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MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS RELATING TO ANTHROPOLOGY.
81

V was a large pile of rocks, giving no evidence of ever having been covered with earth. It was opened and some skeletons were found, probably those of Indians killed in some attack on Harrodsburg.

W and X are similar to V.

The above list includes all the points of much interest in these two counties. Nearly every spot mentioned has been examined, and the relics carried off or destroyed. The great majority of those relics, such as pipes, arrow and lance heads, grooved axes, and celts, have been plowed up isolated in fields all over the counties; but the larger number have been found on the farms contiguous to Salt River. No shell heaps have been noticed except at A, where the common mussel of Salt River seems to have been used for some purpose other than pottery manufacture, perhaps as food.

Nothing is known as to our caves or cliff shelters having been used for dwellings. A cave east of Danville, on the farm of Samuel Stone, contained some human skeletons; but as the remains had been thrown down into a sink-hole without other opening, and as there were no implements, I suppose that the persons were Indians, or perhaps murdered whites of a comparatively recent date, and not mound-builders. The bones were in a good state of preservation. Nowhere in this part of the State has anything resembling masonry been observed, to my knowledge.

As far as I can learn, no carving, engraving, or sculpture has been discovered in those counties; but in the Deaf and Dumb Institution at Danville, Professor Dudley, principal, there is a carved image or rather bust of Aztec type, which was plowed up in Marion County, Kentucky. Rock paintings and inscriptions are not found here. The dead are discovered both in mounds and in isolated graves. Some contain one individual, others more. It is difficult to determine the position of the bodies when interred, as the pressure from above and the trees over them have forced them out of place. Some appear to have been buried in a sitting posture, some were stretched out, and others evidently lying on their sides. They were laid, in most cases, toward the east, sometimes toward the west, and again in every direction like spokes in a wheel. A few were placed in cists, others in earth only. Generally only a few of the more solid bones were preserved. At one point in Boyle County some arrow-heads were turned up by the plow, but they were lost or thrown away. No large places are known where flint implements have been manufactured; but chippings, evidently broken off by mechanical means, show that arrow-heads have been made in limited quantities. I am unable to learn whether or not the pottery found at A had been made on the grounds. The presence of many fragments, the quantities of decaying mussel shells, the balls of sand carried from the river, and the proximity to suitable clay all render it likely; yet there are no places, that I could see, which give any reliable evidence of its manufacture.