HOLMER] ABORIGIlSrAL AMERICAN ANTIQUITIES PART I 151 



in large measure through their study an open book. In arid regions 

 the most fragile and evanescent of art materials — even cotton, wool, 

 and feathers, and fabrics made of them — are preserved from pre- 

 Columbian times almost without change, as in Peru, serving to show 

 what the peoples used, what they made, and how they made it. The 

 story of the food-acquiring industries is told by weapons of the 

 chase, especially those of stone, metal, and bone, and that of agri- 

 culture by the simple tools employed in cultivating the soil. The 

 food-preparing arts are well represented by nut-cracking, mealing, 

 and cooking utensils and by the countless tools for cutting, rubbing, 

 and pounding. The varied activities connected with the acquirement 

 of the materials employed in the arts and the preparation and shap- 

 ing of these to serve the needs of man are amply represented. Quar- 

 rying, mining, and transporting, and the industries connected with 

 the manufacture of implements and other articles of use and beauty, 

 are included in this group. The activities of war are practically 

 unceasing among primitive tribes and employ the energies of the 

 peoples in countless ways — in the preparation of weapons and works 

 and in expeditions of offense and the critical work of defense — and 

 are amply illustrated by the relics and remains of antiquity. The 

 remains of the building arts tell the story of the builders with gi-eat 

 clearness, more especially in the higher stages of barbarism, where 

 stone was employed in construction; and the textile and plastic arts 

 and the working of metals are revealed by the multitude of products 

 obtained from occupied sites and burial places, and traces of the 

 personal arts — clothing and emljellishment — reveal a wide range of 

 activities according to the materials used, the methods employed, the 

 forms taken, and the esthetic treatment. 



(8) Students of Old World culture have come to recognize a 



definite succession of progressive steps which have 

 cluSre steTs ^^ somewhat well-established relations with periods of 



time. These are known as the Early Stone, the Late 

 Stone, and the Bronze ages. In America, although the probabilities 

 are strong that a somewhat similar succession may apply, at least in 

 part, no lines of separation on a culture basis, except in so far as 

 such steps may be recognized among living peoples, have been estab- 

 lished, and classification of artifacts on the basis of culture steps is 

 not attempted. 



(9) Classification of antiquities by use brings together groups 



corresponding in many ways with those based on the 



Classification by . I'lj." i • i i'j?^ 



Functious ^^'^^ ^^^^^ industries and on simple artifact groups, 



and any of these three groupings may be employed 

 according to the needs of the student or the use to which his studies 

 are to be devoted. Abi-ading implements regarded as a use group 

 would include several artifact groups, as scrapers, grindstones, files, 



