31R17, March 15, 1958
The crew on the site early this A.M., and we decided to work on the east side of the ditch and in the vicinity of the burials that had been found previously. We staked out square 31R17, and began work; we removed the plow zone. We scraped off the new surface in search of any possible pattern of pit outline, or postmold, and there was none to be found. Potsherds, and other items, were collected for that level F. S. 185 which was the plow zone.
With no visible pattern in the horizontal profile at DD 5.0 we began the next level collecting potsherds, which were designated F. S. 187. At DD 5.0 to DD 5.5, and at two-tenths of a foot in the level there appeared the top of a skull (See burial form 34). Burial 34 had a skull at its feet, possibly a trophy skull, and was a positive association with burial 34. At the completion of the square, the following information was recorded:
There were four burials directly beneath Burial 34, and in a very compact arrangement; two of the burials were adults, and two of them infants. They were in a very disturbed condition, at the time they were discovered. The problem arose as to what took place. They were in an east-west direction, and in very compact arrangement. It seems as though each burial was disturbed when each succeeding burial was placed in the pit. The question arose, due to the placement of one atop each other in such an exact arrangement, could there have been some sort of mark to denote the location (That is, if each one had a time space between them.) But the search produced nothing to indicate such a marker; no postmolds could be found.
These burials began atop the subsoil, and continued upward to datum depth 5.2. If there was a pit outline in the square it was not visible to us, and that is one of the items we are so careful about. In spite of the fact that the burials were disturbed and in a very poor state of preservation, one assuring condition was the position of the remaining vertebrae which indicated the four burials were under burial 34. There was a broken bottle associated with these burials, and in all probability belonged to burial 34 F. S. 191; DD 5.7 to the bottom of the vessel.
The soil changed to a lighter brown at DD 5.5 and continued about the same to subsoil which was listed as DD 6.0. The DD was based on the average depth of subsoil.
About two inches south of the 32 line, there appeared another burial, which was almost entirely in the square to the north, square 32R17. The south half of square 32R17 was also opened in order to record this burial. In doing so, the top of a bottle appeared, about two feet north of Burial 32, and nearby were the fragments of an infant burial and there were no artifacts associated with it. The burial was partly in the plow zone, and was almost completely destroyed. The bone was in poor condition and crumbled in removal.
The bottle was associated with a burial. The burial was on top of the subsoil and consisted of part of one arm, the radius, ulna, and hand—nothing else. There was no indication of disturbance, and no missing bones were found in the midden. Less than two feet north of burial 34 was another burial, the feet extending into parts of squares 31R16 and 32R16. The burial was in a shallow pit in the subsoil, and had one association with it, a bowl F. S. 190. The vessel had little nodes on four sides near the top, four nodes to each side except one side which had three nodes. This burial was .4 ft. below the average datum depth of the subsoil of this square. There was no disturbance to burial 32 and burial 33 was partly under burial 32. Burial 33 was in a lighter brown soil than that above datum depth 5.5.
There have been many burials in somewhat similar condition in regard to the missing bones, both disturbed and undisturbed, throughout the whole site in which burials were found. The skeletons were removed to the best of our ability, one of the burials in its entirety.
We filled the square and returned home.