As primitive peoples advance in culture and the various branches of art
are differentiated, each of the materials employed is made to fill a
wider and wider sphere of usefulness. Clay, applied at first to vessel
making and used perhaps as an auxiliary in a number of arts in which it
took no definite or individual shapes, gradually extended its dominion
until almost every art was in a measure dependent upon it or in some way
utilized it. The extent of this expansion of availability is in a
general way a measure of the advancement of the races concerned. The
Chiriquians employed clay in the construction of textile machinery, as
shown by the occurrence of spindle whorls, and a number of small
receptacles, probably needlecases, are constructed of that material. It
was employed in the manufacture of stools, statuettes, drums, rattles,
and whistles. With less cultured races, such as the Pueblo and mound
builders of the north, such articles were rarely manufactured, while
with the more cultured nations of Mexico and Peru a wider field was
covered and the work was considerably superior.