188 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1891. 



their positions only added to this difficulty, and it was evaded or ac- 

 complished by concession on th(^ one hand or the other so as finally to 

 make the best divsplay possible. 



This new classification and arrangement of the department is such a 

 departure from former procedures as to justify a few sentences of ex- 

 planation. The arrangement in former times was to exhibit all objects 

 of one kind together, classifying them according to function, as has 

 been described. This classification undoubtedly served a good purpose 

 in its beginning, but it had wrought out that purpose, and Dr. Kau 

 declares in his last report (Smithsonian Annual Report for 1886, p. 

 Ill), that the collection would be ultimately arranged geographically. 

 Such, therefore, was his intentioii at the time of his death, and I do but 

 carry it out. 



His conclusion and the present action are correct on principle. All 

 museums other than prehistoric, proceed upon a different basis, with a 

 different method of education, and are in pursuit of a different object 

 (from the prehistoric). In the historic museum the objects displayed 

 are after the fashion of illustrations in a book. They are only used as 

 descriptive of the particular branch of art, science, or civilization to 

 which they belong. They have nothing, or but little, primarily to do 

 with the history of the people who made or used them. That history 

 is given in books and in the descriptions of travelers and visitors. The 

 books contain the text of the history, while the objects displayed in the 

 museums are the illustrations of the various branches to which they 

 belong. Not so in a prehistoric museum. While the objects displayed 

 also serve as illustrations and are to be studied for their own sake, in 

 order to determine their origin, mode of manufacture, use and the vari- 

 ous improvements that may have been made in all these regards, yet 

 none of these liave the primary idea on which the ])rehistoric museum is 

 based. The objects belong to a prehistoric age and have no history, or 

 but little. They were made and used by a people of whose origin, mi- 

 gration, government, manners, habits, customs, civilization, we have no 

 history. The articles or objects displayed in the prehistoric museum, 

 when viewed in connection with their di^'overy, association, and strata 

 of superposition form the only basis of knowledge we have of the peo- 

 ple. These articles are at once the texts of the liistory as well as its 

 illustrations. 



In historic museums we study the object displayed ; in the prehistoric 

 museum we rather study the man who made the object, and therefore 

 the necessity of having all his relics and remains assembled together. 

 Thus will be shown, side by side and at a glance, all the paraphernalia 

 of a tribe or the occupants of a given locality, whether the objects be 

 for use in war, the chase, agriculture, domestic and home life, ceremony, 

 religion, medicine, or what not. These, together with man's remains 

 as found in his graves and tombs, and the monuments he has left form 

 all our sources of knowledge concerning him. To properly study the 



