HANDBOOK OF THE COLLECTION. 

(In the following pages the figures in full-faced type refer to those on the specimen labels of 
the collection. From these, therefore, reference may be made to individual specimens of the col- 
lection, for the purpose of verifying or exemplifying the statements of the text.) 
Meteorites are stony or metallic bodies of extra-terrestrial origin 
which fall to the earth from space. 
They may fall at any time of the day or of the year and on any 
part of the earth’s surface. Their fall is usually accompanied by 
luminous phenomena,such as the appearance of a ballof fire, showers 
of sparks and clouds of smoke and by sounds like those of cannonad- 
ing, of thunder, or of bellowings and rattlings. 
( Observation of such falls is only occasional, since the larger 
number of meteorites fall into the sea or upon uninhabited regions. 
Daubrée calculates that the fall of a meteorite upon some portion 
of the earth’s surface is a phenomenon of daily occurrence, yet the 
record of observed falls for the past century shows an average of only 
two and a half a year. ) 
It is known, however, that such bodies have fallen to the earth 
since the very earliest periods of human history, because some of the 
most ancient records known to exist, refer to such phenomena. 
Being regarded by ancient man and by barbarous tribes as of 
miraculous origin, they were often carefully preserved, enshrined 
and worshiped as gods, and thus a knowledge of their existence has 
come down to us. 
Thus a stone which fell in Phrygia at a very early period was 
long worshiped as Cybele, ‘‘the mother of the gods” and about 204 
B. C. was removed with great ceremony to Rome. It was described 
as ‘‘a black stone in the figure of a cone, circular below and ending 
in an apexabove,” so that it is very probable that it was a meteorite. 
The Roman historian Livy tells of a shower of stones which took 
place on the Alban Mount about 652 B. C., by which the senate was 
so impressed that it held a solemn festival of nine days in honor 
of the event. 
The famous Diana of the Ephesians and Venus of Cyprus were 
probably meteoric stones which were worshiped as gods. 
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