THE ARCHEOLOGICAL HISTORY OF NEW YORK 40I 



the seeker of truth far astray and may, if he is successful, delay or 

 prevent the correct alignment of facts that lead to the solution of 

 some important problem. There should be severe penalties foi 

 forgery of this kind; indeed, some states make it a criminal offense. 



Honest collectors should seek out the sources of frauds and report 

 them to a responsible museum or archeological association. Every- 

 thing should be done to learn where the frauds were sold, who has 

 them, and pains taken to inform the owners. 



Gorgets. Gorgets are generally thin tablets of stone well formed 

 and polished, and pierced by one or more perforations. This gives 

 to them the descriptive term, " pierced tablets." 



The area in which gorgets are found in the United States and 

 Canada nearly coincides with that of the banner stone. In New 

 York gorgets have been found in nearly every part of the State 

 showing any considerable signs of Algonkian or mound-builder 

 occupation. None is found on Iroquoian sites. Some have been 

 found in graves of the polished slate culture, but most have been 

 picked up upon the surface. Some have been found in fragments 

 and others complete, in refuse heaps. 



Gorgets are generally made of some variety of compact orna- 

 mental slate, but there are many specimens made of monochrome 

 slate, of shale, sandstone, and even shell. The form of gorgets varies 

 considerably and indeed there are several distinct types, ranging 

 from specimens that seem to be pendants having one hole, to tablet 

 forms having three or more. The outline varies from natural ovid 

 pebbles through rectangular shuttle-shaped, spatulate, incurved sides 

 to segments of arcs and outcurved sides. The State Museum has 

 many interesting specimens from nearly all parts of the State. (See 

 plate 123.) 



Several uses have been suggested for the pierced tablets or 

 gorgets and indeed it is quite likely that these tablets, varying in 

 outline and position of perforation, did have varied uses according 

 to type. Supplementing the theories already on record we wish to 

 record one which had its origin in our investigations among the 

 Canadian Delaware in 1910. Inquiry led to the statement that the 

 Delaware at an early historic period had used gorgets as hair orna- 

 ments employing them as roach spreaders, the married women using 

 them as fasteners for a single braid of hair which w^as looped up. 

 Lewis H. Morgan in 1850 collected a gorgetlike implement made of 

 wood covered with buckskin. This article he found among the Ca- 

 nadian Indians of the Six Nations' reservation. The label states that 



