The Indian was the first human being to implant his footsteps upon that soil in Illinois. The fact that the primitive aborigines left no written records, and that we are totally ignorant of their origin, language and traditions, suggests the wisdom of formulating conclusions concerning them with the utmost care. We know they were Indians by the physical and biological evidence of their anatomical remains. And, although the analist's scale of years and centuries can not reliably be applied to the measure of cosmic time, it can be asserted with some degree of confidence that the first Indians arrived here less than 2,000 years ago. Meeting no one to contest their possession of the country, they occupied it peacefully. Atmospheric and climatic conditions were the same then as now, and the ecology of plant and animal life but little different. The forces of rains, winds, here and aggradations there, as still in action, had frost and water currents-causing erosions and abrasions, shaped the surface of Illinois and had given expression and charm to its varied landscapes. No positive evidence of the existence of a Paleolithic age in Illinois has yet been discovered. In all parts of the State ample opportunities have been afforded scientists for exhaustive examination of its mantle rock, till, loess and moraine deposits in their bisections by postglacial streams, by their exposure in numerous railroad cuts, in deep borings, well-digging and other excavations, without, thus far, bringing to light any object that could certainly be identified as a pre-glacial or inter-glacial paleolith of artificial shaping; or other proof of an extinct human race prior to the Indians. The rudely chipped flints represented in Plate 1, found, with others, in the glacial gravels of the old lake beaches at Chicago some years ago, and widely proclaimed to be implements of a pre-Indian, pre-glacial, people, were carefully examined, with their surroundings, by competent archaelogists who, observing they were there associated with camp refuse of recent Indians, and discovering that similar objects of the same material and same style of workmanship were common surface finds in many localities, pronounced them of no greater age than the mounds, and geologically quite modern. Reviewing the many claims for man's high antiquity in America, Professor Hrdlicka says: "The evidence as a whole only strengthens the conclusion that the existence on this continent of a man of distinctly primitive type and of exceptional geological antiquity has not as yet been proved."" Well-marked characteristics of all physical remains of the pre-Columbian people of America, from the Arctic zone to Terra del Fuego, conclusively testify to the fact that they were one distinct homogeneous race; divided, however, into many cultural groups denoting various stages of development. They were all red Indians, and very probably their initial tribes occupied the subtropical regions of this continent during, and long before, the Ice Period. Early Indian migrations followed-though not invariably the principal water courses. Traced by similarity of skeleton structure, and analogous artifacts, warrants the assertions that the first human beings in Illinois were Indians who followed the Mississippi up from the south, and slowly moving northward, finally located in the territory between that great stream and the Illinois river. They were mound builders, wholly dependent for subsistence upon the chase and native products; and were adepts in the neolithic culture of the Stone Age, but had not mastered the ceramic art. Their advent here may have been a dozen centuries ago; but since their arrival no striking physiographical mutations in the State's surface have occurred. Minor topographical changes are occasionally observed which seemingly indicate a vast • Bulletin No. 34 of the U. S. Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, D. C., 1909. |