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MOUND EXCAVATIONS NEAR STOCKTON

PHILIP MILLS JONES

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION
In 1898, when W. H. Holmes visited California, he was shown
certain earth mounds near Stockton, and unusual implements taken
from them, which H. C. Meredith was at the time beginning to
describe.' Professor Holmes subsequently discussed the remains with
his usual succiinctness and lucidity.2 In 1900 the late Dr. Philip
Mills Jones, commissioned by Mrs. Hearst to explore the prehistoric
localities of California, excavated several mounds in this region, and
subsequently filed a report, the major part of which forms the follow-
ing paper. The peculiarities of the artifacts characteristic of the
region of Stockton and the lower San Joaquin delta have been
brought out by the earlier observers; therefore they are not reenum-
erated in Jones' report, whose significance lies in its account of the
structure of the mounds examined by him, and the place in them of
burials and implements. His is the first paper that gives accurate
information on this aspect of the data.
The prehistoric culture of the Stockton area shows the following
local peculiarities.
(1) Flattish mounds, mainly of earth, with some refuse, and
practically no shells. Meredith and Holmes regard them as reared
as places of habitation in an annually inundated country; but Jones
looks upon them as natural formations.
(2) Bodies not regularly oriented, when buried, and as often in
extended as in flexed position.
(3) Serrated obsidian implements, single or double pointed,
curved or angular in outline. These, known as "Stockton curves,"
have been variously interpreted as intended for scarification, cutting
flesh, and as due to the grain of obsidian nodules available. E. W.
Gifford, however, has recently ascertained from the Miwok of the
1 In Warren K. Moorehead, Prehistoric Implements, Section Ix, pp. 258-294,
[1900]; Land of Sunshine, October, 1899; American Archaeologist, ii, pp. 319 ff.,
1898.
2 Anthropological Studies in California, in Rep. U. S. National Museum for
1900, pp. 155-187, 1902 (pp. 176-178 on Stockton district).