The student will find scattered throughout a wide range of archæologic
literature frequent but casual mention of works of art in shell.
Individual uses of shell have been dwelt upon at considerable length by
a few authors, but up to this time no one has undertaken the task of
bringing together in one view the works of primitive man in this
material.
Works of ancient peoples in stone, clay, and bronze, in all countries,
have been pretty thoroughly studied, described, and illustrated.
Stone would seem to have the widest range, as it is employed with almost
equal readiness in all the arts.
Clay is widely used and takes a foremost place in works of utility and
taste.
Metals are too intractable to be readily employed by primitive peoples,
and until a high grade of culture is attained are but little used.
Animal substances of compact character, such as bone, horn, ivory, and
shell, are also restricted in their use, and the more destructible
substances, both animal and vegetable, however extensively employed,
have comparatively little archæologic importance.
All materials, however, are made subservient to man and in one way or
another become the agents of culture; under the magic influence of his
genius they are moulded into new forms which remain after his
disappearance as the only records of his existence.
Each material, in the form of convenient natural objects, is applied to
such uses as it is by nature best fitted, and when artificial
modifications are finally made, they follow the suggestions of nature,
improvements being carried forward in lines harmonious with the
initiatory steps of nature.
Had the materials placed at the disposal of primitive peoples been as
uniform as are their wants and capacities, there would have been but
little variation in the art products of the world; but the utilization
of a particular material in the natural state gives a strong bias to
artificial products, and its forms and functions impress themselves upon
art products in other materials. Thus unusual resources engender unique
arts and unique cultures. Such a result, I apprehend, has in a measure
been achieved in North America.
In a broad region at one time occupied by the mound-building tribes we
observe a peculiar and an original effort--an art distinctive in the
material employed, in the forms developed, and to some extent in the
ideas represented. It is an age of shell, a sort of supplement to the
age of stone.
It is not my intention here to attempt at extended discussion of the
bearings of this art upon the various interesting questions of
anthropologic science, but rather to present certain of its phases in
the concrete, to study the embodiment of the art of the ancient American
in this one material, and to present the results in a tangible manner,
not as a catalogue of objects, but as an elementary part of the whole
body of human art, illustrating a particular phase of the evolution of
culture.
This paper is to be regarded simply as an outline of the subject, to be
followed by a more exhaustive monograph of the art in shell of all the
ancient American peoples.
Art had its beginning when man first gathered clubs from the woods,
stones from the river bed, and shells from the sea-shore for weapons and
utensils. In his hands these simple objects became modified by use into
new forms, or were intentionally altered to increase their convenience.
This was the infancy, the inception of culture--a period from which a
tedious but steady advance has been made until the remarkable
achievements of the present have been reached.
Rude clubs have become weapons of curious construction and machinery of
marvelous complication, and the pebbles and shells are the prototypes of
numerous works in all materials. Rude rafts which served to cross
primeval rivers have become huge ships, and the original house of bark
and leaves is represented by palaces and temples, glittering with light
and glowing with color.
The steps which led up to these results are by no means clear to us;
they have not been built in any one place or by any one people. Nations
have risen and fallen, and have given place to others that in turn have
left a heap of ruins. We find it impossible to trace back through the
historic ages into and beyond the prehistoric shadows, the pathway to
culture followed by any one people. The necessity for groping increases
with every backward step, and we pick up one by one the scattered links
of a chain that has a thousand times been broken. So far our information
is meager and fragmentary, and centuries of research will be required to
round up our knowledge to such a fullness as to enable us to
rehabilitate the ancient races, a result to be reached only by an
exhaustive comparative study of the art products of all peoples and of
all ages.
By collecting the various relics of art in shell I shall be able to add
a fragment to this great work. Destructible in their character these
relics are seldom preserved from remote periods, and it is only by
reason of their inhumation with the dead that they appear among
antiquities at all. A majority of such objects, taken from graves and
tumuli, known to post-date even the advent of the white race in North
America, are so far decayed that unless most carefully handled they
crumble to powder.
It is impossible to demonstrate the great antiquity of any of these
relics. Many of those obtained from the shell heaps of the Atlantic
coast are doubtless very ancient, but we cannot say with certainty that
they antedate the discovery more than a few hundred years.
Specimens obtained from the mounds of the Mississippi Valley have the
appearance of great antiquity, but beyond the internal evidence of the
specimens themselves we have no reliable data upon which to base an
estimate of time. The age of these relics is rendered still less certain
by the presence of intrusive interments, which place side by side works
of very widely separated periods.
The antiquity of the relics themselves is not, however, of first
importance; the art ideas embodied in them have a much deeper interest.
The tablets upon which the designs are engraved may be never so recent,
yet the conceptions themselves have their origin far back in the
forgotten ages. Deified ancestors and mythical creatures that were in
the earlier stages rudely depicted on bark and skins and rocks were,
after a certain mastery over materials had been achieved, engraved on
tablets of flinty shell; and it is probable that in these rare objects
we have, if not a full representation of the art of the ancient peoples,
at least a large number of their most important works, in point of
execution as well as of conception.
Man in his most primitive condition must have resorted to the sea-shore
for the food which it affords. Weapons or other appliances were not
necessary in the capture of mollusks; a stone to break the shell, or one
of the massive valves of the shells themselves, sufficed for all
purposes.
The shells of mollusks probably came into use as utensils at a very
early date, and mutually with products of the vegetable world afforded
natural vessels for food and water.
For a long period the idea of modifying the form to increase the
convenience may not have been suggested and the natural shells were used
for whatever purpose they were best fitted. In time, however, by
accidental suggestions it would be found that modifications would
enhance their usefulness, and the breaking away of useless parts and the
sharpening of edges and points would be resorted to. Farther on, as it
became necessary to carry them from point to point, changes would be
made for convenience of transportation. Perforations which occur
naturally in some species of shell, would be produced artificially, and
the shells would be strung on vines or cords and suspended about the
neck; in this way, in time, may have originated the custom of wearing
pendants for personal ornament. Following this would be the
transportation of such articles to distant places by wandering tribes,
exchanges would take place with other tribes, and finally a trade would
be developed and a future commerce of nations be inaugurated.
Results similar to the foregoing would spring doubtless from the
employment of substances other than shell, but that material most
closely associated with the acquisition of food would come first
prominently into use.
The farther these useful articles were carried from the source of supply
the greater the value that would attach to them, and far inland the
shell of the sea might easily become an object of unusual consideration.
Having an origin more or less shrouded in mystery, it would in time
become doubly dear to the heart of the superstitious savage, perhaps an
object of actual veneration, or at least one of such high esteem that it
would be treasured by the living and buried with the dead.
The material so plentiful on the sea-shore that it was thought of only
as it proved useful for vessels and implements, became a valued treasure
in the interior; its functions were gradually enlarged and
differentiated; it was worked into varied shapes, such as pendants for
the ears, beads for the neck, pins for the hair, and elaborate gorgets
for the breast; it served its turn as fetich and charm; and was
frequently used in the ceremonial jugglery of the mystic dance.
The slightest modification of these relics by the hand of man attracts
our attention, and from that infant stage of the art until the highest
and most elaborate forms are reached they have the deepest interest to
the student of human progress.