In the description of the primitive methods of pottery manufacture,
allusion was made to the fact that vegetable and animal forms were
copied by the early artificers.
Although the immediate originals of many kinds of clay vessels were
baskets of various kinds, we must not forget that these also were often
textile imitations of natural objects. Gourds which are of almost
ubiquitous occurrence undoubtedly were early and independently utilised
as vessels. For the more convenient porterage of them they would be
enclosed in netting or basketry. The better the accessories became, the
less need for the original foundations, especially as the latter were
brittle. From the fact that the shape of certain baskets in a district
resemble those of the gourds of that district, we may assume that this
process of evolution has operated spontaneously in diverse places. Clay
vessels which were modelled from the suggestion of such baskets would
thus remotely be phyllomorphs but having an intermediate skeuomorphic
stage.
Instead of this indirect mode of origin a more direct one has often
occurred. Messrs. Squier and Davis[110] record: “In some of the
southern states (of North America), it is said, the kilns, in which
the ancient pottery was baked, are now occasionally to be met with.
Some are represented still to contain the ware, partially burned, and
retaining the rinds of the gourds, etc., over which they were modelled,
and which had not been entirely removed by the fire.” They also state
that the Indians along the Gulf moulded their vessels “over gourds and
other models and baked them in ovens.”
[110] Squier and Davis, _Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi
Valley_, 1848, p. 195.
It is not necessary to believe that this has everywhere been the
original ceramic gourd-derivatives, even among savage peoples. Once
the power of working in clay was acquired, intentional copying of
gourds (Figs. 107, 108), or other vegetable vessels, may very well have
occurred. This is rendered all the more probable from the fact that
animal forms are modelled as earthen vessels. I am not here alluding
to figures of men or of totem, sacred, or familiar animals which may
belong to a somewhat higher stage of culture than that which we are now
more particularly considering; but to clay utensils which are copied
from receptacles which are the shells or other parts of animals.
[Illustration: FIG. 107.—Gourd; after Holmes.]
[Illustration: FIG. 108.—Clay vessel, made in imitation of a gourd,
from a mound in South-eastern Missouri; after Holmes.]
Wherever shells of sufficient size are found they are utilised as food
and water vessels, and there are numerous instances in various parts of
the world of vessels being modelled so as to represent the ancient and
familiar utensils.
[Illustration: FIG. 109.—Clay vessels imitated from shells, from the
mounds and graves of the Mississippi Valley; after Holmes.]
Clay vessels imitating both marine and fresh-water shells are
occasionally obtained from the mounds and graves of the Mississippi
Valley. The conch-shell appears to have been a favourite model
(Fig. 109, A and B). A clam shell is imitated in C and D. The more
conventional forms of these vessels are exceedingly interesting, as
they point out the tendencies and possibilities of modification. The
bowl (E) has four rosettes, each consisting of a large central boss
with four or five smaller ones surrounding it. The central boss, as in
a, is derived from the spire of the conch shell, and the encircling
knobs from the nodulated rim of the outer whorl of the shell. Mr.
Holmes suggests that in this case the conception is that of four conch
shells united in one vessel, the spouts being turned inwards and the
spires outwards. With all possible respect to Mr. Holmes, I venture
to demur to this interpretation. The fusion of elements which are
essentially isolated is rare amongst primitive peoples; it is difficult
to imagine how they could conceive of the structural union and fusion
of four conch shells. This is very different from the amalgamation
of the clay imitations of such vessels as gourds or coco-nuts, for
these are frequently fastened in pairs or in small groups to a common
string handle, and there is already the idea of multiplicity and the
apposition of the vessels. Again, Mr. Holmes does not present us with
any intermediate stages of this or similar clay vessels; until such
evidence is forthcoming it would be safer to regard this as an example
of transference. According to my interpretation, the rosette derived
from the spire of a conch shell was a pleasing motive, and it was
applied to and repeated upon a circular bowl, which may, as Mr. Holmes
elsewhere[111] suggests, be derived from the lower half of a gourd. A
single conch derivative would be entitled to one rosette only, and the
association of ideas would operate in favour of only one being moulded,
at all events until a very extreme stage of degeneration had been
attained; but in the case of transference there would be no continuity
of custom to control the potter, and consequently more scope could be
given to his fancy.
[111] W. H. Holmes, “Pottery of the Ancient Pueblos,” _Fourth
Annual Report Bureau of Ethnology_, p. 271.
A highly conventionalised form is shown in F (Fig. 109). The cup is
unsymmetrical in outline, and has a few imperfect bosses near one
corner, but its resemblance to a shell would hardly be recognised by
one unacquainted with more realistic renderings of similar subjects. In
G we have an imitation of a shell cup placed within a plain cup.
The skins, bladders, and stomachs of animals are very frequently
employed as water-carriers. The characteristic forms of these may often
be traced in the pottery of the same districts, odd details of form or
of surface marking usually persist to a surprising degree.
In Fiji and elsewhere the image of a turtle has been modelled in clay,
doubtless because the carapace is often used as a vessel.
While the use of an animal or the part of an animal as a vessel has
often led to the imitation of that animal in clay or other material,
owing to an association of ideas, we must be very careful not to run
to the extreme and to say that there was a primitively utilitarian
origin for all zoomorphic vessels. Sympathetic magic and religion are
responsible for many, and we must admit that mere fancy must sometimes
come into play, and when this is the case theorising is necessarily at
fault.