The SurfaceView is double- or triple-buffered. The previous contents are "preserved" in the sense that the system doesn't go out of its way to clear older buffers, but you can't rely on that behavior.
If you specify a dirty rect, the framework will render whatever you ask, then copy the non-dirty region from the previous buffer on top of the new buffer.
The system is allowed to expand the dirty rectangle -- the Rect you pass to lockCanvas()
may be updated. You're required to redraw every pixel inside it.
For a (somewhat eye-searing) example of this in action, see "Simple Canvas in TextureView" in Grafika.
For more details on how the system works, see this article.