sites on the shores of Lake Superior and northern Lake Huron.

88 THE DUMAW CREEK SITE

The cultures manifested at such sites (cf. McPherron, 1963; Wright, 1963;
and Quimby, field notes) are not at all like Duinaw Creek culture. I there-
fore feel that the various cultural divisions of the Chippewa can be divorced
from the problem of the ethnic identification of the Dumaw Creek culture.

Although I am not able to identify seventeenth century Ottawa cul-
ture, the documented proximity of the Ottawa to the Huron of that period
makes it very unlikely that the Ottawa had any connection with the Du-
maw Creek site. The Ottawa were in the eastern part of the upper Great
Lakes region. I shall also eliminate the Illinois, Shawnee, and Erie from
consideration because they were known to have been south of the upper
Great Lakes region in the seventeenth century and because their tenta-
tively identified culture-types are diff'erent from Dumaw Creek culture.
In this particular context, either reason is sufficient for discarding thein.

With Huron, Petun, Neutral, Erie, Winnebago, Chippewa, Ottawa,
Illinois, and Shawnee eliminated from consideration, what tribal group-
ings are left? What ethnic groups inhabited western Michigan or, for that
matter, any part of Michigan, in the first half of the seventeenth century?
A statement by Dr. Emerson F. Greenman, which in my opinion is only
applicable to the decades of the mid-seventeenth century, has some bear-
ing on the matter. Greenman (1961, p. 25) wrote, "The lower peninsula
of Michigan was for the most part a sort of no man's land, an empty buffer
zone between the Iroquois to the east and the Algonquian tribes — the
Potawatomi, [Kickapoo] Sauk, Fox, Menomini, Mascoutins, and Miami
— in eastern Wisconsin. Rumors and legends current after 1670 hint that
some of these same tribes had lived in the lower peninsula [of Michigan]
before 1650, and that they had been driven to the other side of Lake
Michigan by the Iroquois." And, in my opinion, it is one of these Algon-
kian-speaking tribes — the Potawatomi, Kickapoo, Sauk, Fox, Menomini,
Mascoutin, and Miami that was responsible for the cultural remains mani-
festing the Dumaw Creek culture. But which one of these tribes should
I choose?

My first choice is Sauk and by making this choice I automatically elim-
inate Fox from consideration for reasons which will become apparent pres-
ently. Fox culture of the period ca. 1690 to 1727 has been described by
Dr. Warren L. Wittry (1963, pp. 1-57) based on cultural remains exca-
vated from the Bell site which was situated on the south side of Big Lake
Butte des Morts in Winnebago County, Wisconsin. The most popular
type of pottery (1079 sherds) found in the site must be that of the Fox
Indians. It is a distinctive ware and in my opinion was made only by
Fox Indians. However, there was a minority (171 sherds) pottery ware
found in the site, Wittry's Type II pottery. The Type II pottery resem-

TRIBAL AFFILIATIONS 89

bles that found at the Dumaw Creek site. In fact, the only close ceramic
relationship I have been able to observe in this study is that between
Type II pottery from the Bell site and Dumaw Creek pottery. As Wittry
(1963, p. 55) notes, "Type II pottery, except for paste and general vessel
shape, is not at all like Type I [Fox] pottery, and in all likelihood repre-
sents a product of potters with a separate background. Since no inter-
mediate 'hybrid' vessels of these two types were present, it would seem
that their makers had only recently come to live together." Since I equate
Type II pottery and Dumaw Creek pottery, I assume that the makers
of Type II pottery at the Bell site were later representatives of the same
ethnic group that in earlier times had occupied the Dumaw Creek site in
western Michigan and whatever group made the Type II pottery at the
Bell site must have been closely associated with the Fox Indians in the
period from 1690 to 1727. Thus the problem is simple, but unfortunately
the solution is complicated, because there were a number of tribes asso-
ciated with Fox Indians during the period in question. Historical records
show that the Fox Indians were closely associated with Sauk, Kickapoo,
Potawatomi, and Menomini at this time. As Wittry (1963, p. 55) has
aptly observed, "Of all the tribes, the Sauk and Kickapoo were the closest
to the Fox in language and presumably also in culture. The linguistic
similarities are so close that these three tribes must have lived near each
other during their prior residency in Michigan." Thus, in attempting
the ethnic identification of the Indians manifesting Dumaw Creek culture,
my first choice is Sauk and second choice is Kickapoo. If the evidence
from the Bell site has been misinterpreted, or if one chooses to ignore the
Bell site evidence, the choices are somewhat different. In such a context
I would make Potawatomi my first choice and for second choice give
equal weight to Sauk, Mascoutin, and some unknown division of the
Miami. In any event, the Indians manifesting Dumaw Creek culture
spoke an Algonkian language and must have been included among the
groups called Asistagueroiion or Assistagueronon by the Hurons.

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