[Illustration: Figs. 337, 338, 339, 340, 341, and 342. TERRA-COTTA COLOR
STAMPS WITH DESIGNS SIMILAR TO THE SWASTIKA. Mexico. Cat. Nos. 99124,
99127, 27887, 99115, 99118, 99122, U. S. N. M.]
The aborigines of Mexico and Central and South America employed
terra-cotta color stamps, which, being made into the proper pattern in the
soft clay, were burned hard; then, being first coated with color, the
stamp was pressed upon the object to be decorated, and so transferred its
color, as in the mechanical operation of printing, thus giving the
intended decoration. Patterns of these stamps are inserted in this paper
in connection with the Swastika because of the resemblance--not in form,
but in style. They are of geometric form, crosses, dots, circles
(concentric and otherwise), lozenges, chevrons, fret, and labyrinth or
meander. The style of this decoration lends itself easily to the Swastika;
and yet, with the variety of patterns contained in the series of stamps
belonging to the U. S. National Museum, shown in figs. 337 to 342, no
Swastika appears; nor in the similar stamps belonging to other
collections, notably that of Mr. A. E. Douglass, in the Metropolitan
Museum of Natural History, Central Park, New York, are any Swastikas
shown. Of the foregoing figures, all are from Tlaltelolco, Mexico (Blake
collection), except fig. 339, which is from the Valley of Mexico, and was
received from the Museo Nacional of Mexico.
[Illustration: Fig. 343. TERRA-COTTA COLOR STAMPS WITH DESIGNS SIMILAR TO
THE SWASTIKA. Piaroa Indians, Venezuela. Tenth Annual Report of the Bureau
of Ethnology, fig. 982.]