Pros and Cons of Consulting Collectors: A Case Study from the River Raisin in Michigan

Summary

In survey, we collect what lies on the surface. But so have others, for decades or more. Ignoring private collections risks neglecting a selective but informative part of the accumulated record. One way to gauge collector effects is to compare what archaeologists found in survey to private collections from the same places. In 1975-77 the University of Michigan surveyed the River Raisin watershed in southeastern Michigan. I compare Michigan’s results to what collectors had found already and, because the survey was probabilistic, estimate the number of period components first ignoring and then including data from private collections.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Great Lakes Archaeology: Current Research and Perspectives   •
• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage