370 



NA TURE 



[August 19, 1897 



-assisting to promote the advancement of science, my principal 

 efforts have now for many years bsen directed towards attempt- 

 ing to forge those links in the history of the world, and especially 

 of humanity, that connect the past with the present, and towards 

 tracing that course of evolution which plays as important a part 

 in the physical and moral development of man as it does in that 

 of the animal and vegetable creation. 



It appears to me, therefore, that my election to this important 

 post may, in the main, be regarded as a recognition by this 

 Association of the value of Archseology as a science. 



Leaving all personal considerations out of question, I gladly 

 hail this recognition, which is, indeed, in full accordance with 

 the attitude already for many years adopted by the Association 

 towards Anthropology, one of the most important branches of 

 true Archeeology. 



It is no doubt hard to define the exact limits which are to be 

 assigned to Archeology as a science, and Archaeology as a branch 

 of History and Belles Lettres. A distinction is frequently 

 drawn between science on the one hand, and knowledge of 

 4earning on the other ; but translate the terms into Latin, and 

 the distinction at once disappears. In illustration of this I need 

 only cite Bacon's great work on the " Advancement of Learn- 

 ing," which was, with his own aid, translated into Latin under 

 the title, " De Augnientis Scientiarum." 



It must, however, be acknowledged that a distinction does 

 -exist between Archeology proper, and what, for want of a better 

 word, may be termed Antiquarianism. It may be interesting to 

 4cnow the internal arrai^gements of a Dominican convent in the 

 middle ages ; to distinguish between the different mouldings 

 -characteristic of the principal styles of Gothic architecture ; to 

 ■determine whether an English coin bearing the name of Henry 

 was struck under Henry II., Richard, John, or Henry HI., or 

 to decide whether some given edifice was erected in Roman, 

 Saxon, or Norman times. But the power to do this, though 

 involving no small degree of detailed knowledge and some 

 acquaintance with scientific methods, can hardly entitle its pos- 

 sessors to be enrolled among the votaries of science. 



A familiarity with all the details of Greek and Roman 

 mythology and culture must be regarded as a literary rather 

 than a scientific qualification ; and yet when among the records 

 of classical limes we come upon traces of manners and customs 

 which have survived for generations, and which seem to throw 

 ■some rays of light upon the dim past, when history and writing 

 were unknown, we are, I think, approaching the boundaries of 

 scientific Archeology. 



Every reader of Virgil knows that the Greeks were not merely 

 orators, but that with a pair of compasses they could describe 

 the movements of the heavens and fix the rising of the stars ; 

 but when by modern Astronomy we can determine the heliacal 

 rising of some well-known star, with which the worship in some 

 iven ancient temple is known to have been connected, and can 

 X its position on the horizon at some particular spot, say three 

 thousand years ago, and then find that the axis of the temple is 

 -directed exactly towards that spot, we have some trustworthy 

 scientific evidence that the temple in question must have been 

 ■erected at a date approximately i loo years B.C. If on or close 

 to the same site we find that more than one temple was erected, 

 •each having a different orientation, these variations, following as 

 they may fairly be presumed to do the changing position of the 

 rising of the dominant star, will also afford a guide as to the 

 •chronological order of the different foundations. The researches 

 of Mr. Penrose seem to show that in certain Greek temples, of 

 which the date of foundation is known from history, the actual 

 orientation corresponds with that theoretically deduced from 

 :astronomical data. 



Sir J. Norman Lockyer has shown that what holds good for 

 Greek temples applies to many of far earlier date in Egypt, 

 though up to the present time hardly a sufficient number of 

 -accurate observations have been made to justify us in foreseeing 

 •all the instructive results that may be expected to arise from 

 Astronomy coming to the aid of Archeology. 



The intimate connection of Archeology with other sciences 

 is in no case so evident as with respect to Geology, for when 

 <onsidering subjects such as those I shall presently discuss, it is 

 almost impossible to say where the one science ends and the 

 other begins. 



By the application of geological methods many archeological 

 <luestions relating even to subjects on the borders of the his- 

 torical period have been satisfactorily solved. A careful 

 examination of the limits of the area over which its smaller 



NO., 1 45 I, VOL. 56] 



I 



coins are found has led to the position of many an ancient Greek 

 city being accurately ascertained ; while in England it has only 

 been by treating the coins of the Ancient Britons, belonging to 

 a period before the Roman occupation, as if they were actual 

 fossils, that the territories under the dominion of the various 

 kings and princes who struck them have been approximately 

 determined. In arranging the chronological sequence of these 

 coins, the evolution of their types — a process almost as remark- 

 able, and certainly as well-defined, as any to be found in nature 

 — has served as an efficient guide. I may venture to add that 

 the results obtained from the study of the morphology of this 

 series of coins were published ten years before the appearance of 

 Darwin's great work on the " Origin of Species." 



When we come to the consideration of the relics of the Early 

 Iron and Bronze Ages, the aid of Chemistry has of necessity to 

 be invoked. By its means we are able to determine whether the 

 iron of a tool or weapon is of meteoritic or volcanic origin, or 

 has been reduced from iron-ore, in which case considerable know- 

 ledge of metallurgy would be involved on the part of those who 

 made it. With bronze antiquities the nature and extent of the 

 alloys combined with the copper may throw light not only on 

 their chronological position, but on the sources whence the 

 copper, tin and other metals of which they consist were originally 

 derived. I am not aware of there being sufficient differences in 

 the analysis of the native copper from different localities in the 

 region in which we are assembled, for Canadian Archeologists 

 to fix the sources from which the metal was obtained which was 

 used in the manufacture of the ancient tools and weapons of 

 copper that are occasionally discovered in this part of the globe. 



Like Chemistry, Mineralogy and Petrology may be called to 

 the assistance of Archeology in determining the nature and 

 source of the rocks of which ancient stone implements are made ; 

 and, thanks to researches of the followers of those sciences, the 

 old view that all such implements formed of jade and found in 

 Europe must of necessity have been fashioned from material im- 

 ported from Asia can no longer be maintained. In one respect 

 the Archeologist differs in opinion from the Mineralogist — 

 namely, as to the propriety of chipping off fragments from perfect 

 and highly-finished specimens for the purpose of submitting them 

 to microscopic examination. 



I have hitherto been speaking of the aid that other sciences 

 can afford to Archeology when dealing with questions that come 

 almost, if not quite, within the fringe of history, and belong to 

 times when the surface of our earth presented much the same 

 configuration as regards the distribution of land and water, and 

 hill and valley, as it does at present, and when, in all prob- 

 ability, the climate was much the same as it now is. When, how- 

 ever, we come to discuss that remote age in which we find the 

 earliest traces that are at present known of Man's appearance 

 upon earth, the aid of Geology and Paleontology becomes abso- 

 lutely imperative. 



The changes in the surface configuration and in the extent of 

 the land, especially in a country like Britain, as well as the 

 modifications of the fauna and flora since those days, have been 

 such that the Archeologist pure and simple is incompetent to 

 deal with them, and he must either himself undertake the study 

 of these other sciences or call experts in them to his assistance. 

 The evidence that Man had already appeared upon the earth is 

 afforded by stone implements wrought by his hands, and it falls 

 strictly within the province of the Archeologist to judge \yhether 

 given specimens were so wrought or not ; it rests with the 

 Geologist to determine their stratigraphical or chronological 

 position, while the Paleontologist can pronounce upon the age 

 and character of the associated fauna and flora. 



If left to himself, the Archeologist seems too prone to build 

 up theories founded upon form alone, irrespective of geological 

 conditions. The Geologist, unaccustomed to archeological de- 

 tails, may readily fail to see the difference between the results 

 of the operations of Nature and those of Art, and may be liable 

 to trace the effects of man's handiwork in the chipping, bruising 

 and wearing which in all ages result from natural forces ; but the 

 united labours of the two, checked by those of the Paleontologist, 

 cannot do otherwise than lead towards sound conclusions. 



It will, perhaps, be expected of me that I should on the 

 present occasion bring under review the state of our present 

 knowledge with regard to the Antiquity of Man ; and probably 

 no fitter place could be found for the discussion of such a topic 

 than the adopted home of my venerated friend, the late Sir 

 Daniel Wilson, who first introduced the word "prehistoric" 

 into the English language. 



