The Topanga Culture: Final Report on Excavations, 1948Treganza, Adan E. (Adan Eduardo)
History
The Topanga Culture: Final Report on Excavations, 1948
Treganza, Adan E. (Adan Eduardo)
California -- Antiquities; Topanga Canyon (Calif.)
Within the limitations imposed by archaeological conditions, the
excavation made possible certain inferences regarding the over-all pattern
and associated complexes derived from an open site typified by crude
percussion-flaked core tools and basic milling implements. The chipped
stone has been compared to that described for the San Dieguito and Lake
Mohave cultures. It includes a somewhat ill-defined variety of scraper
planes, scrapers, choppers, projectile points, and large blades. Our
Topanga series of scrapers and planes was numerically large enough and
exemplified a sufficient degree of internal variation to warrant a
breakdown into descriptive categories or types. Ground- and pecked-stone
pieces consisted mainly of manos and metates. Here too, quantity and
diversity allowed a reduction to types. The cultural validity and
developmental implications of the typology presented are limited although
some such considerations were discussed. Specimens represented only
sparingly, as was true with a number of forms of flaked tools, and
especially mortars, pestles, cogged stones, disks, and ornaments, have
been described individually. For additional details and for information
not included here the reader is referred to the earlier published report
(Treganza and Malamud, 1950).
On the basis of eight burials, all in poor condition, two modes of
interment were recognized: primary inhumation and reburial. Difficult to
characterize concisely are the various manifestations defined as
_features_. They include unusual aggregates of stone and/or implements,
hearths, or any circumstance that appeared atypical of the relatively
homogeneous midden deposit as it was understood in 1947.
A physical analysis of the mound mass and its contents indicates a
considerable degree of antiquity for the occupation represented. The
midden material is extremely compact, and there is a suggested development
of a soil profile. With the exception of fragmentary, occasional bits of
shell, charcoal, bone, and a trace of ashaltum, all organic substances
have long since disappeared from the site. What little mammal bone
remained was almost inevitably in a poor state of preservation, generally
fragmentary, and considerably decomposed. Marine shell, crushed and
friable, was encountered in occasional pockets in the lower limits of the
deposit and under inverted metates. This shell probably represents
evidence of the occasional use of shellfish as a dietary item. No shell
artifacts were found below 6 inches and all shell refuse was found below
48 inches. The few artifacts as were found in the upper levels were only
in a fair state of preservation and can probably be assigned to Phase II
occupation.
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