INDIAN NOTES ! AND MONOGRAPHS A SERIES OF PUBLICA- TIONS RELATING TO THE AMERICAN ABORIGINES A NATIVE COPPER CELT FROM ONTARIO BY ALANSON SKINNER NEW YORK MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN HEYE FOUNDATION 1920 LIBRARY UNIVERSITY Of CALIFORNIA SAfJ DIEGO I Publications of the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation THE GEORGE G. HEYE EXPEDITION CONTRIBUTIONS TO SOUTH AMER- ICAN ARCHAEOLOGY Vol.1 The Antiquities of Manabi, Ecuador: A Pre- liminary Report. By Marshall H. Saville. 1907. $25.00. Vol.2 The Antiquities of Manabi, Ecuador: Final Report. By Marshall H. Saville. 1910. $25.00. CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN, HEYE FOUNDATION Vol. 1 No. 1: Lucayan Artifacts from the Bahamas. By Theodoor de Booy. Reprinted from Amer. Anthropol., Vol. 15, 1913, No. 1. SOc. No. 2: Precolumbian Decoration of the Teeth in Ecuador, with some Account of the Oc- currence of the Custom in other parts of North and South America. By Marshall H. Saville. Reprinted from Amer. Anthropol., Vol. 15, 1913, No. 3. SOc. No. 3: Certain Kitchen-middens in Jamaica. By Theodoor de Booy. Reprinted from Amer. Anthropol., Vol. 15, 1913, No. 3. (Re- printed, 1919.) SOc. No. 4: Porto Rican Elbow-stones in the Heye Museum, with discussion of similar objects elsewhere. By J. Walter Fewkes. Reprinted from Amer Anthropol., Vol. 15, 1913, No. 3. SOc. INDIAN NOTES AND MONOGRAPHS A SERIES OF PUBLICA- TION'S RELATING TO THE AMERICAN ABORIGINES A NATIVE COPPER CELT FROM ONTARIO BY ALAXSON SKINNER NEW YORK Ml M.I'M OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN HEYE FOUNDATION 1920 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFOKNIA. SAH 'OUA. r.A 1 "Nia THIS series of INDIAN NOTES AND MONO- GRAPHS is devoted primarily to the publica- tion of the results of studies by members of the staff of the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, and is uniform with HISPANIC NOTES AND MONOGRAPHS, published by the Hispanic Society of America, with which organization this Museum is in cordial cooperation. A NATIVE COPPER CELT FROM ONTARIO BY ALANSON SKINNER SKINNER COPPER CELT NATIVE COPPER CELT FROM ONTARIO A NATIVE COPPER CELT FROM ONTARIO BY ALANSON SKINNER HE specimen here illustrated is an extremely long, thin celt, measur- ing 15 in. inlength, by 3f in. at the bit and 2 in. at the poll, and is of a type more often encountered in the area from Tennessee southward to the Gulf of Mexico. It is made of native copper, shaped by hammering, the lamination still being visible beneath the green corrosion. The celt, with one other, similar except that its edges flare at the bit, was found in 1908 in an immense Attiwandaron or Neutral Indian cemetery at Saint Davids, Ontario, by contractors engaged in strip- ping off surface sand to obtain a deposit of commercially valuable gravel beneath. Aside from the fact that this implement INDIAN NOTES COPPER CELT is of a type that could not fail to attract attention from any locality, its occurrence so far from the region where the form nor- mally occurs is of unusual interest. While it is possible that the Attiwandaron were acquainted with the sources of native cop- per on Lake Superior, through their neigh- bors, the Huron and Tobacco Nations, the type and technique of this celt eliminate this direction as its source of origin. That the specimen came from the lower Missis- sippi or near the Gulf of Mexico is rendered more probable by the fact that discoidal beads, tubes, cups, gorgets, and even whole shells of Strombus gigas, a conch found in Southern waters, were not uncommon at Saint Davids, and also at other Attiwan- daron sites in the township of Beverly and at Lake Medad, near Waterdown, Ontario. No similar celt from New York is known to exist in any museum, but the same type has been found in various southern locali- ties. For references to and illustrations of these, see Clarence B. Moore, Certain Abo- riginal Remains on Black Warrior River, figs. 27, 28, 33, Philadelphia, 1905. INDIAN NOTES No. 5: Note on the Archaeology of Chiriqui. By George Grant MacCurdy. Reprinted from Amer. Anlkropol., Vol. 15, 1913. No. 4. 50c. No. 6: Petroglyphs of Saint Vincent, British West Indies. By Thomas Huckerby. Re- printed from Amer. Anthropol., Vol. 16, 1914. No. 2. 50c. No. 7: Prehistoric Objects from a Shell-heap at Erin Bay, Trinidad. By J. Walter Fewkes. Reprinted from Amer. Anthropol., Vol. 16, 1914, No. 2. 50c. No. 8: Relations of Aboriginal Culture and En- vironment in the Lesser Antilles. By J. Walter Fewkes. Reprinted from Bull. Amer. Geogr. Soc., Vol. 46, 1914, No. 9, 59c. No. 9: Pottery from Certain Caves in Eastern Santo Domingo, West Indies. By Theodoor de Booy. Reprinted from Amer. Anthropol.. Vol. 17, 1915, No. 1. 50c. Vol.2 No. 1 : Exploration of a Munsee Cemetery near Montague, New Jersey. By George G. Heye and George H. Pepper. 1915. $1.00. No. 2: Engraved Celts from the Antilles. By J. Walter Fewkes. 1915. 50c. No. 3: Certain West Indian Superstitions Per- taining to Celts. By Theodoor de Booy. Reprinted from Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, Vol. 28, No. 107, 1915. 50c. No. 4: The Nanticoke Community of Dela- ware. By Frank G. Speck. 1915. $1.00. No. 5: Notes on the Archeology of Margarita Island, Venezuela. By Theodoor de Booy. 1916. 50c. No. 6: Monolithic _Axes and their Distribution in Ancient America. By M arshall H. Saville. 1916. 50c. Vol. 3 Physical Anthropology of the Lenape or Dela- wares, and of the Eastern Indians in Gen- eral. By Ales Hrdlicka. (Bur. of Amer. Ethnol., Bull. 62, 1916, with added title-page and cover.) $1.00. Vol.4 No. 1 : The Technique of Porcupine-Quill Dec- oration among the North American Indians. By William C. Orchard. 1916. $1.00. J^o. 2: Certain Archeological Investigations in Trinidad, British West Indies. By Theo- door de Booy. Reprinted from Amer. An- thropol., Vol. 19, 1917, No. 4. 50c. No. 3: The Nacoochee Mound in Georgia. By George G. Heye, F. W. Hodge, and George H. Pepper. 1918. $1.50. Vol. 5 No. 1: A Letter of Pedro de Alvarado Relating to his Expedition to Ecuador [1534]. By Marshall H. Saville. 1917. 50c. No. 2: The Diegueno Ceremony of the Death- Images. ByE. H.Davis. 1919. 50c. No. 3: Certain Mounds in Haywood County, North Carolina. By George G. Heye. Re- printed from Holmes Anniversary Volume, 1916. 1919. 50c. No. 4: Exploration of Aboriginal Sites at Throgs Neck and Clasons Point, New York City. By Alanson Skinner. 1919. $1.00. Address : MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN, HEYE FOUNDATION, BROADWAY AT 155TH ST., NEW YORK CITY