A Study of Pueblo Pottery as Illustrative of Zuñi Culture Growth | Page 9

yet the Oraibes, by descent the modern representatives of the _A′ wat u i ans_ are the poorest potters and painters among the Mokis. Near their pueblo the clay and other mineral deposits mentioned as abundant at _A′ wat u i_ are meager and inaccessible. Still, it may be urged that time may have introduced other than natural causes for change; this could not be said of another example pertaining to one period and a single tribe. I refer again to the Zu?is. The manufactures of Pescado probably surpass in decorative excellence all other modern Pueblo pottery, while both in their lack of variety and in delicacy of execution of their painted patterns the fictiles of Ojo Caliente are so inferior and diverse from the other Zu?i work that the future arch?ologist will have need to beware, or (judging alone from the ceramic remains which he finds at the two pueblos) he will attribute them at least to distinct periods, perhaps to diverse peoples.
POTTERY INFLUENCED BY MATERIALS AND METHODS USED IN BURNING.
Other influences, to a less extent local, had no inconsiderable effect on primitive Pueblo pottery: materials employed and methods resorted to in burning.
Only one kind of fuel, except for a single class of vessels, is now used in pottery-firing; namely, dried cakes or slabs of sheep-dung. Anciently, several varieties, such as extremely dry sage-brush or grease-wood, pi?on and other resinous woods, dung of herbivora when obtainable, charcoal, and also bituminous or cannel-coal were employed. The principal agent seems, however, to have been dead-wood or spunk, pulverized and moistened with some adhesive mixture so that flat cakes could be formed of it. I infer this not alone from Zu?i tradition, which is not ample, but from the fact that the sheep-dung now used is called, in the condition of fuel, _kú ne a_, while its name in the abstract or as sheep-dung simply is _má he_. Dry-rot wood or spunk is known as _kú me_. In the shape of flat cakes it would be termed _kú mo we_ or _kú me a_, whence I doubt not the modern word _kú ne a_ is derived.
Of methods, four were in vogue. The simplest and worst consisted in burying the vessel to be burned under hot ashes and building a fire around it, or inverting it over a bed of embers and encircling it with a blazing fire of brush-wood, as is still the practice of the Maricopas and other sedentary tribes of the Gila. The most common was building a little cone or dome of fuel over the articles to be baked and firing; the most perfect was to dig or construct under ground a little cist or kiln, line it evenly with fuel, leaving a central space for the green ware, and slowly fire the whole mass.
Irrespective of the kind of fuel used, the baking by ash-burial made the ware gray, cloudy, or dingy, and not very durable. Pottery burned with sage or grease-wood was firm, light gray unless of ocherous clay, less cloudy than if ash-baked, yet mottled. Turf and dung, although easily managed, did not thoroughly harden the pottery, but burned it very evenly; dead wood or spunk-cakes baked as evenly as any of the materials thus far mentioned, and more thoroughly than the others. Resinous or pitchy woods, while they produced a much higher degree of heat, could be used only when color was unimportant, as they still are used to some extent in the firing of black-ware or cooking pots. The latter, while still hot from a preliminary burning, if coated externally with the mucilaginous juice of green cactus, internally with pi?on gum or pitch, and fired a second or even a third time with resinous wood-fuel, are rendered absolutely fire-proof, semi-glazed with a black gloss inside, and wonderfully durable. Tradition represents that by far the most perfect fuel was found to be cannel coal, and that, where abundant, accessible, and of an extremely bituminous quality, it was much used. The traces of little pit-kilns filled with, cinders of mineral coal about many of the ruins in the northwestern portion of the Pueblo region, coupled with the semi-fusion and well-preserved condition of most of the ancient jars found associated with them, certainly give support to this tradition. Happily I have additional confirmation. When, two years ago, I was engaged in making ethnologic collections at Moki for the United States National Museum, some Indians of the Te wa pueblo brought me a quantity of pottery. It had been made with the purpose of deceiving me, in careful imitation of ancient types, and was certainly equal to the latter in lightness and the condition of the burning. I paid these enterprising Indians as good a price as they had been accustomed to getting for genuine ancient specimens, but told