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Deer scalp headdress (UCM 6102)

From Scoggin's journal:

I've come across a situation...whatever it turns out to be, the moccasins found yesterday belong with it as does a spectacular headpiece uncovered during today's work. February 20, 1940

Scoggin discovered Mantle's Cave Cache 3, which contained this deer scalp headdress and the previously described pair of moccasins. The headdress had been placed on a bed of cedar bark in a shallow pit with the moccasins on top of it. The unique and carefully crafted headdress is made from the crown of a doe. The hair was removed and the hide was tanned. The ears have feather quills woven in them. Cedar bark was stuffed into the ears at the base. Both strategies help the ears to stand rigid. What appear to be the eye holes were sewn shut with cordage that is two-ply, S spin, Z final twist. Eyes sewn shut are also seen in the pouch that held the flicker feather headdress from Cache 1, although the cordage used to sew those slits was two-ply, Z spin, S final twist. Recently obtained radiocarbon dates indicate that this headdress is from the Middle Archaic (3000-500 B.C.).

This artifact produced two calibrated carbon-14 dates: 1734-1455 B.C. (.99) and 1620-1410 B.C (.94), which we interpret as about 1572 B.C. This date was completely unexpected because it was believed that Mantle's Cave was used between approximately 400 and 800 A.D. In addition, the moccasins found in the same cache dated several hundred years earlier, suggesting this cache was formed by more than one individual over time.

Few other similar headdresses have been recovered in archaeological contexts. Allen and Munsey (2002:101) describe a partial deer scalp headdress recovered from Canyonlands and radiocarbon dated to 1470-1660 A.D. It is similar in construction to the Mantle's Cave specimen, having the eye sewn shut, but varies in that the ear is stiffened with a twig. It also has part of an antler and is decorated with olivella shells.

Based on their research on Numic and Puebloan ethnographic animal headdresses and the few similar headdresses recovered from eastern Great Basin archaeological contexts and Fremont and earlier Great Basin rock art, Allen and Munsey suggest that such headdresses were used ceremonially to prepare for hunts or as disguises in hunts. They posit that the Mantle's Cave headdress may be a precursor to their specimen, hence also possibly used in ritual.