Attention has been called to the great numbers of pieces of
earthenware recovered from the mounds and graves of the middle
province of the Mississippi Valley. In certain districts--as remarked
by one of our collectors--we have but to dig to fill museums. Such
districts must have been occupied for a long period by a numerous
people who recognized the claims of the dead upon their worldly
treasures. The burial grounds of many other sections of the American
continent are correspondingly rich in ceramic remains.
The vessels were not to any extent cinerary, and probably not even
mortuary in the sense of having been constructed especially for
inhumation with the dead. They were receptacles for food, drink,
paint, and the like, placed in the grave along with other possessions
of the departed in obedience to the demands of an almost universal
custom.
The material employed in manufacture embraced clay in all grades of
refinement, from coarse loamy earths to the refined slips used in
surface finish. The tempering materials--used in greater or
lesser quantity according to the character of the vessel to be
made--consisted of shell, sand, and potsherds reduced to various
degrees of pulverulence.
The stage of the art represented by this ware is one of hand building
purely. No lathe or other revolving device was known, although
varieties of improvised molds--baskets, gourds, and the like, such
as are known to nearly all pottery-making peoples--were frequently
employed.
The highest degree of finish known was attained by the application
of a slip or wash of fine clay which was given a good degree of
mechanical polish by means of a smooth implement held in the hand.
Ornament was produced by both flat and plastic methods. The colors
used in painting were white, black, and red earths. The plastic
subjects were incised, stamped, relieved, and modeled in the round.
The period was one of open-air baking, a moderate degree of hardness
being secured. The texture was porous and the vessels were without
resonance. The paste exhibits two distinct varieties of color which
may be described roughly as light and dark. A certain range of dark
hues--blacks, browns, and grays--were probably produced by "smother
baking." Another set of colors embracing light reddish and yellowish
grays resulted from changes in the clay produced by simple open air
baking.
A feature worthy of especial note is the great diversity of
form--indicating a long practice of the art, a high specialization of
uses, and a considerable variety in the originals copied. The manual
skill exhibited is of no mean order. Symmetry of form combined with
considerable grace of outline has been achieved without the wheel--a
result attained in still greater perfection by other American races.
Notwithstanding the great diversity of the forms of vessels, the very
primitive condition of the art is indicated by the absence of bricks,
tiles, whistles, lamps, spindle-whorls, toys, and statuettes. The
models from which the vessels were copied must have been quite varied,
comprising shells of mollusks--marine and fresh-water--gourd shells of
varying shapes, and vessels of wicker, bark, horn, and wood, such as
are in common use with our western and northern tribes.
The execution of the ornamental designs indicates a rather low grade
of skill. This is especially true of work in color, which has the
appearance of a newly acquired art. Intaglio and relief work evinces
much greater skill--the incised forms especially giving evidence of
long experience.
In subject-matter the ornament employed bespeaks nothing higher
perhaps than could be expected of our historic tribes. The great body
of the devices are geometric, and comprise such motives as could have
developed within the art or that might have been borrowed from closely
associated arts. A small percentage of incised linear designs come,
apparently, from mythologic sources, and delineate, in a rude way,
both men and animals.
The modeling of life forms in connection with earthen vessels
constitutes a feature of considerable interest, the highest known
achievement being represented by a series of vases imitating human
heads. Animal forms are generally rudely modeled, the imitation
of nature having been apparently a secondary consideration--the
associated idea or the fancy for the grotesque being the stronger
motive. The animal forms are inferior to those carved in stone by some
of the mound-building peoples.
That any of these images were idols in the ordinary acceptation of the
term is an idea that cannot be entertained. They are always associated
directly with vessels, and could not be more than representations
of the tutelary deities supposed to be interested in the uses or
ceremonies to which the vessels were assigned.
In form there are many suggestions of the characteristic utensils of
the north, in ornament there are occasional hints of the south--of
Caribbean and Mexican art.
With the Pueblo peoples, notwithstanding their proximity, there is
hardly a hint of relationship of any kind. Unlike the Pueblos, the
ethnical environment of the Mississippi Valley races would seem to
have been considerably diversified; there was less isolation; yet
there are strong indications that the art is mainly of indigenous
growth, as there is unity and consistency in all its features.
In reference to the period of culture represented by this ware, a
few words may be added. There is no feature in it that could not
reasonably be expected of the more advanced historic tribes of the
Valley. It indicates a culture differing in many ways from that of the
Pueblos, ancient and modern, but on the whole rather inferior to it.
The work of Mexico, Central and South America is decidedly superior in
every essential feature.
There are many difficulties in the way of instituting a comparison of
this work with that of the primitive work of the Old World. These I
shall not stop to present in this place. In the most general way, I
may say that the ceramic art of the Middle Mississippi is apparently
superior to that of the stone age in Europe, but little can be
inferred in regard to relative grades of culture. In classic countries
it is difficult to find its true equivalent. To reach a stage of art
correspondingly low we shall have to go behind the heroic age--to
pass down through more than the five prehistoric cities of the hill
of Hissarlik and descend into the lowest archaeologic substratum. Even
this, unless it represent the first achievement of that grade of art
upon the continent, would afford uncertain data for comparative study.
A given grade of ceramic achievement runs so freely up and down
the scale of culture that alone its evidence is of little value in
determining culture status.