Part 8

“Examples may be seen on the margin of a bronze shield from Cyprus (Plate III., Fig. 2); on a vessel of terra-cotta from the third sepulchre of Mycenæ (Plate III., Fig. 8); and on an enamelled Roman vase found on Bartlow Hill (Plate III., Fig. 5); whilst a twin-form, which presents both contrast and repetition, occurs on another bronze shield from the Mediterranean (Plate III., Fig. 1) and is the basis of the Assyrian ornament and its Greek variant called the guilloche. (Plate III., Figs. 4, 3.)

“A different skeuomorph is derived from a different method of basketry, in which a single fibre is turned round a row of osier-sticks, so as to produce a wave repetition (Plate III., Fig. B), as may be seen on the pottery of the ancient Pueblos (Plate III., Fig. 6). When these discs disappear, the fibre by itself resembles the Vitruvian scroll, and may be called a curvilinear fret. (Plate III., Fig. B.)

“Whenever the pattern has a stepped form, as on many of the Pueblo vases (Plate III., Fig. 7), it indicates that the methods of textile manufacture had already influenced the eye and mind of the race before the invention or introduction of pottery.”

The scroll-patterns illustrated by Dr. March may at one time and place have had the origin supposed by Dr. March, but it does not appear to me to be probable that they would have arisen in this way both in South Europe and in Mexico. I have shown (p. 51, Fig. 27) how a simple guilloche has arisen from interlocking birds’ heads. The Vitruvian scroll design occurs among the Tugeri head-hunters of New Guinea, and it is most improbable that it owes its origin to basketry. It is probable that the Pueblo pottery with curvilinear patterns, such as Plate III., Fig. 6, is more recent than that with angular designs; but I shall return to this later on. In fact, I would feel inclined to state that Dr. March’s view is possible for the origin of the patterns in question, once and in a restricted locality, but highly improbable for wide application.

There is a great tendency for spirals to degenerate into concentric circles; examples could be given from New Guinea, America, Europe, and elsewhere. In fact, one usually finds the two figures associated together, and the sequence is one of decadence, never the evolution of spirals from circles. The intermediate stage has been aptly termed a “bastard spiral” by Dr. Montelius, “that is to say, concentric circles to which the recurved junction-lines give, to a casual glance, the appearance of true spirals.”[30]

[30] O. Montelius, “Sur les Poignées des Epées et des Poignards en Bronze,” _Congr. prehist. Stockholm_, 1874, ii. p. 891.

“The strangest skeuomorph of all,” writes Dr. March, “was that common to the early inhabitants of Northern Europe. They were adepts in basketry, and in wattle-work for walls and ramparts. Moreover, the pliant bark of the birch was ever ready to the hand for a thousand purposes of life. The Norwegian still makes hinges for gates and loops for the oar out of the entwisted fibre. The old Norseman spoke of the rudder withy, for the earliest rudder was an oar; and leather thongs were also used to keep the oar against the thole-pin. The skeuomorph consists of a withy wound upon itself. (Plate VII., Fig. 11.) This device, wrongly called a rope-pattern, gained such an ascendency over the northern mind that it was employed sometimes as a symbol (Plate VII., Fig. 12), like the reefing knot on Roman altars. (Plate VII., Fig. 13.) It was used also by the ancient Hittites. (Plate IV., Fig. 1.)

“It is evident that the withy skeuomorph (Plate IV., Figs. 2, 3), the Scandinavian worm-knot, established itself as a necessity of the mind before those men who were dominated by it had discarded a covering of skins for one of cloth; for its type is antagonistic to the regular intersections and the stepped designs of textile fabrics, and no trace of these appears on their early pottery.

“When weaving was at last introduced, so as to be practised by these people, it was probably along with the introduction of metals. But for a while the use of metal only increased the number of twisted things. The words, wire, wicker, and withy are all from the root WI, _to plait_, and the Teutonic WIRA means filigree, an ornament of twisted filaments of metal; and as the simplest manner of terminating a wire is to coil its end, the earliest filigree is preponderantly spiral. (Plate IV., Figs. 5, 6, 7.) Thus was the way prepared,” concludes Dr. March, “for the advent of the serpent zoomorph, so much affected by Teutons and Scandinavians.”

In early times wooden bands were interwoven to form flat surfaces, as, for example, in the floor of a lake-dwelling at Niederwyl, in Switzerland (Plate IV., Fig. 8), but few traces of the art of “fascining,” as Dr. March points out, remain to us from antiquity, since wood-work rapidly perishes by decay, and is easily destroyed by fire. This art produces a bold decorative effect which appears to have been perpetuated in various ways. Amongst others may be mentioned the interior decoration of an earthen vessel from Ueberlingen See (Plate IV., Fig. 9), a crescent of red sandstone from Ebersberg (Plate IV., Fig. 10), and an incised stone from Hadrian’s Wall, in Northumberland. (Plate IV., Fig. 11.)

So far we have only considered the type of ornamentation which occurs on plaited or woven objects, and these are seen to be conditioned by that particular technique. We have now to see what occurs when a new material is substituted for the old.

There are many varieties of tapa in the Pacific, some of which are coarse and others of extreme fineness and softness. The process of making and decorating tapa has often been described; sometimes the tapa is ribbed, having been beaten with more or less finely corrugated wooden mallets, occasionally it is marked with squares which give it an appearance of having been stamped by a simply plaited mat, but many pieces are quite smooth. There is nothing in the texture or manufacture of tapa to prevent its being ornamented with intricate and involved patterns. As a general rule, all over the Pacific we find that tapa patterns are largely geometrical—that is, they are formed of straight and angled lines; bowed lines, which are grouped into leaf-like designs, are not infrequent, but doubly curved lines and scroll-like designs are extremely rare. The evidence clearly points to a time anterior to the employment of tapa, and when mats and other textiles were the only fabrics; the decoration of these was necessarily angular in style. When tapa became general the older designs were transferred to the new material, and quite irrespective of its capabilities. Only gradually has it been found that the smooth surface of tapa lends itself to a more elaborate decorative treatment. The essential conservatism of the savage precludes rapid emancipation from long existent thralls, especially as the æsthetic mind has, so to speak, become set in angularities.

It is probable that the practice of beating tapa with wooden mallets led to the discovery of printing in colours. The transitions are slight between finding the natural graining of wood impressing itself on the soft tapa, of so cutting the mallets as to produce a regularly grooved surface, and of colouring the blocks, and lastly of making the great printing blocks on which the pattern stands up in relief, which were made in Fiji. Sometimes the lines in relief of printing blocks are made by fastening the mid ribs of palm leaves on to a stout piece of tapa.

In certain islands it has been discovered that fern fronds covered with pigment can be used for printing, and thus what is known in this country as “nature-printing” has been independently arrived at.

What has happened in the Great Ocean apparently also took place in New Guinea. In the south-eastern peninsula the men wear tapa belts which are often painted. About the district of Kerepunu, in British New Guinea, tapa belts are worn by the men which are painted in a peculiar manner with grey and orange pigments. In Fig. 51 we have two typical patterns. It is obvious that the interlaced design would be easily arrived at in a plaited belt, but it is highly improbable that it is, so to speak, indigenous to the tapa.

In all the other examples of painted tapa known to me from British New Guinea, angular designs alone occur.

Professor von den Steinen discovered in Central Brazil some patterns, which most people would designate as “geometrical,” painted on pieces of bark which formed a frieze round a chief’s house. These patterns (Fig. 52) are derived from serial repetitions of the minute triangular garment which constitutes the sole clothing of the women. This is a good example of the necessity for local information concerning the significance of designs. I would refer the reader to later pages for further examples of analogous patterns from the same district.

4. _Skeuomorphic Pottery._

Perhaps no manufacture is of such importance to anthropologists as pottery. In Europe pottery first appeared in what is termed by archæologists the Neolithic Age, or that period of human history when man had learnt to neatly chip and to polish his stone implements, but had not as yet discovered metal. Amongst living people the Australians and the Polynesians are the only great groups among whom pottery is unknown.[31] There can be little doubt that the ceramic art has been independently discovered in various parts of the world, and Mr. Cushing believes that this has been the case even in America.

[31] In Oceania pottery is unknown save in the West, and there only sporadically. It is absent in Polynesia except in the Tonga Islands, where it is doubtless due to Fiji influence. Its distribution in Melanesia is erratic; for example, it occurs in the Fiji Islands, New Caledonia, and the Loyalty Islands. Rude, unglazed dishes are made in Espiritu Santo (R. H. Codrington, _The Melanesians_, 1891, p. 315), but not Aurora, in Pentecost and Lepers’ Island in the New Hebrides, nor in Banks’ Islands, Torres Islands, Santa Cruz Group, and most of the Solomon Islands. While wanting in the Bismarck Archipelago, it occurs in New Guinea. But even where pottery is made it is very local and confined to certain tribes. For example, in British New Guinea (A. C. Haddon, _The Decorative Art of British New Guinea_, 1894, pp. 149, 222-224) it is made only in the south-east peninsula and in some of the adjacent islands. In scattered villages, or even in parts of villages, from Yule Island to Maopa in Aroma, pottery is made from clay in the lump; but in the Engineer Group, and especially in Wari (or Teste Island), the clay is laid down in a spiral, and no stone and beater are used, but it is smoothed by a Tellina shell. This method is described and figured by Dr. Finsch (O. Finsch, _Samoafahrten_, 1888, p. 280; _Ethnological Atlas_, 1888, Plate IV.). The upper border of these pots, he says, “exhibits various simple band patterns, which are scratched with fork-like bamboo instruments, and which serve not as ornamentation but as trade-marks. Thus here also (as at Bilibili) each woman has her own mark, with which she signs her fabrication.” I have elsewhere (cf. _Decorative Art of British New Guinea_, p. 223) printed an extract from the unpublished journal of Dr. H. O. Forbes, in which he gives an account of the method of making pottery at Wari. Fig. 23 is a copy of Dr. Forbes’ sketches of these slightly decorated vessels. In German New Guinea (Kaiser Wilhelm’s Land) pottery is made from the lump, as among the Motu of British New Guinea, at Sechstroh River (Humboldt Bay), Goose Bay (Dallmann Harbour), the island of Bilia (Eickstedt Island in Prince Henry Harbour), and more especially at the island of Bilibili in Astrolabe Bay. Dr. Finsch claims that this pottery is of better quality and better decorated than that of the south-east coast. Some of the vessels are ornamented with small bosses. But the insignificant patterns, frequently made with the finger-nail, are probably intended, as in Port Moresby, for trade-marks, and not merely for ornament. From their extremely local and scattered distribution it is evident that the pottery makers of New Guinea are not autocthones, but belong to the waves of Melanesian immigration that have washed the coast and neighbouring islands.

In speaking of New Caledonia Baron L. de Vaux (L. de Vaux, “Les Canaques de la Nouvelle-Calédonie,” _Rev. d’Ethnog._, ii., 1883, p. 340) says, “formerly the women of Pouébo, Oubatche, and Pam had the monopoly; now the art tends more and more to disappear as the natives find it more practical to buy trade vessels. They succeeded in making pots to the height of two feet, and very often decorated externally with lizards and frogs in relief. The base being ready, they superimpose rings of well-prepared clay the one above the other, holding them and joining them from the interior with the left hand, whilst they smooth their work externally by means of the right hand and of a little beater of smooth, hard wood.”

Mr. Atkinson (J. J. Atkinson, “Notes on Pointed Forms of Pottery among Primitive Peoples,” _Journ. Anth. Inst._, xxiii., 1893, p. 90) also describes the New Caledonian method of making pottery, and draws attention to the fact that the occasional traces of faint horizontal marks occasioned by the technique “imitate the marks left by pottery made on the system of plastering wickerwork employed by some people,” and therefrom he suggests a necessary warning not to take the latter method as having been of universal occurrence.

Earthen vessels are comparatively easy to make, and though they are brittle, their fragments, when properly baked, are almost indestructible. The history of man is unconsciously written largely on shards, and the elucidation of these unwritten records is as interesting and important as the deciphering of the cuneiform inscriptions on the clay tablets of Assyria. The Book of Pots has yet to be written, but materials for its compilation lie scattered throughout the great literature of archæology, anthropology, and ceramics, and in the specimens in a multitude of museums and collections. The scientific treatment of the subject has been sketched out mainly by W. H. Holmes and F. H. Cushing, and I have not hesitated to borrow largely from the publications of these American anthropologists.

There are three principal methods of making clay vessels—1, by coiling; 2, by modelling; or 3, by casting.

In the first method longer or shorter rope-like pieces of clay are formed. These are laid down in a spiral, and the vessel is built up by a continuation of the same process.

In modelling, or moulding, a lump of clay is taken, and this is first worked with the hands, and then the clay is gradually beaten into the desired shape and thickness by means of a wooden mallet, which hits against a stone or other object that is held inside the incipient vessel.

The third method, by casting, is very rarely employed except by quite civilised peoples. It was a comparatively late discovery that clay vessels could be cast within hollow moulds if the paste was made thin enough.

The coiling and moulding processes are in some places employed side by side, and a vessel may be commenced in the latter method and finished by coiling. (Fig. 55.) This is done by the Nicobarese,[32] Pueblo Indians, and other peoples.

[32] E. H. Man, “Nicobar Pottery,” _Journ. Anth. Inst._, xxiii., 1893, p. 21.

The subject of the forms and decoration of pottery is so important for our study that it will be advisable to quote at considerable length some of the American investigations which bear upon it. Nowhere than in that continent are conditions more favourable to a scientific study of the evolution of ceramics, and our American colleagues happily are fully alive to this fact. Their researches afford valuable sidelights upon the probable history of European prehistoric ceramics.

Mr. J. D. Hunter,[33] writing of the Mississippi tribes in 1823, says that they spread the clay “over blocks of wood, which have been formed into shapes to suit their convenience or fancy. When sufficiently dried they are removed from the moulds, placed in proper situations, and burned to a hardness suitable to their intended uses. Another method practised by them is to coat the inner surface of baskets, made of rushes or willows, with clay, to any required thickness, and when dry, to burn them as above described.”

[33] J. D. Hunter, _Manners and Customs of several Indian Tribes located west of the Mississippi_. Philadelphia, 1823, p. 296.

Messrs. Squier and Davis,[34] referring to the vessels of the Gulf Indians, say:—“In the construction of those of large size, it was customary to model them in baskets of willow or splints, which at the proper period were burned off, leaving the vessel perfect in form, and retaining the somewhat ornamental markings of their moulds. Some of those found on the Ohio seem to have been modelled in bags or nettings of coarse thread or twisted bark. These practices are still retained by some of the remote western tribes.”

[34] Squier and Davis, _Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley_, 1848, p. 187.

Mr. W. H. Holmes[35] points out that “clay has no inherent qualities of a nature to impose a given form or class of forms upon its products, as have wood, bark, bone, or stone. It is so mobile as to be quite free to take form from surroundings.... In early stages of culture the processes of art are closely akin to those of nature, the human agent hardly ranking as more than a part of the environment. The primitive artist does not proceed by methods identical with our own. He does not deliberately and freely examine all departments of nature or art, and select for models those things most convenient or most agreeable to fancy; neither does he experiment with the view of inventing new forms. What he attempts depends almost absolutely upon what happens to be suggested by preceding forms.

[35] W. H. Holmes, “Origin and Development of Form and Ornament in Ceramic Art,” _Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology_, 1882-83. Washington, 1886.

“The range of models in the ceramic art is at first very limited, and includes only those utensils devoted to the particular use to which the clay vessels are to be applied; later, closely associated objects and utensils are copied. In the first stages of art, when a savage makes a weapon, he modifies or copies a weapon; when he makes a vessel he modifies or copies a vessel” (pp. 445, 446).

The discovery of the art of making pottery was probably in all cases adventitious, the clay being first used for some other purpose. “The use of clay as a cement in repairing utensils, in protecting combustible vessels from injury by fire, or in building up the walls of shallow vessels, may also have led to the formation of discs or cups, afterwards independently constructed. In any case the objects or utensils with which the clay was associated in its earliest use would impress their forms upon it. Thus, if clay were used in deepening or mending vessels of stone by a given people, it would, when used independently by that people, tend to assume shapes suggested by stone vessels. The same may be said of its use in connection with wood and wicker, or with vessels of other materials. Forms of vessels so derived may be said to have an adventitious origin, yet they are essentially copies, although not so by design” (p. 445). In other words, such pottery is primitively skeuomorphic. Ceramic biomorphs will be dealt with in a later chapter.

Mr. Holmes further points out that the shapes first assumed by vessels in clay depend upon the shape of the vessels employed at the time of the introduction of the art, and these depend, to a great extent, upon the kind and grade of culture of the people acquiring the art, and upon the resources of the country in which they live.

A few examples will suffice. Mr. Holmes (_loc. cit._, pp. 383, 448) figures an oblong wooden vessel with a projecting rim, which is narrow at the sides but broad at the ends; it is in fact a sort of winged trough; this is sometimes copied in clay. It is evident that the elongated terminal shelf-like projections are more suited to a wooden than to an earthen vessel.

In Fig. 53 we have an Iroquois bark-vessel. Mr. Cushing[36] informs us that in order to produce this form of utensil from a single piece of bark, it is necessary to cut pieces out of the margin and fold it. Each fold, when stitched together in the shaping of the vessel, forms a corner at the rim. These corners, and the borders which they form, are decorated with short lines and combinations of lines, composed of coarse embroideries with dyed porcupine quills. Clay vessels (Fig. 54), which strikingly resemble the shape and decoration of these birch or linden bark vessels, are of common occurrence in the lake regions of the United States. There can be but little doubt that the clay vessels are directly derived from the bark vessels.

[36] F. H. Cushing, “A Study of Pueblo Pottery as illustrative of Zuñi Culture Growth,” _Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology_, 1882-83. Washington, 1886.

Mr. Cushing’s long and intimate knowledge of the Zuñi Indians has enabled him to speak with authority on matters which might be merely happy suggestions by other anthropologists. Any one can guess at origins and meanings, but there are few who know at first-hand, and who therefore can act as interpreters to the student at home. The following account of Zuñi pottery is taken from Mr. Cushing’s paper, entitled “A Study of Pueblo Pottery as illustrative of Zuñi Culture Growth.”

So far as language indicates, the earliest Zuñi water vessels were tubes of wood or sections of cane. The latter must speedily have given way to the use of gourds. While the gourd was large and convenient in form, it was difficult of transportation, owing to its fragility. To overcome this it was encased in a coarse sort of wicker-work. Of this there is evidence among the Zuñis, in the shape of a series of rudely encased gourd vessels into which the sacred water is said to have been transferred from the tubes.

This crude beginning of the wicker-art in connection with water vessels points towards the development of the wonderful water-tight baskets of the south-west, explaining, too, the resemblance of many of its typical forms to the shapes of gourd vessels. The name for these vessels also supports this view.

Mr. Cushing suggests that water-tight osiery, once known, however difficult of manufacture, would displace the general use of gourd vessels. While the growth of the gourd was restricted to limited areas, the materials for basketry were anywhere at hand. Basket vessels were far stronger and more durable than gourds.