Part 8

Another smaller vessel, still more unique in character, is illustrated in Fig. 355. One of the nodes is very much prolonged, giving, with the upright neck, a form rudely suggestive of a bird. The ornament, like the last, consists of two bands. The upper is of diamond-shaped figures in white upon a black ground, and the lower of a cleverly managed meander, which is made to conform neatly to the eccentricities of the body. The hooks encircle the nodes as in the preceding case.

A smaller specimen is given in Fig. 356. The node next the handle being prolonged resembles the tail of a bird, while the other nodes, which would occupy the place of the two prominences of the breast, are barely suggested. The decoration is extremely simple.

A fine specimen of these novel vessels is illustrated in Fig. 357. The body is much prolonged on one side and has no prominence whatever at the breast points. The handle is but slightly arched and connects the rim with the extreme point of the projecting lobe. There is here a rather decided suggestion of a skin or intestine vessel. It is but a step from this form to the well-known shoe or moccasin shape of a later period of Pueblo art, a form known in nearly all centers of ancient American culture. The decoration is simple and unique, consisting of a meandered figure in white upon a black ground, with parallel bordering lines in black. It connects opposite sides of the rim passing beneath the projecting lobe.

A number of the best examples are in the National collection. One of these, Fig. 358, is figured by Mr. Stevenson in the Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology. It might be described as shoe-shaped, yet we are forcibly reminded of the headless body of a bird, the rather square projecting breast being a marked feature. The painted ornament consists of broad zigzag, meandered bands filled in with fine oblique stripes.

One of the finest specimens is presented in Fig. 359. The triangular or three-lobed form of body is still noticeable, two of the points forming the breast, and the other, much prolonged, standing for the tail of the bird. The meaning of the latter feature is made plain by the painted figure. A conventional design, consisting of concentric, plain and zigzag lines, occupies the back, and terminates behind in a row of pinnate marks, evidently a conventional drawing of the tail. The wings are indicated at the sides by a design like that upon the back. The breast is embellished with a series of oblong dots probably intended for feathers. In this case the neck, which is high and narrow, has three prominences near the top; one at the front represents the bill of the bird, and others at the sides are meant for eyes. A handle has connected the head with the middle of the back. This is nearly all broken away and the stumps have been perforated for the insertion of cords. A serrate collar in black encircles the neck. The original of this vase was obtained in the Pueblo country and belongs to Dr. Sheldon Jackson. A specimen recently acquired by the National Museum is superior to this in its decorative treatment. The body has four lobes, one for the breast, another for the tail, and one for each of the wings. Each of these lobes is made the center about which the volutes of the very elaborate scroll-work are turned.

I shall give one more illustration, Fig. 360. This is taken from the Keam collection and represents a bird. The vessel is quite distinct in shape from those previously given, being much like the bird vessels of the mound-builders. It is a cup with constricted rim, the head, tail, and wings of the bird projecting horizontally from the outer margin of the rim. It is of the white ware and has had a painted design in black lines, now nearly obliterated.

CONCLUDING REMARKS.

Two great groups of ceramic products have now been presented--the coiled ware and the white decorated ware. These groups belong to the first great period of pueblo art in clay. Their chronological identity is sometimes questioned, the coiled ware to all appearances being the more archaic. It is simple in form and rude in finish, is without painted ornament, and was relegated to the more ordinary uses. These and other features give countenance to the theory of greater antiquity; but the intimate association of the two groups in nearly every locality indicates close identity in time. It cannot be said that the other classes of ware found within the same province belong to different times or to distinct races, but they are widely separated in many important characters from the two leading groups. They exhibit greater variety of form, less constraint in decoration, and greatly improved technique, points tending to prove advance in culture, and, presumably, in time.

The more closely the ceramic art of the ancient peoples is studied the more decidedly it appears that it was profoundly influenced by the textile arts, and especially by basketry. The latter art was practiced from remote antiquity, and within historic times the manufacture of baskets has been the most important industry of the tribes of the Pacific slope of temperate North America. Ceramic shapes, wherever found within this region, coincide closely with textile outlines, and the geometric ornamentation can be traced to textile prototypes originating in the technical peculiarities of construction.

Another point brought out by the preceding studies follows naturally the foregoing statement. There are in the pueblo country no primitive forms of earthenware. This may lead to the inference that the pueblo tribes migrated from other regions in which the earlier stages of the art had existed, but taken in connection with the lack of individuality in the potter's art, and its evident dependence upon the textile art, it leads decidedly to the conclusion that art in clay was acquired by these tribes in comparatively recent times. The ancient pueblos practised the art of basketry, but clearly remained ignorant of the plastic art, until by some accident of environment it was introduced or discovered. Under the influence of the sister art, pottery at once took a high stand. During the first stages, however, it was a servile art, reproducing the forms and decorations of basketry. The true plastic characters of clay remained practically undiscovered, and is only now, under the influence of the European, dawning upon the conservative mind of the inhabitant of the plateaus.

Besides basketry, it is probable that the early pueblos made use of gourds and of tissue vessels, traces of their influence occurring quite frequently, but there is no indication whatever of the presence of carvings in shell, wood, and stone.

I do not wish in this place to dwell upon the details of pueblo ornament. A single example will serve to illustrate the origin and character of the leading decorative conceptions. Glancing through the series of vases illustrated under painted ware, we find that ninety-four out of one hundred designs are meanders, or are based upon the meander. Beginning with the simple waved or broken line we pass up through all grades of increasing complexity to chains of curvilinear and rectilinear meanders in which the links are highly individualized, being composed of a sigmoid line, terminating in reversed hooks; but in no case do we reach a loop in the curved forms or an intersection in the angular forms. The typical intersecting Greek fret does not therefore occur, nor, I may add, is it found anywhere in native American art.

The constructional characters of the art in which these linear forms developed, although they encouraged geometrical elaboration, forbade intersections or crossings of a line upon itself, and the genius of the decorator had never freed itself from this bondage. The forms imposed upon decoration by the textile art are _necessarily_ geometric and rectilinear, and their employment in other and less conventional arts, has been too limited to destroy or even greatly modify these characters.

The study of Pueblo art embodied in the preceding pages tells the simple story of the evolution of art--and especially of decorative art--in a period when the expanding mind of primitive man, still held in the firm grasp of instinctive and traditional methods--the bonds of nature--was steadily working out its æsthetic destiny.

INDEX.

PAGE

Abiquin, N. Mex., Pottery of 282 Acoma pottery 300 Age of pueblo ceramic art 267 American Naturalist on pottery 276 Animas Valley 315 Antiquity of coiled ware and white ware, Relative 358-359 Araqnaya coiled pottery 276 Arizona, Coiled ware from 279 pottery 291, 353-358 Art, Pueblo 266 Review, cited on coiled ware 279 Artist in ancient pottery, Freedom of 303 Avoca, N. C., Coiled pottery from 277 Aztec Springs ruin 319 Bandelier, A. F., on pueblo pottery 298 Barber, E. A., on Ute pottery 276-277 Basket marked pottery 282 Basketry a primitive art 359 Bottles 283, 301, 306, 320, 343, 345, 351, 352 Bowls 283, 306, 308-314, 316, 322-334 Brazilian Indian coiled pottery 276, 277 Burial of dead under dwellings 288 Burial of property with the dead 288

Cañon de Chelly, Pottery of 293, 319 Cave-houses 284-286, 293 Ceramic art, The 267 forms, Origin of 269 Chaco Valley 315 Character of Pueblo art 266 Chiquito, Colorado 306 Cihola pottery 297, 307, 316, 321, 343, 344, 356 Classification of pottery 272, 304, 306 Cliff-dwellers 304, 305 Cliff-dwellings 284-286, 293 Coil in ornamentation, The 278-282 Coiled ware and white ware, Relative antiquity of 358-359 imitated 299 Coiling of the Pueblos 273-275 Coil-made pottery 273-299 Color of coiled pottery 283 of designs in pottery 302 of Pueblo pottery 269 Colorado Chiquito 306 pottery 321-357 Indian pottery 276 plateau house sites 281 pottery 281, 305 ruin 319 Construction, Pueblo ceramic 268 Cooking, Pottery for 272, 283 Crimped coil on pottery 279, 280, 282 Cross, Ideographic 345 Cups 349

Distribution of Pueblo art 266 Domestic pottery 272, 283, 306 Dumont describes pottery 275, 276

Eccentric forms of pottery 283, 307, 353 Epsom Creek pottery, Utah 286-287 Execution of design in painted pottery 302

Fillmore, Utah, Pottery from grave at 292 Firing of Pueblo pottery 268 Flat heads 340 ornaments 271 Florida coiled pottery 277 Form in pottery, Origin of 269

Gila pottery 281, 283 Glaze of Pueblo pottery 268 Gourds copied in pottery 270, 306, 353 Guilloche 309 Handled vessels 271, 300, 314, 319, 325, 340 Hartt, Prof. C. F., on Indian pottery in Brazil 276 Humboldt, W. O., on coiled pottery of the Orinoco 276

Indented pottery patterns 280 Indian coiled pottery of Brazil 276 Individuality of pottery designs 305 Intaglio ornament 271

Jackson, Dr. Sheldon; Indian vases 357 Jackson, W.H., on pottery 287, 318, 319 Jones, Prof. Marcus E., on pottery of Utah 292

Kanab, Pottery from 281, 287, 310, 314 Keam, T. V., Pottery collection of 293, 296, 321, 330, 336, 348, 355 La Plata Valley 315 Life forms in pottery 283, 307, 353 Little Colorado, Pottery of the 283, 292, 321, 330 Louisiana, Coiled Indian ware in 275-276

McElmel Valley 315 Magalhaes, Dr., on coiled pottery of the Araguaya River 276 Mancos Valley 315 Material used in pottery 267, 283 Meander in ornament 359 Mended Pueblo pottery 286 Mexico, Coiled pottery from 277 Mindeleff, Victor, collected pottery 293, 311, 338 Miscellaneous ornamentation of pottery 283 Moki pottery 277, 290, 293, 299 Monteztuna Cañon 315, 318 Mormon town 287, 310 Mortuary pottery 272 Moss, Capt. John, on Ute pottery 276, 319 Mound village, Utah 287-288 Muge 307, 320, 347

National Museum, Pottery in 285, 287, 321, 331, 333, 357 Navajo pottery 299 Nelson, E. W., obtained pottery 279, 292, 353 Nevada, Pueblo pottery in 287 New Mexico pottery 282, 298 North Carolina coiled pottery 277 Nutria pottery 344

Ollas 283-287, 293, 306, 314, 318, 335 Origin of ceramic forms 269, 272 the coil 277 Orinoco, Coiled pottery of the 276 Ornament, Ceramic 271, 278-282, 303, 305, 337, 359

Painted pottery 302-307 Parowan pottery 292 Pitcher forms 307 Plain pottery 299-301 Pottery Catalogue of Jaines Stevenson 265 developed from basketry 359 mended by Pueblos 286 Property buried with the dead 288 Provo, Utah, Pottery from 321 Pueblo art 266 coiled ware 273-275 Putnam, Prof. F. W., cited 279

Relief ornament 271, 282 Rio de Chelley Valley 316 Dolores Valley 316 Gila pottery 281, 283, 299 Grande pottery 298, 305 Mancos cliff-houses 284-286 , Pottery of the 281, 284-286 Pecos, Pottery of the 298, 305 San Juan, Pottery of the 315-321 Virgen, Pottery of the 287-292, 307-315

Saint George tumulus, Utah, Pottery from 281, 287-291, 300, 307, 312, 334 Saint John, Pottery from 305 Salt Lake City Museum, Pottery in 292, 300 Salt Lake Valley, Pottery of 292 San Antonio Springs, Pottery at 344 Juan pottery 274, 281, 284-287, 291 Santa Clara River, Pottery on 287 Santarem, Brazil, Coiled pottery at 276 Springerville, Ariz., Pottery at 279, 291, 305, 353 Stages of ornament for painted pottery 303-304 Stephen, John, on pottery 293 Stevenson, James, on pottery 265, 293, 357 Storage of water, Pottery for 284 Surface finish of Pueblo pottery 268

Tempering materials in pottery 267 Transportation, of water, Pottery for 284 Tusayan pottery 269, 279, 283, 294, 300, 304, 307, 311, 316, 321, 358

Utah pottery. (_See_ Saint George and Springerville) 279, 286-291, 300 Ute pottery 276-277

Vases 301, 335-351 Vegetable forms copied in pottery 270 Village site mound or tumulus 287

Water, Pottery for transportation and storage of 284 White ware 269, 304, 305-358 and coiled ware, Relative antiquity of 358-359

Yarrow, Dr. H. C., obtained pottery in Utah 292 Yuma, Pottery of 300

Zuñi pottery 290, 293, 300, 333, 344

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Transcriber's Note:

Italics denoted by underscores.

Alternative spellings retained.

Punctuation normalized without comment.

Minor typos corrected without comment.

Image scaling factors (1/2 etc.) only usful for comparing relative sizes between objects, not actual sizes.