Back in the 1970's I had a fieldschool in "Long Island Prehistory"
taught by R. M. Gramly, Ph.D., Margaret Gwynne, now Ph.D. (her
dissertation was on the human ecology of the Mount Sinai Harbor where
the excavations went on) and Sherene Baugher, Ph.D. (her dissertation
on the Prall Site in former Tory capitol of Staten Island,
Richmondtown, now a "little Williamsburg," she became NYC Landmark's
Commission's first official archaeologist) we found I think two dog
burials in the scallop shell midden on the harbor. One I recall was
very "cute" the small dog with its head resting on its front paws.
Along with the scallop shell (the bay kind that swim and can be get
caught in nets, instead of dragged off the bottom, the larger scallop,
sometimes notoriously substituted with cookie cutter "skate") James
Gibb of the SHA I recall removed them and one of them travelled to
Massachusetts. There were also sturgeon carapace in the midden, which
are finally being brought back to the Hudson River estuary. I was told
in the Messina, NY Museum the St. Lawrence River also had 10 foot long
ones before the locks and dams of the St. Lawrence Seaway, doing
survey along there a number of years ago in the "Algonquin to
Adirondacks" ecology.

On 6/6/05, Joe Dent <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> on 6/5/05 2:39 PM, Matthew Sterner at [log in to unmask] wrote:
> 
> > Dog burials are actually not uncommon on prehistoric sites here in the
> > Southwest. Not sure about cats though. Will have to ask a couple of
> > colleagues and get back to the list on that one!
> >
> > mas
> >