AN ERIE INDIAN VILLAGE AND DURIAL SITE 47I 



lectors who with a single passion — a greed for rehcs — have spaded 

 over sites, overturned mounds and desecrated graves, merely to 

 gratify their desire to find some new curiosity and add it to their 

 collection. Such collectors have seldom preserved in writing the 

 circumstances of the find or even the most meager information, and 

 their collections are usually only a heap of stones almost worthless 

 scientifically except as an exhibition of some indefinite Indian art. 

 ]\Iore enlightened collectors, realizing the differences in culture in 

 different regions, and bearing in mind the various problems of 

 American archeology have done their work conscientiously and with 

 care, preserving a record of their finds, and are to be commended 

 for their work, especially when they have finally placed their col- 

 lections in the keeping of some scientific institution where its value 

 would be appreciated. The breaking up and scattering of a collec- 

 tion is the breaking up and destruction of just so much knowledge. 

 With the increase of population and the growth of towns many 

 more sites will be obliterated and their value lost forever. It is 

 therefore for us of today to rescue and preserve, while there is 

 yet time, for the people of tomorrow the prehistory of our State 

 and to secure for it the relics of that prehistory. 



METHODS OF COLLECTING ARCHEOLOGICAL MATERIAL 



Assuming that a given territory was inhabited anciently there 

 are two ways of discovering and preserving the circumstances of 

 that ancient occupation. The first method is to collect and study 

 its traditions, and the second is to make a systematic study of the 

 visible relics of that occupation. While traditions may not always be 

 truthful, they are not without a certain value. Often they furnish 

 clues that lead to important discoveries. Often a discovery sub- 

 stantiates a tradition or a tradition explains the presence and use 

 of certain things peculiar to a region. If a tradition is entirely 

 without foundation in fact it is still interesting for it reveals what 

 men assumed or affected to be true. 



The second method by presenting actual objects from which con- 

 clusions may be drawn is the more reliable and universally so recog- 

 nized by modern archeologists. 



Archeological material is collected for two distinct purposes ; first, 

 to increase knowledge, and second, to illustrate and diffuse knowl- 

 edge. 



Three methods of accomplishing these objects are employed by 

 people or institutions interested in archeology. The first method, 



