REVIEWS 371

Frank Bleitz, and Edith Bleitz (pp. 28-39); and city of researchers who have the background (5) Channel Islands Pictographs, by Richard and patience needed for completing this type Quist (pp. 40-45). of study. Gary Fry is one of these researchers who Rock Art of East Mexico and Central Amer­ during his graduate studies at the University ica: An Annotated Bibliography. Matthias of Utah undertook the study of prehistoric Strecker. Los Angeles: University of California human coprolites. His dissertation centered Institute of Archaeology, Monograph X, on the analysis of coprolites from Danger and 81 pp., 1979. Occasionally it is worthwhile for Hogup caves, and resulted in this monograph students of California and Great Basin rock which is an abridged version of that art to consider art perhaps remotely related dissertation. but in the same continuum in the New World. Fry's report on the analysis of prehistoric This bibliography provides titles pertaining coprolites from Utah is an important docu­ to rock art produced by a variety of peoples ment that should be kept readily available to at various points of technological achieve­ those archaeologists who might someday find ment. Some titles and notes may offer ideas, coprolites during their excavations. The report on interpretation of astronomical phenomena is not lengthy, is broken into easy-to-find for example, that may be useful for those sections, and discusses the basic philosophy working with the California or Great Basin and methods of coprolitic analyses. It is a valu­ data. able research resource for researchers inter­ ested both in the prehistoric record of Utah and the merits of coprolite analysis. This monograph is divided into four major sections: (1) Introduction, (2) Methods and Analysis of Prehistoric Coprolites from Utah. Procedures, (3) Analysis Results, and (4) Sum­ Gary F. Fry. University of Utah, Anthro­ mary and Conclusions. The five-page intro­ pological Papers No. 97, 1976, xii + 45 pp., duction is short and to the point. It offers a illus., $8.00 (paper). brief history of coprolite analysis, a review of Reviewed by VAUGHN M. BRYANT, JR. how coprolite analysis has changed during the Anthropology Research Laboratory past seventy years and a glimpse of the culture Texas A & M Univ. history and physical setting of the two caves College Station, TX 77843 (Danger and Hogup) which contained most of the prehistoric coprolites Fry examined. The Prior to the I960's, a person could almost three-page methods and procedures section is count on one hand the total number of pub­ the most important for anyone interested in lished articles pertaining to prehistoric human learning how and why coprolite studies are coprolite (preserved feces) analysis. Since the done. It contains a step-by-step examination 1960's that number has increased, and many of how to process coprolites and how to avoid new innovative methods of coprolite analysis the problems of "overextending" the results have been developed and reported. Even derived from coprolite studies. In other words, today, however, the field of coprolite analysis it tells the researcher what to do and what pit­ is still a limited field within archaeology with falls to avoid. In the third major section. Fry few specialists who regularly pursue this type discusses what he found in the 146 coprolite of research. Today, as before, the main limiting samples he examined, how that information factor is not a scarcity of samples, but a scar­ can be used to reconstruct patterns of pre- 372 JOURNAL OF CALIFORNIA AND GREAT BASIN ANTHROPOLOGY historic diet and health, and finally how his is a picture of widespread intestinal infestation coprolite data compare with the available from at least three parasite groups. This seems ethnographic records for the Great Basin probable since even in modern populations region. The final one-page section is an ex­ one would find only small percentages of panded abstract which quickly summarizes the human feces containing parasite eggs even main points developed and discussed in the when the infection was present in almost 100% previous sections. of the population. Even more important. Fry Aside from its value as a document on how has documented the earliest known human and why coprolite studies are important, this records of pinworm infestation {ca. 10,000 monograph also provides new insights into the B.P.) anywhere in the New World. Other non- lives and health of the prehistoric peoples dietary data recovered from the Utah copro­ who once lived in Utah. His coprolite study lites include records of ectoparasite infestation consisted of 46 specimens from Danger Cave from the body louse (Pediculus humanus), the that range in age from 9500 B.C. to A.D. 20, sharpening of flint tools using one's teeth, and 60 specimens from Hogup Cave that range in the excessive excretion of sodium, suggesting age from 6800 B.C. to A.D. 1850, and 40 the eating of foods containing high amounts of specimens from the Glen Canyon that date salt. The coprolite specimens also contain data from A.D. I to A.D. 1300. The Danger and that indicate a late summer or early fall use of Hogup cave specimens indicate that the Danger and Hogup caves. Archaic lifeway in Utah began before 9800 The quality of the report is excellent and B.C. and persisted virtually unchanged for the writing style is clear and easy to read. nearly 10,000 years until the influx of Fremont When scientific words or jargon are used, they and Shoshoni people around A.D. I. Even are explained or defined for the reader. The after the arrival of the Fremont and Shoshoni photographs are sharp and add clarity to the groups, the dietary patterns changed only data presented. And finally, the area map and slightly. Previous food staples, such as cactus many data tables aid the serious researcher and chenopod seeds, remained important, who wants to use this report for comparison while the use of pickleweed seeds decreased. with other coprolite data. In fact, I found only In addition, the coprolites from Fremont and two minor flaws with this report and neither later Anasazi deposits contained the remains is probably the author's fault. First, I do not of agricultural plants such as gourds, squash, think the report should have been a mono­ and maize, foods missing from the dietary graph since it is short enough to have been records of Danger and Hogup caves. used as a journal article. By reducing the size After examining this monograph, the (but not number) of the tables and photo­ reader discovers how much data can be graphs to less than full-page items, the total derived from coprolite studies. In addition to length of the monograph could have been providing the most exact possible records of reduced by more than one-half. Secondly, actual prehistoric diet components, coprolites even though the cost of printing has increased, can also yield clues about the health of the 1 believe a price of $8.00 is too much to ask for individuals, imbalances in diet, and clues a short forty-five page monograph. about seasonality of site occupation. In the In spite of the minor flaws, this report is coprolites Fry examined, he found that 7% of important and should be added to the book­ them contained eggs of the Thorny-headed shelf of the serious scholar who wants to have Worm, 3% contained pinworm eggs, and 6% an up-to-date view of how and why coprolite contained tapeworm eggs. Thus, what emerges analyses are useful to the archaeologist. REVIEWS 373

The University of Utah must be thanked of his presentation is to set forth all of the for the publication, although long delayed, statements given by the main proponents and of these data contributions to the anthro­ treating them in much the same manner that pological record. they would perhaps be handled in some en­ lightened court of law. Hanna's legal experi­ ence has served him well here, but there is ««« more to it than that. He is obviously a pains­ Lost Harbor: The Controversy Over Drake's taking, thorough investigator who has spent a California Anchorage. Warren L. Hanna. great deal of time studying the voluminous Berkeley: University of California Press, Hterature on Drake's great voyage, especially 1979, xvii + 459 pp., 63 illus., $15.95. that part pertaining directly or marginally to the California sojourn. As such, he does not Reviewed by ALBERT B. ELSASSER casually neglect small bits of evidence, even if 824 Park Way at first blush they seem of doubtful validity. El Cerrito, CA 94530 Unfortunately, much of the evidence, his­ When Samuel Eliot Morison called the torical, ethnological, botanical, and zoologi­ plate of brass found on the shore of San cal, bearing upon the location of Drake's Francisco Bay in 1936 (and subsequently California anchorage almost seems to have referred to as the Drake's Plate) "a complete been deliberately planned to confound the and clumsy hoax," he was surely being exces­ unwary or even the fair-minded. The loss of sive. Hanna rightly argues in the book under Drake's log, misunderstandings and omissions review that any practical joke or deception that in Chaplain Fletcher's accounts, and inexact is able to challenge the abilities of some of the sketches of the California coast by early car­ world's greatest scientists as to its genuineness tographers, all contribute to often murky for nearly half a century may be 'complete', but understanding, and allow numbers of alternate certainly is not 'clumsy'. Although the plate explanations. is only one link in the chain of evidence that Nevertheless, Hanna reviews the opinions has been used to stir up the controversy over and counteropinions on the landing spot, the exact location of Sir Francis Drake's 1579 dating from 1790 and perhaps coming to a landing place in California, it might well serve boil in a debate published on the subject by as the best symbol of the heated dispute. Other the California Historical Society in 1974. aspects of the case, mostly based upon accounts Characteristically, he comes to no positive of Drake's chaplain, Francis Fletcher, pub- conclusion on which of the contenders is hshed in 1589 and in 1628, have been inter­ correct, although a graded assessment at the preted by various scholars, serious and other­ end seems to favor the Drake's Estero wise, as evidence pointing to some favorite argument over that of the other two leading location anywhere from San Luis Obispo in the candidates. south to the coast of Oregon in the north. While this volume does not pretend to Hanna has eschewed the extremes, and solve the mystery of the landing place, it has essentially chosen to discuss the merits of should probably be considered the definitive the arguments for Drake's Estero, San Quentin work on the subject. Unless new and undoubted Cove in San Francisco Bay, and Bolinas archaeological or archival evidence concerning Lagoon. At times the reader may feel that some Drake's California landing is forthcoming, it of the arguments or counterarguments which promises to remain the last word for a long he reviews are frivolous, but the whole point time to come.