Part 14
The largest specimen in the collection, shown in Fig. 250, represents an alligator and is finished in the usual conventional style of the alligator group. The air chamber is large and the sounds emitted are full and melodious and are lower in pitch than those of any other instrument in the collection. The cavity in the mouth and head is separated from the body chamber, and, with the addition of earthern pellets, probably served as a rattle. The mouthpiece is in the tail and the finger holes are in the sides of the body.
[Music]
Mammals are very often reproduced in these instruments. What appears to be the ocelot or jaguar is the favorite subject. A representative specimen is shown in Fig. 251. The mouthpiece is in the tail and one of the sound holes is in the left shoulder and the other beneath the body. The head is turned to one side and the face is decidedly cat-like in expression. The decoration is in black and red and may be taken as a typical example of the conventional treatment of the markings of the bodies of such animals. The tips of the ears, feet, and tail are red. Rows of red strokes, alternating with black, extend in a broad stripe from the point of the nose to the base of the neck. Red panels, inclosing rows of red dots and enframed by black lines, cross the back. On the sides we have oblong spaces filled in with the conventional devices so common in other animal representations. The legs are striped and dotted after the usual manner.
[Music]
A unique form, and one that will be looked at with interest by comparative ethnologists on account of the treatment of the tongues, is given in Fig. 252. The instrument consists of an oblong body to which four ocelot heads are fixed, one at each end and the others at the sides. It rests upon four feet, in one of which the mouthpiece is placed. The finger holes are in the side of the body near the legs, as seen in the cut. The decoration, which consists of more or less conventional representations of the skin markings of the animal, is in black and red. Its notes are three, as follows:
[Music]
The prevalence of bird forms is due no doubt to the resemblance of the notes of primitive whistles to the notes of birds. The shape of the bird is also exceptionally convenient, as the body accommodates the air chamber, the tail serves as a mouthpiece, and the head is convenient for the attachment of a cord of suspension. A great variety of forms were modeled and range from the minute proportions of the smallest humming bird to those of a robin. The larger pieces represent birds of prey, such as hawks, eagles, and vultures, and the smaller are intended for parrots and song birds. The treatment is always highly conventional, yet in many cases the characteristic features of the species are forcibly presented. The painted devices have reference in most cases to the markings of the plumage, yet they partake of the geometric character of the designs used in ordinary vase painting. The ground is the usual yellowish gray of the slip, and nearly all the pieces belong to the lost color and alligator groups.
A characteristic example is illustrated in Fig. 253. The head is large and flat and the painted devices are in the red and black of the lost color group. The three notes are as follows:
[Music]
The piece given in Fig. 254 has the shape and markings of a hawk or eagle. It belongs to the alligator ware and is elaborately finished in semigeometric devices in red and black. All of these devices refer more or less definitely to the markings of the plumage.
[Music]
The example shown in Fig. 255 represents a bird with two heads, the shape and markings of which suggest one of the smaller song birds.
[Music]
I cannot say that the whistles were modeled and pitched with the idea of imitating the notes of particular birds, but it is possible for the practiced performer to reproduce the simpler songs and cries of birds with a good deal of accuracy.
The human figure was occasionally utilized. The treatment, however, is extremely rude and conventional, the features having the peculiar squirrel-like character shown in the figurines already given. The unique piece given in Fig. 256 represents a short, clumsy female figure with a squirrel face, carrying a vessel upon her back by means of a head strap, which is held in place by the hands. The mouthpiece of the whistle is in the right elbow and one sound hole is in the middle of the breast and the other in the left side. The costume and some of the details of anatomy are indicated by red and black lines in the original. Its notes are the same as those presented with Fig. 249.
LIFE FORMS IN VASE PAINTING.
This section is to be devoted to a short study of the decorative system of the ancient Chiriquians, and more especially to a consideration of the treatment of life forms in vase painting. Many of the finest examples of these designs, so far as execution and effect in embellishment are concerned, have already been given; but it is desirable now to select and arrange a series to illustrate origins and processes of growth or modification.
Elements of ornament flow into the ceramic art from a number of sources, but chiefly in two great currents: the one from art, and consisting chiefly of technical or mechanically produced phenomena, and hence geometric, and the other from nature, and carrying elements primarily delineative, and hence non-geometric. When once within the realm of decoration the various motives or elements are subject to modification by two classes of influences or conditioning forces: the technical restraints of the art and the esthetic forces of the human mind. Mechanical and geometric elements, although born within the art or its associated arts, are modified in the processes of adaptation to the changing requirements and conditions of the art and through the tendency towards elaboration under the guidance of the esthetic forces; left by themselves they remain, throughout all changes of use and modification of form, purely geometric. Imitative elements tend, under the same influences, to move in the direction of the unreal or geometric. In this way the realistic forms undergo marked changes, gradually assuming a geometric character and finally losing all semblance of nature.
Now it must be noted that the decorations of any group of art products may embody both classes of elements or they may be restricted rather closely to either. This fact enables us to account for many of the strongly marked distinctions observed in the decorative systems of different communities, races, and times. In a recent study of ancient Pueblo art I traced the decoration to a mechanical origin, mainly in the art of basketry, and thus accounted for its highly geometric character. Chiriquian art presents a strong contrast to this, as the great body of elements are manifestly derived from nature by delineative imitation. It was further observed in Pueblo art that as time went on life forms were little by little introduced into its decoration and that in recent times they shared the honors equally with the primitive geometric forms. In Chiriquian art we find but meager traces of a primitive geometric system, and conclude that either the earliest art of the people did not give rise to such a system or that the graphic motives, entering gradually and steadily multiplying, supplanted the archaic forms, finally usurping nearly the entire field. As noticed in the preceding sections, there is always a certain amount of geometricity in the arrangement and the enframing of the designs, as well as a certain degree of convention in the treatment of even the most graphic motives; but these characters may be due to the restraining conditions of the art, rather than to the survival of original or ancestral features or characters.
In beginning the study of Chiriquian decorative art I found it impossible to approach the subject advantageously from the geometric side, as was done in the Pueblo study, since life elements so thoroughly permeate every part of it. I have, therefore, turned about, and in the following study present first the more realistic delineations of nature, arranging long series of derivative shapes which descend through increasing degrees of convention to purely geometric forms. These remarks relate wholly to the plan or linear arrangement of the motives.
As to method of realization, ceramic ornament may be arranged in two classes: the plastic or relieved and the non-plastic or flat. Life forms are freely rendered by both plastic and non-plastic methods, and in either style may range from the highly realistic to the purely geometric. As shown in a preceding section, plastic life forms in Chiriquian art appear to have been subject to two divergent lines of thought, the one trivial and the other serious. Through the one we have grotesque and perhaps even humorous representations of men and of animals. The figures are attached to the vessels for the purpose--perhaps for the exclusive purpose--of embellishment, and often with excellent success, as judged by our own standards of taste. The other deals with plastic representations apparently of a serious nature, although utilized also for embellishment. The animal forms employed are treated in a way to suggest that in the mind of the artist the creature bore a definite relation to the vessel or its use, a relationship originating in superstition and preserved throughout all changes of form. Their office was symbolic, and this office was probably not always lost sight of by the potter, even though, through the forces of convention, the animal shapes were reduced to mere knobs, ridges, or even to painted devices.
In color delineations, although the same subjects are to a great extent employed, there is necessarily greater constraint--there is less freedom as well as less vigor in the presentation of natural forms. There is apparently no attempt at the grotesque or amusing. The variants are practically infinite. The work is more purely decorative and is perhaps less subject to the restraints of associated ideas and of use with particular vessels or in definite relations to other features of the vessel. At the same time it is manifest that these painted figures are not all merely meaningless decorations, but that many, throughout all degrees of modification, refer with greater or less clearness to natural originals, to ideas associated with these originals, or to the relationship of these originals to the vessel and its uses.
It is clear, however, that a considerable body of nature-derived elements, plastic and painted, are employed as simple embellishments, having no other function. This suggests the separation of all decorations into two grand divisions, based upon the kind of thoughts associated with them. These divisions may be designated as significant and non-significant, the term significant referring not to the mere identification of a device with an original form or to its office as an ornament, but to its symbolism, to its mystic relation with the vessel and its uses. But I have to do here with the forms taken by motives, with their morphology rather than with their signification, as the latter must, with reference to archæologic material, remain greatly speculative.
In the application of life forms in vase painting several classes of modifying and constraining agencies of a technical nature are present, and the following examples are grouped with the idea of defining these classes of forces and keeping them in a measure distinct.
Of all the animal forms utilized by the Chiriquians the alligator is the best suited to the purpose of this study, as it is presented most frequently and in the most varied forms. In Figs. 257 and 258 I reproduce drawings from the outer surface of a tripod bowl of the lost color group. Simple and formal as these figures are, the characteristic features of the creature--the sinuous body, the strong jaws, the upturned snout, the feet, and the scales--are forcibly expressed. It is not to be assumed that these examples represent the best delineative skill of the Chiriquian artist. The native painter must have executed very much superior work upon the more usual delineating surfaces, such as bark and skins. The examples here shown have already experienced decided changes through the constraints of the ceramic art, but are the most graphic delineations preserved to us. They are free hand products, executed by mere decorators, perhaps by women, who were servile copyists of the forms employed by those skilled in sacred art.
A third illustration from the same group of ware, given in Fig. 259, shows, in some respects, a higher degree of convention. The scales are here represented by triangular dentals, which occupy the entire length of the back. These dentals are filled with the round dots that stand singly in the preceding cases.
In another class of ware--the alligator group--the treatment is quite different, being decidedly more clumsy and realized by distinct processes; but prominence is given to a number of corresponding features. The strong curve of the back, the dentals and dots, and the muzzle and mouth refer apparently to the same creature. The curiously marked panel in the body of the last example is a unique feature, which appears, however, in a few other cases.
These drawings occur upon the sides of vases, alternating with the plastic features, and are perhaps generally associated with such features in the expression of some mythical idea.
The modeled creature is often represented with two heads instead of with a head and a tail, and the painted forms, in many cases, exhibit the same peculiarity as shown in Fig. 262. I surmise that the employment of two heads arises from the need of securing perfect balance of parts rather than as an original product of the imagination.
It will be interesting, as additional examples are presented, to note the effect of modification upon particular features of the animal, to observe how some come into prominence, representing the creature and the idea, while others fall into disuse and disappear. In nature the line of the body is perhaps the most strongly characteristic feature, and it is in art the most persistent. It survives in the stems of many conventional devices from which all other suggestions of the animal have vanished.
The following examples depart still further from nature, approaching the border line between the distinctly imitative and the purely conventional or geometric phases. In the first (Fig. 263) all the leading features are recognizable, but are very much simplified. The jaws are without teeth, the head is without eyes, and the body without indication of scales. The other example (Fig. 264) is of a somewhat different type and may possibly refer to some other reptilian form, but many links connecting the two are found. The shape is more angular and is a step further removed from nature. From shapes as conventional as this we drop readily into purely geometric forms, as will be seen further on. These and the preceding drawings are all executed on broad surfaces, where fancy could have free play. The modifying or conventionalizing forces are, therefore, quite vague. Variation from natural forms is due partly to a lack of skill on the part of the painter, partly to the peculiar demands of ceramic embellishment, and partly to the traditional style of treatment acquired in still more primitive stages of culture and in other and unidentified branches of art.
I shall now call attention to some important individualized or well defined agencies of convention. First, and most potent, may be mentioned the enforced limits of the spaces to be decorated, which spaces take shape independently of the subject to be inserted. When the figures must occupy a narrow zone they are elongated, when they must occupy a square they are restricted longitudinally, and when they must occupy a circle they are of necessity coiled up. Fig. 265 illustrates the effect produced by crowding the oblong figure into a short rectangular space. The head is turned back over the body and the tail is thrown down along the side of the space. In Fig. 266 the figure occupies a circle, and is in consequence closely coiled up, giving the effect of a serpent rather than an alligator. In Fig. 267 the space is semicircular, and we observe peculiar conventional conditions, some of which may be due to other causes. For example, such spaces may originally have been filled with purely geometric figures, which tended to impart their own characters to the life forms that supplanted them.
Now, it often happens that, as in the last example given, the animal form, literally rendered, does not fill the panels satisfactorily. The head and the tail do not correspond and there is a lack of balance. In such cases two heads have been preferred. The body is given a uniform double curve and the heads are turned down, as shown in Figs. 268 and 269, or one may turn up and the other down, as seen in Fig. 270. The two headed form may also arise from imitation of plastic forms, as I have already shown. The example given in Fig. 268 is extremely interesting on account of its complexity and the novel treatment of the various features. The two feet are placed close together near the middle of the curved body, and on either side of these are the under jaws turned back and armed with dental projections for teeth. The characteristic scale symbols occur at intervals along the back; and very curiously at one place, where there is scant room, simple dots are employed, showing the identity of these two characters. Some curious auxiliary devices, the origin of which is obscure, are used to fill in marginal spaces. The shape given in Fig. 269 is so highly modified that it is not recognizable as an animal form, excepting through a series of links connecting it with more realistic delineations. It is perfectly symmetrical and consists of a compound curve for the body, with hooks at the extremities and two appended hooks for legs. The spots symbolizing the scales are here placed within the body, showing another step toward complete annihilation of the natural forms and relations. Three additional examples, showing still higher degrees of convention, are presented in Figs. 271, 272, and 273. The series could be filled up and continued indefinitely, connecting the whole family of devices in which dentals, hooks, spots, and circles occur with the alligator radical or with other reptilian forms confused with the alligator through the carelessness or ignorance of the decorator.
In looking over a large series of the vases it will be seen that the tendency of decoration is toward the zonal arrangement, the spaces being narrow and long, even when divided into the usual number of panels. As a consequence the motives tend to take linear forms. Parts are repeated or greatly drawn out to fill the spaces. This phase of conventional evolution may be illustrated by a multitude of examples.
Beginning with an ordinary form in Fig. 274, _a_, we advance under the restraint of parallel border lines through the series, ending in a simple meander, _f_, the spaces about which are, however, filled out with the conventional scale symbols, the triangles inclosing dots. Thus we witness the transformation of the life form into a linear device, in which the flexures of the body are emphasized and multiplied without reference to nature, and there is little doubt that the series continues further, ending with simple curved lines and even with straight lines unaccompanied by auxiliary devices.
Next to the body line the most important of the alligator derivatives is the notched or dotted hook, which in the lost color group stands sometimes for the whole creature, but more frequently for one or more of the members of its body, the snout, the tail, or the feet. It is employed singly or in various arrangements suited to the shape of the spaces to be filled or occurs in connection with the body line or stem, where, by systematic repetition, it serves to fill the triangular interspaces. Take, for example, an ornament (Fig. 275) which encircles the shoulder of a handsome vase of the lost color group. The space is neatly filled with groupings in which the simple life coil elements are joined one to another in such a way as to give somewhat the effect of an ordinary running ornament. The same motive takes a different form in Fig. 276, which is part of the decorated zone of an earthen drum (see Fig. 235). Here the body of the creature is represented by a wide meandered line, and to this the notched or scalloped hooks are attached with perfect regularity, one to each angle of the meandered body. In other examples the angular geometric character extends to every part of the detail and the curved hooks lose their last suggestion of nature and are entirely dropped or used separately.
The rings, strokes, spots, and dentate figures that serve to represent the markings and scales of the reptile are among the most important of the derivative devices and occur in varied relations to other classes of derivatives. They also occur independently, either singly or in groupings. Thus we see that the alligator, in Chiriquian vase painting, is represented by an endless list of devices, and it is interesting to note that among these are several figures familiar to the civilized world in both symbolism and ornament.