The Project Gutenberg eBook ofThe Emeryville Shellmound

The Project Gutenberg eBook ofThe Emeryville ShellmoundThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: The Emeryville ShellmoundAuthor: Max UhleRelease date: April 15, 2022 [eBook #67841]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024Language: EnglishOriginal publication: United States: The University Press, 1907Credits: Charlene Taylor, Pat McCoy and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EMERYVILLE SHELLMOUND ***

This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.

Title: The Emeryville ShellmoundAuthor: Max UhleRelease date: April 15, 2022 [eBook #67841]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024Language: EnglishOriginal publication: United States: The University Press, 1907Credits: Charlene Taylor, Pat McCoy and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)

Title: The Emeryville Shellmound

Author: Max Uhle

Release date: April 15, 2022 [eBook #67841]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024

Language: English

Original publication: United States: The University Press, 1907

Credits: Charlene Taylor, Pat McCoy and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EMERYVILLE SHELLMOUND ***

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PUBLICATIONS

AMERICAN ARCHAEOLOGY AND ETHNOLOGY

Vol. 7No. 1

THE EMERYVILLE SHELLMOUND.

MAX UHLE.

CONTENTS.

California has but few characteristic archaeological remains such as are found in the mounds of the Mississippi valley or the ancient pueblos and cliff-dweller ruins of the South. In the shellmounds along this section of the Pacific coast it possesses, however, valuable relics of very ancient date. These are almost the only witnesses of a primitive stage of culture which once obtained among the early inhabitants of this region.

Some years ago Professor Merriam recognized the necessity of exploring these ancient mounds and represented the facts to the University of California. Mrs. Phoebe A. Hearst generously made the undertaking possible by providing ample financial support for the exploration work.

UNIV. CAL. PUB. AM. ARCH. &. ETH. VOL. 7, PL. 1

Plate 1 Map of east shore of San Francisco BayPlate 1: Map of the east shore of San Francisco Bay in the vicinity of Berkeley, showing the location of the Emeryville Shellmound with several others in this region. Scale: 1 inch = about three miles.

Plate 1: Map of the east shore of San Francisco Bay in the vicinity of Berkeley, showing the location of the Emeryville Shellmound with several others in this region. Scale: 1 inch = about three miles.

One of the largest and best preserved shellmounds was selected as the object of the present investigation, which was entrusted to Professor Merriam and the writer. The mound selected is situated on the eastern side of the Bay of San Francisco at Shellmound Station near Emeryville, and is commonly known as the Emeryville mound. At present it forms a conspicuous feature of the recreation grounds known as Shellmound Park (pl. 1).

The water of the bay rises to within 130 feet of the base of the mound (pl. 3) during high tide. The beach is then only one foot above the water level, while the ground in the immediate vicinity of the mound is from two to three feet higher. This ground is quite level and forms a part of an extensive alluvial flat. A small creek, having its source about three miles away, in the hills back of Berkeley, passes the mound on its south side, at a distance of two hundred feet, and empties into the bay. In summer the creek runs dry, but its bed furnishes a channel for subterranean water. Another, lower mound, containing graves, lay on the site of the Emeryville race-track near by, but it has been leveled down during the construction of the track. The shellmound which was the object of the excavation has the form of a truncated cone, with a diameter of 270 feet at its base and 145 feet at the top, and rising 27 feet above the plain. On the north side its foot extends 100 feet farther over the flat, a few feet higher than the level of the ground about it.

Twenty-five or thirty years ago the shore line of the bay lay fifty feet farther out; a pile set at that time is still to be seen at that distance from the beach. It is above the water during high tide and marks the coast line on this side of which floodland was sold by the State. The top of the mound was not at that time crowned by the wooden pavilion which is there at the present time. It was still ungraded, having its natural conical form, and was covered with a wild growth of bushes and brambles. The creek, as yet unregulated, followed its own course and overflowed the land, causing it to become marshy. In the seventies and eighties of the last century, railroad tracks were laid along the eastern side of the mound, and took in a section of its eastern foot. At that time a number of graves and Indian artifacts were discovered. Few of these, however, found their way into the collections of the University, then but recently founded.

Early Settlements in the Region.

Fages, the first traveler who passed through the country, from south to north, traveled along the eastern shore of the Bay of San Francisco in 1774,[1]and came upon Indian settlements where he found a friendly welcome. His account of this expedition however, fails to throw any light upon the question whether or not the shellmounds were still occupied at that time. The neighboring creek bears the name of “Temescal” from a region between Berkeley and Oakland through which it passes.[2]This name appears to be a mutilation of the Nahua word “temazcalli,” hot-house, the name of sweat-houses in Mexico, and the place may have been so named by Mexicans living on the Bay, from an Indian sweat-house standing there. Hence it may be assumed that an Indian settlement was in existence on the banks of this creek at a time from which the name could pass over into the existing vocabulary.

Other evidences of early Indian settlements in this section of the eastern shore country of the Bay are the shellmounds, twelve of which may be found along the coast between Point Richmond and Alameda in a stretch of twelve miles (pl. 1). They may be seen near Point Richmond upon the eastern side, facing the peninsula, upon Brooks Island, near Ellis Landing, northeast from Stege upon a marshy ground intersected by narrow channels, near Seaver’s Ranch to the west from Stege, on Point Isabel, in West Berkeley, in Emeryville, and in the eastern section of Alameda between Mound, Central, and Lincoln avenues. There is also said to have been one in East Oakland on the canal between Oakland Harbor and Lake Merritt, but it has disappeared owing to building over that section of ground. In all probability many others may have met with a similar fate.

All these evidences of an early occupation of the country are but a few of the mounds that skirt the Bay upon all sides, continuing along Suisun Bay and the Sacramento and Feather rivers. Besides these, there are numerous mounds dotting the coast land of Northern California, those surrounding swamps and rivers along the Tulare and Kern lakes in southern California,[3]and on the shore near Santa Cruz. Others are found in the regions of San Luis Obispo,[4]of Santa Barbara,[5]and the islands opposite that place.

[1]Cf. H. H. Bancroft, The Native Races, 1886, II, p. 595.

[2]Cf. also “San Francisco Quadrangle” with the topographical maps of California by the U. S. Geological Survey.

[3]Warren K. Moorehead, Prehistoric Implements, 1900, p. 258.

[4]Paul Schumacher, Smithson. Reports, 1874, p. 335 ff.

[5]Schumacher, Bulletin of the U. S. Geol. and Geogr. Survey of the Territories (F. V. Hayden), 1877, III, p. 73 ff.; F. W. Putnam, Reports upon Archaeological and Ethnological Collections from vicinity of Santa Barbara, Cal., etc.; Report upon U. S. Geogr. Surveys west of the 100th Meridian (G. M. Wheeler), 1879, VII, Archaeology. From more northern sections of the Pacific Coast may be mentioned specifically the shellmounds of Oregon (P. Schumacher, Bulletin,l. c.), of Vancouver, and of the mainland of British Columbia opposite (H. H. Bancroft, Native Races of the Pacific States, 1886, IV, p. 739), also those upon the Aleutian Islands, explored exhaustively by W. H. Dall (in U. S. Geogr. and Geol. Survey of the Rocky Mountain Region, J. W. Powell, Contributions to the North American Ethnology, 1877, I, p. 41 ff.). Together with those of California these shellmounds are an important counterpart to those found along the Atlantic coast, found from Nova Scotia to the Gulf of Mexico, as well as in the river valleys of nearly all the southern states (Charles C. Abbott, Primitive Industry, 1881, p. 439; Short, The North Americans of Antiquity, 1892, p. 106), and almost all of which have been carefully studied in some of their aspects, although not yet conclusively.

All the publications treating of the shellmounds of central and northern California, which from the nature of their contents are different from those of the coast and the islands of southern California, may be condensed into the following bibliography:

The Smithsonian Reports of 1869 mention a collection of artifacts from the shellmounds of Alameda county presented to the Institute by Dr. Yates.[6]J. W. Foster, in 1874, speaks of a newspaper notice concerning a shellmound in the region of San Pablo.[7]James Deans follows in 1876 with a short notice (together with drawings of some artifacts) concerning a mound between Visitacion Valley and Point Bruno on the western shore of the Bay.[8]A short notice by H. H. Bancroft, accompanied by views of four objects, points to the great historical value of the shellmounds. The Marquis de Nadaillac in his well known work mentions the shellmounds in the vicinity of San Francisco.[9]Moorehead in his work gives a few remarks on excavations in shellmounds of central California.

[6]Smithson. Reports, 1869, p. 36.

[7]Prehistoric races of the United States of America, 1874, p. 163.

[8]Journal of the Anthropological Inst. of Great Britain and Ireland, 1876, V, p. 489. The majority of these shellmounds have been graded down.

[9]Prehistoric America, ed. by W. H. Dall, 1885, p. 50.

The work of exploration was commenced by Professor Merriam and the writer in February, 1902, toward the end of the rainy season, and was finished early in May. Captain Siebe, the proprietor of Shellmound Park, gave all possible assistance in the investigation. Owing to the presence of the circle of trees around the truncated top of the mound it was necessary to confine the excavations to a lateral section and a tunnel extending from it toward the center of the mound. However desirable a more extended section through the hill might have been, the results obtained in these partial excavations are as a whole similar to those which would have been obtained by a cut through the entire mound.

The western slope of the mound, facing the bay, was selected as the starting point for the operations. The entire work of excavation may in a chronological order be divided into the following four stages.

A.The first lateral cutting in the mound. This was made in the western foot of the mound, seven feet and a half above the level of the bay and at a distance of fifty feet from the plateau. The trench was two feet deep, eighteen feet long and six feet wide, its floor sloped towards the center of the mound.

B.Tunnel construction. The tunnel formed the underground continuation of the trench; it was the means of reaching the interior of the mound and down to its original base. Hence the floor of the tunnel was made to slope steeply inward. The tunnel was extended from the end of the trench A for forty-two feet into the interior of the mound, and at its terminal point it sank to two feet below the level of the bay. It was five feet wide and six and a half feet high. Several distinct strata were cut through by the tunnel section. Eleven feet of the length of the tunnel extended under the plateau of the mound. This was still sixty feet from the vertical center of the hill (pl. 4), but the observations made in this interior part of the mound were of a relatively greater value than those of the outer zone. Many difficulties were met during the construction of the tunnel, among which the porosity of the soil was one of the worst. The tunnel was therefore timbered and its sides sheathed. Another difficulty was the ground water, of which there was often a very strong flow when digging in the lower part of the tunnel. According to the advance of the season, it was encountered at different depths, and it grew less with the approach of summer. A small hand pump was used to exhaust this water, but it barely answered the purpose, and it was often with great difficulty that the inrushing water could be mastered.

C.The upper vertical cut of the entire mound. In order to obtain a view of all the strata contained in the mound this section was undertaken. The lowest parts of the mound having been thoroughly explored by the construction of the tunnel, it was now sufficient to make the upper sectional cut only as deep as the roof of the tunnel, while its terminal point was fixed by the circle of trees on the summit of the mound. Its greatest length from the mouth of the tunnel was twenty-six feet. The sides of the cut were sloped in order to prevent the fall of loose soil and to avoid the cost of timbering. The length of this section at its lower end, nearb(pl. 4), was reduced from 26 feet to 19 feet, and the width to 10 feet along the entire foot of the trench froma[10]tob. Inpl. 5there is shown the first cut into the mound, before it had been made wider by five feet throughout its length. In making this cut the earth was removed stratum by stratum. For want of other marks of division, the dividing lines of the various strata (I to VII) were chosen arbitrarily from the several visible lines of structure, and they are marked in the diagram,pl. 4, by asterisks. In order to obtain a uniform classification of the contents of the mound it was thought necessary to introduce the same lines of division in the sectional diagram of the tunnel: objects found there had been marked previously by the distance of their position from the mouth of the tunnel and their relative height. These strata in conformity with the numbering of the upper ones were marked as numbers VII to X.

D.A series of pits was dug from the foot of the tunnel out to the bay shore. The pits were made in order to ascertain the general outline of the base of the mound under the cuts already made, as well as under the unexcavated portion of the mound farther out toward its margin. The pits are marked ashin the interior of the mound, and asi,k,l,m, toward its periphery. The two pitsnando[11]are situated on the outside of the superficial foot of the mound, at a distance of 35 feet and 67 feet from the nearest pit,m. It was here seen that the terminal point of the foot of the mound lay between the pitsnando, the pit nearnshowing only the debris of the shellmound, while that nearorevealed nothing of it. These two pits were connected by a trench, which gave an exceedingly interesting section of the margin of the mound.

[10]aseems to have been situated at the intersection of the dotted lines separating divisionsA,B,C,pl. 4, fig. 2.—Editor.

[11]itoreferred to in the text seems to be represented inpl. 4, fig. 1, by the west end of the cut extending fromntol.—Editor.

The mound consists mainly of a mass of broken or entire shells, ashes, bits of charcoal, and some artifacts. This mass extends far above the surface of the surrounding land and ends two and a half feet below the level of the ground water and two feet below the general tide level of the bay, and rests immediately upon a sharply defined yellowish alluvial clay stratum. There is no indication of a rocky elevation which might have served as an inducement for the original settlement, and would have helped to raise the mound to its present height. Some of the charcoal and small boulders brought here by man rest upon the clay soil. A slight discoloration of the upper line of the clay stratum may have been caused by a transitory plant growth during some early period, while there is no indication of a crust of good soil which would be a sign of a longer period of vegetable growth upon it.

The base of the mound is horizontal according to all indications gained between pitshandm. A slight variation of the level of the ground nearhof but a few inches does not materially change this level. Betweenmandn, however, the original soil lies one foot and seven inches lower for a distance of thirty-five feet, and fromntoothe level drops a foot lower. The mound was originally founded upon a site rising two feet above the adjacent ground on its western side. A gravel stratum of 8 inches in thickness nearo, and of 4 inches nearp, but disappearing towardsn, covered the clay which originally sloped to the west. This gravel stratum was examined by Professor Lawson and considered to be probably a fresh-water deposit and not a deposit formed in the bay, as the gravel is more or less angular instead of much water-worn. The mound terminates nearp, 177 feet from its center, where it runs to a point between layers of clay, which are above and below it (pl. 4, fig. 1). It rises again toward the outside for the last 17 feet measured from the depressionn, the difference being one and one-quarter feet, thus varying from the rest of the base which inclines to the west. A stratum of ferruginous clay, the same as that underlying the base of the mound, is here inserted between the gravel stratum and the characteristic mixture of which the mound is composed, and covers it up even with the present surface of the soil. This raises the actual height of the shellmound from 27 feet to 32 feet and the actual diameter to at least 310 feet instead of 270 feet. The volume of the mound, measured as a truncated cone, may be estimated as being 55,000 cubic yards, or about 39,000 cubic meters.[12]

From what we know of the situation it is obvious that the mound was rounded upon firm though still somewhat marshy land, near the bay shore and close to the creek. The latter was the occasion of its location[13]at this place. The ground must have been dry, since a gently rising slope was selected. The soil was alluvial and relatively new, since it has no overlying cover of good earth, yet it must have been dry long enough to allow a thin growth of vegetation to cover it, causing the slight gray discoloration of this stratum.

The situation of the base of the mound two feet below the water level cannot be explained on the assumption that refuse from a pile dwelling had been the first cause of its formation. This theory would presuppose modes of living to be followed by the Indians of this coast for which there is no parallel elsewhere, and which are not borne out by other evidence obtained in the study of the mound. If the mound has not risen from the water, then the former land surface must have sunk. The mound could not possibly have sunk below the water level from its own weight, for the original ground underneath it is still several feet higher than that to the west, for instance, nearn, and sections of the base upon which the full weight of the mound rested, such as nearh, are on the same level with others over which the mound rose only 14 feet. Since the sinking of the mound has not been brought about by local causes, it must have been caused by a general subsidence of this coast region. Similar subsidences of the coast, due probably to sliding motions, are frequent phenomena on alluvial coasts.[14]Evidences of this are furnished apparently by the shores of San Francisco Bay.[15]The ground under the mound having a slope of two feet, it may be assumed that the original foundation of the base was at least one foot above tide level. Accordingly the coast must have sunk three feet since the formation of this mound.[16]This sinkage was leveled up again to its former height by later alluvial deposits, in consequence of which the originally dry base of the mound is now situated two feet below the level of the bay, while the surrounding flats are three feet above it.

It is to be noted that the younger alluvial deposit, nearo(pl. 4) has a thickness of six feet.

Samples of soil taken from various parts of the clay stratum underlying the base of the mound were subjected by Professor W. A. Setchell to microscopical examinations, but no Diatoms were found in any of them. Hence those strata were probably formed of alluvial deposits of the creek, as Professor Lawson had at first suggested, and not of deposits of the bay. This finding is entirely in accordance with the origin of the gravel stratum as above stated.

The slope of the mound was an obstacle to the course of the creek when it became swollen. In the natural course of things it deposited a bar near the foot of the mound, which, when the edge of the latter gradually extended, grew out over this new obstacle. The creek in the same manner continued to heap up alluvial deposits against the latter. The horizontal growth of the mound and the vertical growth of the surrounding land took place simultaneously. This was the cause of the brim-like upward curve of the edge of the mound as seen in the cross section (pl. 4). While the mound increased about seventeen feet in its periphery, the vertical alluvial accumulation was about one and one-half feet. Hence the base of the mound peripherally increased one foot while the ground grew one inch, showing that the alluvial growth of the soil was much slower than the peripheral growth of the mound. About 310 cubic yards or 240 cubic meters produce a growth of one foot in a mound 9 feet high and about 300 feet in diameter at the base. If the peripheral growth of the mound had continued with the growth of the soil, the foot of the mound would have spread out so that the outer edge would rest in the highest or surface layer of the present alluvium. The wedge-like margin situated between alluvial strata is, however, proof that its peripheral growth ceased a long time before the termination of the alluvial accumulation in this region, as a result of which the alluvium has spread itself over the foot of the mound. The alluvial deposit above the wedged-in margin of the mound (atp) being 3 feet 8 inches in thickness, and the alluvium deposited underneath it from the beginning of the formation of the mound measuring only 1-1/2 feet, and assuming the increase to have been absolutely uniform, a period two and a half times as long has passed since the ceasing of its peripheral growth, as had been necessary for a peripheral growth of 17 feet on each side. The cessation of this peripheral growth of the mound, however, is not identical with the cessation of its growth altogether. It took place apparently when the mound began to grow more acutely conical in shape, whereby it increased to twice its former volume. Assuming that the mound was abandoned 100 years before the end of the alluvial growth of the land in the vicinity, then according to formula

100 × 2/3f= 2-1/2 × 1/3f

it might be concluded that the mound was probably 600 years old before it was abandoned.[17]Several numerical values upon which the formula is based are unfortunately so uncertain that the result may not be considered as more than suggestive of the possible age.

The sinking of the coast and the alluvial increase of the ground since the first settlement of the mussel-eaters would in themselves give an adequate measure for an estimate of the age of the mound if the measures upon which both depend were not also unknown; according to Professor Lawson, this probably occupied centuries at least.[18]At any rate, such observations as have been made furnish good reasons for believing that the founding of a settlement and the beginning of the heaping up of the mound occurred at a remote date.

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