Within the River Basin Surveys, Smithsonian Institution, administration and scientific research are closely integrated but separate efforts. The one depends upon the other and vice versa, throughout, yet they require different kinds of orientation. This basic principle of simultaneous integration and separation can and should be applied to all anthropological research. Problems that must be met in administration are those of finance and the fiscal year, personnel procedures, supply and equipment, geography and logistics, coordination of scientific needs and available funds, and finally specimen and record processing. All of these have their special aspects in the River Basin Surveys but apply in general to all phases of anthropological research.

Contract emergency research is seen as sharing essentially the same limitations as other emergency work. These are: the pressure of time; an arbitrary restriction of geographic area of study; the obligation to sample adequately the full range of cultures represented; and the possible problem of dealing with a large volume of data. The contract also carries with it a stipulated deadline for the completion of an acceptable report. All of these limitations are seen as advantageous.

There has not been an adequate development of systematic programs of salvage archaeology on privately financed construction work. As a consequence, the great majority of building projects are undertaken without any effort being made to save the historic and scientific resources that may be destroyed during the course of construction. Salvage archaeology on privately financed projects is largely restricted to public lands. Because of a favorable industrial and public attitude toward salvage archaeology, this would appear to be an appropriate time to initiate a major campaign to extend salvage programs to other construction operations, particularly those on nonpublic lands. Four specific steps are proposed to expand salvage archaeology into the major unprotected areas.

A survey of previously unknown Nankoweap Canyon, in the extreme northeast section of Grand Canyon National Park, revealed 48 archaeological sites. These included sherd areas, cliff granaries, petroglyphs, rock alignments for water control purposes, and house outlines, the latter constituting the majority of the sites. The 34 house areas ranged from one to more than seven rooms, and from a single, simple, rectangular outline to complex multi-roomed units with adjacent kiva depressions. As has been found elsewhere on the north side of the Colorado River within Grand Canyon, the temporal range of the sites was quite short, with the occupation concentration occurring between A.D. 1050 and 1150. An attempt to arrive at some idea of the population change during the period of occupation resulted in a curve with a sharp increase prior to A.D. 1100, and a sharp decrease thereafter. A reconstruction of the culture history of this section of the canyon is added to serve as a hypothetical guide for further research in this and adjacent areas.

The problem of relationships between the Sevier and Fremont cultures and the Virgin Branch of the Kayenta Anasazi culture is approached by comparison of the representative plain pottery types. Statistical comparison of modes of technique shows markedly more similarity between Snake Valley Gray (Sevier) and North Creek Gray (Virgin Branch) than between Turner Gray, Emery Variety (Fremont) and North Creek Gray.

The burial of the dead is a conservative trait in all cultures, and thus the diffusion and spread of the rare extended burial pattern in the American Southwest provides excellent evidence of cultural contacts and cultural change. Prior to A.D. 1000, the common Southwestern burial pattern is seen to be that of flexure of the dead, with a few rare extended burials known. Concentrations of extended burials first appear at Chaco Canyon sites dating about A.D. 1050, and the pattern seems to spread from there first to the Sinagua region and to nearby Mogollon groups, then to the Hopi and Zuni regions, and finally, with the Sinagua and Salado migrations, into the Gila-Salt River Valley. The complex may ultimately be of Mesoamerican origin. Some data on grave types and burial covering are also discussed.

Two small shell middens, containing numerous Poverty Point objects and associated with a 4000-year-old subdelta of the Mississippi River, have been located in the Pontchartrain Basin. Dated by the radiocarbon method at approximately 1740 B.C., the sites have been established as a separate phase of the Poverty Point horizon. A third site, characterized by abundant imported stone and a well-developed microflint industry, is believed to be contemporaneous with the Poverty Point and Jaketown sites.

Until recently, pre-Columbian mushroom-shaped pottery objects were known only from El Salvador. New evidence indicates that they were also used in Chiapas, Tabasco, and Veracruz, in Mexico, in the Lowland Maya Rain Forest area, and possibly on the Pacific coast of Guatemala. They seem to be diagnostics of the latter part of the Late Pre-Classic and Proto-Classic periods. Due to their resemblance, when turned upside down, to round-bottomed, tall-necked jars, an undetermined number of specimens may have been classified by archaeologists and illustrated in the literature as jars. Their function is still unknown, but it is believed that, like the mushroom stones, they were used in connection with the ceremonial consumption and adoration of hallucinogenic mushrooms.

The finding of ceremonial bone and shell objects at Puntarenas Farm, Jalaca, southeastern Costa Rica, along with ceramics of known Chiriqui or Red and Black ware, has thrown new light upon the extent of pre-Columbian trade and the penetration of cult traits from northern South America into lower Central America. Although no radiocarbon date has been obtained as yet, it is known that the manufacture of Chiriqui or Red and Black ware was continued into post-Columbian times.

The presence in this region of shells found only on the Caribbean coast of Central America and not on the Pacific, as well as artifacts of manatee (Trichechus m. manatus Linn.) bone, also associated solely with the Caribbean littoral, indicate the extent and importance of trade. In the same sense, the appearance of the alligator-serpent motif on both coasts of the Nicoya Peninsula and on the western coast with ware related to Ulua Polychrome types and with an Ulua style alabaster vase, places a new northern boundary with respect to the diffusion of this cult motif. The Ulua Polychrome types and the Ulua style alabaster vase put a time horizon covering from A.D. 1000 probably to the Spanish arrival. The alligator-serpent concept, so familiar in the Amazon and Andean regions, the “eagle” or “condor” concept, the feline, the monkey, and the frog all emphasize the common base of lower Central American religion. Likewise they point to San Agustin as a cultural center of great importance in lower Central America.

From the artistic point of view, the bone objects represent some of the most intricate carving yet known in eastern Central America. Both the style and subject matter place these figures in a different category from bone artifacts associated with Mesoamerican cultures.

More than 50 campsites, quarries, and workshop sites belonging to the pre-agricultural stage have been explored at Ancón on the central coast of Peru. The sites are located in areas of extinct fog vegetation, which was exploited not only for its seeds and roots, but also for grazing animals. The sites are winter camps. Six different lithic industries have been identified and seriated in a tentative sequence which may reach back to the Pleistocene. The earliest industry almost entirely lacks projectile points and other fine stone work. The next two industries are characterized by their stemmed projectile points and distinctive scrapers, while the three latest assemblages have stemless points and lack scrapers. The pre-agricultural stage came to an end around 2500 or 2000 B.C. with the establishment of permanent villages near the shore as a result of the retreat of the fog vegetation and the enrichment of the sea.

In the Department of Beni, northeastern Bolivia, there are remnants of cultivated fields, roadways, and canals that are distributed over an area of 15,000 square miles. These features are interpreted as indicating the former existence of a highly organized, populous, agrarian society that antedates the culture of the Indian tribes now in the area.

Recent work in the mountains of Honduras has disclosed four ceramic and ten preceramic sites all between altitudes of 5000 and 6500 feet. Fluted stemmed points, medium-sized scrapers, and very small side scrapers link the preceramic sites to late Paleo-Indian or early Archaic times. Stonework from the ceramic sites is typologically different. Migration routes at these altitudes are suggested.

A rare ceramic form commonly called the doughnut-shape is reported for Kaminaljuyú, Guatemala, Miraflores phase. This specimen provides another example of the stucco technique on Pre-Classic pottery. A trial distribution of doughnut-shaped vessels is plotted for the Americas. Although this chart is based upon only a few published illustrations, certain deductions can be made as to the value of this form as a horizon marker. The horizontal variety of doughnut vessel may be a good marker for the Late Pre-Classic horizon in Mesoamerica.

That cultural units are contemporary merely means that they are assigned to the same arbitrary division of time, or period. The degree of contemporaneity which is implied when units are assigned to the same period depends upon the duration of the units and the length of the period. Correlation is the alignment of sequences of units or the placement of units with respect to sequences. Synchronic correlation, or cross-dating, involves assigning units to the same period because they are contemporary. When correlations are based on contemporaneity, detailed interpretations of the archaeological evidence are possible. Precise cross-dating permits more detailed statements about cultural process and relationship. Precise cross-dating is possible when units are assigned to periods which have brief spans in time or when reference is made to a chronological framework which is not defined in terms of the archaeological materials. Cross-dating is most credible when both the sequences of units in the different localities and the patterning of each cultural unit are known and understood.

The archaeological profession is currently faced with a shortage of trained personnel, primarily field archaeologists with experience in salvage archaeology. A training program is outlined whereby this shortage can be alleviated. The program recommended consists of a series of courses on the undergraduate level which specifically train the student to meet the demands of a professional position in salvage archaeology. It is anticipated that such a program will attract more students to consider archaeology as a career.

Amateur collecting of archaeological specimens is not new, but the great increase in the number of collectors since 1945 introduces a new, quantitative element into the rate of destruction of archaeological resources. The sociological forces operating in our own culture to produce great numbers of amateurs have become a factor for professionals to reckon with in an effort to save valuable sites from complete destruction.

A radiocarbon date of A.D. 398 ± 175 for the Davis site was published in 1951. The material dated was charred corn cobs from a submound house structure. A new radiocarbon date of A.D. 1307 ± 150 on corn cobs from the same structure would seem to be more accurate in view of certain archaeological interpretations and corn typology.

A small bifacial foliate from the Solutrean of France suggests that fluted points, whether made accidentally or otherwise, may occur occasionally in the Old World. However, there seems to be no historic relationship with those of the New World.

At variance with published opinion, worked flint sometimes shows pressure-flake scars two inches long, multiple eraillures, and hinge fractures curving as much as 180 degrees.