Miscellaneous Papers Relating to Anthropology/Shell Heaps in Barnstable County, Massachusetts
SHELL HEAPS IN BARNSTABLE COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
By Daniel Wing, of South Yarmouth, Mass.
On both banks of Bass River, which separate the towns of Yarmouth and Dennis, in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, are ancient shell heaps and stone hearths. They are particularly numerous in the vicinity of the Old Colony Railroad bridge and below the village of Georgetown; in both cases upon the Yarmouth side of the river. They are generally upon the brow of the river bank in a commanding position, though sometimes on lower ground. In diameter they vary from 4 or 5 to 15 feet, and in depth from 2 or 3 inches to 2 or more feet. They consist principally of oyster, clam, and quahaug shells. Stone implements have been found in the vicinity of shell heaps in great numbers, though not of many species. This I attribute to the fact that the Indians living hereabout used shells for many purposes. The Pilgrims on landing upon our shores found in the wigwams baskets formed by sewing together shells of the horseshoe crab. I have a collection of nearly a hundred spear and arrow points of stone, in about every form represented in Schoolcraft's large work on the Indian tribes of the United States. I have also a stone pestle, ax, hatchet, and a fragment of a stone mortar or kettle. All up and down the peninsula of Cape Cod are to be found stone implements of the kinds mentioned above—though in the attack upon the Pilgrims at Nainskaket Creek, in 1620, the arrows used by the Indians were tipped with brass, eagles' claws, and bits of horn. This last fact led some writers to suppose that the Indians could find no suitable material on the cape for constructing their implements. Though there are no outcropping ledges on the cape, yet there are many bowlders and fragments of rock which the Indians found suited to their purposes. I know of several ancient burial places, but they have not been examined, or, if they have, I am not aware of the fact.