STONE IMPLEMENTS OF THE POTOMAC-CHESAPEAKE 

 TIDEWATER PROVINCE 



By William Henry Holmes 



PREFATORY NOTES 



The Indian tribes inhabiting the great province di-ained by the tide 

 water tributaries of the Chesa])eake were simple fishermen, hunters, 

 and warriors whose art aimed at little beyond the sui)ply of passing 

 needs, and the district now furnishes almost nothing in tlie way of art 

 remains to attract the popular eye. Little has been preserved beyond 

 the simplest varieties of stone implements; but inconspicuous and ele- 

 mentary as these objects are, they have attracted much attention on 

 the part of arcbeologists, and are now eagerly studied because of their 

 bearing, not only on tlie history of the region and its people, but on 

 questions of general import in the history of primitive progress. Tlie 

 explorations and studies recorded in the present paper were undertaken 

 for the purpose of determiinng, if possible, the precise status of these 

 remains, thus making tliem safely available to the historian of the race 

 who seeks drstof all a safe basis on which to found his structure. But 

 some special questions have arisen that for the time overshadow the 

 more general features of the investigation. 



Tlie earlierstudiesof the stoneimplementsof the province developed 

 decided ditterences of opinion as to the signiticance of a peculiar class 

 of rudely flaked stones found in vast numbers about the head of tide- 

 water in James, Potomac, and Sus(iuehanna valleys. The main (jues- 

 tion at issue may be stated as follows: Do these rude objects form part 

 of the remains left by the peoples of the region known to us historic- 

 ally — the Algonquian trilies and their neighbors — as their associations 

 ill a general way indicate; or do they belong to an earlier race of much 

 lower culture as suggested by the fact that somewhat analogous forms, 

 found in other parts of the world, characterize the art of very ancient 

 and jirimitive peoples? 



The most extensive deposits of the rudely flaked stones are found 

 along the blutfs in and about the city of Washington. The careful 



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