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Mortars are referred to by numerous writers, including Abbott (1) in Surveys West of 100th Merid., VII, 1879, (2) Prim. Indus., 1881; Cushing in Proc. Am. Philos. Soc., XXXV, 153, 1896; Fowke, Archæol. Hist. Ohio, 1902; Hoffman in 14th Rep. B. A. E., 1896; homes in Nat. Mus. Rep. 1902, 1903; Jones, Antiq. So. Inds., 1873; Lawson (1701), Hist. Car., repr. 1860; MacCauley in 5th Rep. B. A. E., 1887; Meredith In Moorehead's Prehist. Impls., 1900 ; Morgan, League of Iroquois, 1904; Niblack in Rep. Nat. Mus. 1888, 1890; Nordenskiöld, Cliff Dwellers of the Mesa Verde, 1893; Powers in Cont. N. A. Ethnol., III, 1877; Rau in Smithson. Cont., XXII, 1876; Schoolcraft, Ind. Tribes, I, 1851; Thruston, Antiq. of Tenn., 1897; Yates in Moorehead's Prehist. Impls., 1900. (W. H. H.)

^[[Checkmark]] Mortuary customs. Yarrow (1st Rep. B. A. E., 1881) classifies Indian modes of burial as follows:

(1) Inhumation, (2) Embalmment, (3) Deposition in urns, (4) Surface burial, (5) Cremation, (6) Aerial Sepulture, (7) Aquatic burial. As the second relates to the preparation of the body, and the third, fourth, sixth, and seventh refer chiefly to the receptacles or the place of deposit, the disposal of the dead by the Indians may be classed under the heads Burial and Cremation.

The usual mode of burial among North American Indians has been by inhumation, or interment in Pitts, Graves, or holes in the ground, in stone cists, in mounds, beneath or in cabins, wigwams, houses, or lodges, or in caves. As illustrations it may be stated that the Mohawk formerly made a large round hole in which the body was placed in a squatting posture, after which it was covered with timber and earth. Some of the Carolina tribes first place the corpse in a cane hurdle and deposited it in an outhouse for a day; then it was taken out and wrapped in rush or cane matting, placed in a reed coffin, and deposited in a grave. Remains of this kind of wrapping have been found in some of the southern mounds, and in one case in a rock shelter. The bottom of the grave was sometimes covered with bark, on which the body was laid, and logs or slabs placed over it to prevent the earth from falling on the remains. An ancient form of burial in Tennessee, S. Illinois, at points on Delaware r., and among ancient pueblo dwellers in N. New Mexico, was in box-shape cists of rough stone slabs. Sepulchers of this kind have been found in mounds and cemeteries. In some instances they were placed in the same general direction, but in excavations made by the Bureau of American Ethnology it was found that these cists, as well as the uninclosed bodies in mounds, were generally placed without regard to uniformity of direction. When uniformity did occur, it was generally an indication of

[[image - drawing of a skeleton in partially opened box made of stone slabs, partially excavated from shallow pit; caption: STONE GRAVE, SHOWING ORDINARY CONSTRUCTION]]

a comparatively modern interment. The Creeks and the Seminole of Florida generally buried in a circular pit about 4 ft 

[[image: drawing of three skeletons, two headless, in opened box made of stone slabs; caption: STONE GRAVE, TOP VIEW; ILLINOIS. (THOMAS)]]

deep; the corpse, with a blanket or cloth wrapped about it, being placed in a sitting posture, the legs bent under and tied together. The sitting position in ancient burials has often been erroneously inferred from the bones occurring in a heap. It appears to have been accustomed in the N. W., as well as in the E. And S. E., to remove the flesh by previous burial or otherwise, and then to bundle the bones and bury them, sometimes in communal pits. It

[[image - edge-on drawing of seated skeleton burial with mound of earth over stone supporting arch structure; caption: STONE GRAVE WITH OFFSET ARCH; IOWA (THOMAS)]]

[[image - edge-on drawing of an arch made of stone for grave; caption: ARCHED STONE GRAVE; OHIO. (THOMAS)]]

was usual in grave burials to place the body in a horizontal position on its back, although the customer placing on the side, often with the knees drawn up, was also practiced; burial face downward, however, was rare. In addition to those mentioned, modes of burials in mounds varied. Sometimes a single body and 

[[image - drawing of a large heap of stones on a flat plain; caption: BURIAL UNDER HEAP OF STONES; HUDSON BAY ESKIMO. (TURNER)]]

sometimes several were placed in a wooden vault of upright timbers or logs laid horizontally to form a pen. Dome-shaped stone vaults occur over a single sitting skeleton. Not infrequently the body was laid on the ground, slightly covered with earth, and over this a layer of plastic clay

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