Sections of bones were found tied in pairs, and while it is not clear that these were threaded on a cord and worn as necklaces or armlets, as Nordenskiöld suggests, they may have been tied side by side, forming a kind of breastplate not unlike that used by the Plains tribes. In a room of Spruce-tree House, according to Nordenskiöld, eight similar pieces of bone were found strung on a fine thong of tide.
Among other bone objects there is one, of unknown use, about an inch long and one-fourth of an inch in diameter, nearly cylindrical in shape. A bone with a hole in one end, similar to those figured by Nordenskiöld, forms part of the collection.
| BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY | BULLETIN 51 [PLATE 35] |
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| BONE IMPLEMENTS | |
Turquoise Ear Pendants and other Objects
The single specimen of turquoise found at Cliff Palace was probably an ear pendant, and a black jet bead was apparently used for the same purpose. With the polished cylinder of hematite found one can still paint the face or body a reddish color, as the Hopi do with a similar object. From the sipapû of kiva D there was taken a small deerskin bag, tied with yucca fiber and containing a material resembling iron pyrites, evidently an offering of some kind to the gods of the underworld.
A button made of lignite, and beads of the same material, were found in the refuse heap in front of the ruin after a heavy rain. The former is broken, but it resembles that found at Spruce-tree House, although it is not so finely made, and also one from Homólobi, a ruin on the Little Colorado, near Winslow, Arizona.
Seeds
The cobs and seeds of corn, squash and pumpkin seeds, beans, and fragments of gourds give some idea of the vegetable products known to the Cliff Palace people. Corn furnished the most important food of the people, and its dried leaves, stalks, and tassels were abundant in all parts of their refuse heaps. Naturally, in a cave where many small rodents have lived for years, it is rare to find seed corn above ground that has not been appropriated by these animals, and in the dry, alkaline bone-phosphate dust edible corn is not very common, although now and then occurs a cob; with attached seeds. The corn of Cliff Palace, already figured by Nordenskiöld, resembles that still cultivated by some of the Hopi.
Textiles
