12 



entire State. It has been catalog- 

 ued and rearranged, and now pres- 

 ents a more attractive appearance 

 than it did in the dingy corners of 

 of the State House. It consists of 

 7,560 specimens, and fills eight 

 large combination table-wall cases. 



The collection is largely the re- 

 sult of the efforts of several well- 

 known collectors. Mr. Harness 

 Renick,of Circleville, was interest- 

 ed in Archaeology for twenty years, 

 and shortly after the Ohio Expos- 

 ition he presented the Society 

 with his cabinet. As his collec- 

 tion was very large, the bulk of 

 the Society's exhibit comes from 

 Pickaway and Ross Counties. 

 Considering the superior workman- 

 ship exhibited in the Scioto Valley 

 relics, it is not surprising to find 

 that Mr. Renick's collection is con- 

 siderably above the average in fine 

 slate ornaments and ceremonials. 



While the exhibit is largely Ar- 

 chaeological, there are a great 

 many papers and relics of histori- 

 cal value. Chief among these are 

 some iron and steel tomahawks, 

 copper kettles, silver earrings and 

 brooches from the Shawnee and 

 Delaware village sites of the State. 

 There is a valuable wooden dipper, 

 a powder horn, and a bread sack 

 presented by one of the head 

 chiefs of the Shawnees to settlers 

 in the Pickaway Plains. 



The exhibit from Flint Ridge 

 covers all the known forms of im- 

 plements from raw material down 

 so the finished arrowhead or drill. 

 Many of the Flint Ridge speci- 

 mens are of exceedingly bright col- 

 or, and some of them are very 

 large. 



There are several thousand ar- 

 row and spear-heads in the exhib- 

 it arranged mostly according to 

 form. These are of various sizes 

 up to eight or nine inches in length. 

 Many of them have round, smooth 

 tops, so highly prized by the col- 

 lectors. The collection is defic- 

 ient in perforating and drilling im- 

 plements, but on the other hand 

 excels in the serrated and rotary 

 spear-heads and knives. It con- 

 tains more than four hundred and 

 fifty celts, axes and pestles. The 

 axes are nearly all of the type hav- 

 ing a groove extending three-quar- 

 ters of the way around. In the 

 lower Scioto Valley it seems that 

 but few of the flat axes are found; 

 those slightly hollowed on the 

 back are more common. In such 

 parts of the collection as come 

 from the eastern and northern por- 

 tions of the State, the flat backed 

 axe is very rare. 



The celts are of a rather com- 



mon form, though some of them 

 are highly polished. There are a 

 few of them flat on one side and 

 oval on the other, having that 

 slightly curved or bevelled edge 

 so rarely seen in collections. As 

 a rule, they are large and thick. 

 Many of them weigh two or three 

 pounds and, are from four by seven 

 to three by eight inches. There 

 are a number of small celts, but 

 they are of the same general type 

 as the large ones. 



Quite a number of the long rol- 

 ler-like pestles are in the collection 

 also some very fine bell-shaped 

 ones. Others have a ring or pro- 

 jecting edge at the top, are grace- 

 fully narrowed towards the center, 

 and made broad and flat at the 

 grinding base. The hammers are 

 both single and double grooved, 

 and for the most part are sand- 

 stone and granite. I think that 

 the lower Scioto furnishes more 

 sandstone axes, celts, pestles End 

 hammers than any other section of 

 the Ohio Valley. 



The pitted hammer-stones and 

 large sandstone slabs having cup- 

 shaped depressions on either side, 

 are quite numerous in the collec- 

 tion. As Mr. Fowke well says, 

 these singular pitted stones have 

 never been satisfactoriiy explained. 

 One of the specimens has twenty- 

 two depressions on its two sides. 



Very few institutions in this 

 country possess a complete set of 

 casts of Squire and Davis' famous 

 effigy pipes. The Historical So- 

 ciety has the entire hundred and 

 fifty. They are colored to repres- 

 ent the originals and serve the 

 student well. There are also re- 

 productions of some of the more 

 famous small objects of the Mexi- 

 can Museum, and also Peruvian 

 and Central American potter}'. 



There are something over a 

 hundred and forty ornaments, cer- 

 emonials and pendants, and about 

 twenty pipes, discoidals and hem- 

 atites. One of these pipes is ten 

 inches in length, and shaped like 

 the long, slender ones found in the 

 south, It is made of steatite, and 

 closely represents the Iroquois, 

 rather than an Ohio type. The 

 ornaments are largely of slate and 

 shale, although one or two are 

 granite. All the forms, common 

 and rare, are represented. The 

 flat tablet-like ornament with two 

 perforations predominates. There 

 are twenty or thirty ornaments 

 having one perforation at the up- 

 per edge. There are two or three 

 stones exhibiting rude pictographs, 

 and one with hieroglyphs, which 

 is doubtless a fraud. 



By means of exchanges the So- 

 ciety has become possessed of a 

 number of Eskimo bone imple- 

 ments and carvings, and also a 

 small but valuable collection of 

 California mortars, pottery and 

 other Pacific coast specimens. It 

 contains several dozen specimens' 

 of Missouri potter)', and also an 

 exhibit of southern quartz and ar- 

 gillite implements. The tops of 

 the cases are covered with Zuni 

 and Moqui pottery, war clubs, etc. 

 There is a large crayon portrait of 

 Sitting Bull, which was taken two 

 or three months before the Messiah 

 craze originated. This is the cnly 

 crayon made from life during the 

 latter years of Sitting Bull's career, 

 and is considered very valuable. 



As the bulk of the material 

 comes from one locality, its care- 

 ful stud_y will give one an insight 

 into the life of the tribes of the re- 

 gion. As there are other large 

 collections in the same museum 

 from different parts of the coun- 

 try, the opportunities for study and 

 comparison are excellent. To 

 brief!)' sum up the general results 

 of an inspection of the Historical 

 Society's collection, one would ar- 

 rive at the following conclusions: 

 That Flint Ridge stone furnished 

 the bulk of the arrow-heads and 

 spears,' knives, etc., but that some 

 local materials were employed. 

 That sandstone was used more 

 than granite, slate or other stones. 

 That long pestles are more numer- 

 ous than in other parts of the 

 State. That the celts are nearly of 

 one type, rather large and thick. 

 That axes are mostly "flat backed." 

 That pottery is thick, generally 

 plain and of poor clays. That fine 

 work in ornamental, ceremonial 

 and emblematic stones, pipes, etc., 

 is more common than in other sec- 

 tions. That foreign materials 

 found on the village sites indicate 

 considerable aboriginal trade and 

 exchange. 



The conclusions might be car- 

 ried further, but this would tres- 

 pass upon the testimony of the 

 mounds of the region, and it is 

 here desired to consider only the 

 surface material. Suffice it to say, 

 whether a student confined his 

 conclusions to the results of vil- 

 lage site and surface searching or 

 to the excavation of mounds, his 

 conclusions would be the same, 

 that the people who inhabited the 

 one built the other. — The Arcli(eol- 

 ogist. 



[Prof. Warren K. Moorehead 

 is the curator of this collection. — 

 Ed.] 



