The decorations used by the Indian women were of the type common to unglazed wares. The clay was incised or embossed and natural earths were used as pigments. This accounts in great measure for the fitness which may be observed in aboriginal decoration. There is an absence of artificial coloring, nor is there any straining after effect, but instead there is shown a sober strength and a sane expression of values which would do credit to a modern designer.
America is fortunate in possessing abundant relics of primitive times but it cannot be doubted that in other lands similar work was done, making allowance, of course, for the characteristic variations in national traits. The potter's craft is of such a nature, using an omnipresent material and requiring the minimum of tools, that almost every nation on the globe has practiced it. In some it has never been developed beyond the narrow limits of the stone age, in others it has reached the utmost perfection of cultured skill.
For perfection of quality in crude pottery, no ware has ever surpassed that of Greece. It is not practicable here to deal with the numerous branches and sub-branches of Greek pottery; let it suffice for the present purpose to speak of only two main groups. In the first, the background of the decoration was supplied by the tint of the bare clay; in the second, this tint afforded the color of the decoration itself, the background being covered with a black pigment. To speak briefly these groups are known as black-figured and red-figured wares.
The wheel was early adopted by the Grecian potters as a means of producing form and although molds were sometimes used, the wheel was, to all intents and purposes, the sole method of manufacture. Greek pottery is once fired. Birch classes it as glazed terra cotta, but the glaze is nothing more than the black pigment with which the decoration is carried out. The uncolored part of the clay is not glazed but polished with a hard tool. Probably some famous potters employed assistants either to make the pieces or to decorate but it does not appear that there was any reproduction, at least, during the best period. At first primitive ideas prevailed. Geometric designs were succeeded by rhythmic friezes of beasts and birds done in black. When the human figure made its appearance the faces were all in profile with full-fronting eye while the prominent details of feature and drapery were scratched with a sharp point before burning.
The change of method to red on black gave much wider scope for the treatment of the human figure, rendered a fuller expression possible and enlarged the power of pictorial action. Great skill in drawing was manifested and details of both drapery and features were expressed with great care by means of the brush.
Such was the state of the art when the decadence set in and the work fell into the hands of plagiarists and charlatans. Meretricious coloring and gaudy ornament succeeded the refinement and restraint of the earlier days and so the art perished.
To the inventive power of the Romans the ceramic art owes more than one novelty. It would appear that the desideratum of the early days was a black ware. Homer in his hymn wrote:
"Pay me my price, potters, and I will sing.
Attend, O Pallas, and with lifted arm protect their ovens,
Let all their cups and sacred vessels blacken well
And baked with good success yield them
Both fair renown and profit."
The Greeks accomplished this blackening by means of a pigment, the Romans secured a similar result by a manipulation of the fire.