It was the last day of Harvard's archaeology field school on Martha's Vineyard last summer. Students and their mentors worked past their 6 p.m. quitting time, hoping to gather a few more artifacts, a few more flakes of stone.

The chance to salvage human remains from the endangered site was a major factor in its selection, but after five weeks of digging, no remains had been found. Once the digging was stopped, undiscovered remains would be vulnerable to the erosion that had already sent bones tumbling to the beach below the site twice in the past.

Then it happened: they uncovered bone.

Further investigation would show it was a partial skull, probably a man's. He might have been friend or foe of the Wampanoags who inhabited the area. He had been buried 1,000 years ago and was facing southwest in typical Native American fashion.

Judging from the wear on the teeth, the man was over 45 -- old by the standard of the day. The fact no other bones were found leads some investigators to believe his was a secondary burial, and makes determining time and location of death more difficult.

"We do know that Native Americans carried the bones of their ancestors, and also of their enemies," said Assistant Professor of Anthropology Elizabeth Chilton, an expert in New England archaeology and director of the field school. "Based on wood burned in the pit, I can say the remains were buried 1,000 years ago. Without further analysis, I can't tell you now when that person died."

The discovery saved the remains from eroding onto the beach and perhaps being lost forever.

"They were really close to the edge, about six feet," Chilton said in March. "We would have lost them in the last snowstorm."

With human remains washing out of the hill, the state considers the site one of Massachusetts' most endangered. And though the Wampanoags are reluctant to see burial sites disturbed, the tribe agreed that it would be better to exhume and rebury remains than to see them scattered by the forces of nature.

Today, the tribe is being discreet about the disposition of the remains. Bret Stearns, an associate planner in the tribe's Natural Resources Department, acknowledged that Native American remains were found on the site, but declined to say what has been done with them. He did say the tribe's normal practice is to rebury remains that come into its possession and that the Wampanoags are happy that the remains were quickly analyzed and turned over to them.

"The tribe took immediate possession of the remains of their tribal ancestor. That makes the dig a success story in our eyes," Stearns said. "This was a wonderful success story in terms of coordination between Elizabeth [Chilton], [State Archaeologist] Brona Simon, and the state."