Thus in the case of the stratified mounds, we well know, if the strata are entire, that whatever deposits are found beneath them were placed there at the period of the construction of the mounds themselves. On the other hand, if they are broken up, it follows with equal certainty that the mound in which the disturbance is observed, has been invaded since its erection.
It will therefore be seen that we have some certain means of determining, aside from the distinctive features of the articles themselves, which of the relics discovered p187 in the mounds pertain to their builders, and which are of a later date. Hence results the importance of knowing the history of those relics which may fall under notice, and the circumstances attending their discovery, in order to feel authorized in drawing conclusions from them. Their true position satisfactorily ascertained, we proceed with confidence to comparisons and deductions, which otherwise, however ingenious and accurate they might appear, would necessarily be invested with painful uncertainty. From want of proper care in this respect, there is no doubt that articles of European origin, which, by a very natural train of events, found their way to the mounds, have been made the basis of speculations concerning the arts of the mound-builders. To this cause we may refer the existence of the popular errors, that the ancient people were acquainted with the uses of iron, and understood the arts of plating, gilding, etc.
Hence, too, the value of systematic investigations, conducted on the spot, if we would aim to throw any certain light upon this branch of inquiry, or do more than excite an ignorant wonder or gratify an idle curiosity.
The general character of this class of remains has already been indicated. They are such only as, from the nature of their material, have been able to resist the general course of decay:—articles of pottery, bone, ivory, shell, stone, and metal. We can, of course, expect to find no traces of instruments or utensils of wood, and but few and doubtful ones at best, of the materials which went to compose articles of dress. Such remains as are found, so far as their purposes are apparent, are classified; the remainder are so arranged as best to facilitate description.
POTTERY AND ARTICLES OF CLAY.
The art of the potter is hoary in its antiquity. It seems to have been the first domestic art practised by man, and the worker in clay may be esteemed the primitive artisan. Go where we will, from the hut of the roving Indian to the palace of the civilized prince, we everywhere find the products of his craft, rude and unpolished from the hand of the savage, or rivalling the marble from the manufactories of Wedgwood and Copeland.
The site of every Indian town throughout the West is marked by the fragments of pottery scattered around it; and the cemeteries of the various tribes abound with rude vessels of clay, piously deposited with the dead. Previous to the advent of Europeans, the art of the potter was much more important and its practice more general, than it afterwards became upon the introduction of metallic vessels. The mode of preparing and moulding the material is minutely described by the early observers, and seems to have been common to all the tribes, and not to have varied materially from that day to this. The work devolved almost exclusively upon the women, who kneaded the clay and formed the vessels. p188 Experience seems to have suggested the means of so tempering the material as to resist the action of fire; accordingly we find pounded shells, quartz, and sometimes simple coarse sand from the streams, mixed with the clay. None of the pottery of the present races, found in the Ohio valley, is destitute of this feature; and it is not uncommon, in certain localities, where from the abundance of fragments, and from other circumstances, it is supposed the manufacture was specially carried on, to find quantities of the decayed shells of the fresh-water molluscs intermixed with the earth, which were probably brought to the spot to be used in the process. Among the Indians along the Gulf, a greater degree of skill was displayed than with those on the upper waters of the Mississippi and on the lakes. Their vessels were generally larger and more symmetrical, and of a superior finish. They moulded them over gourds and other models, and baked them in ovens. In the construction of those of large size, it was customary to model them in baskets of willow or splints, which, at the proper period, were burned off, leaving the vessel perfect in form, and retaining the somewhat ornamental markings of their moulds. Some of those found on the Ohio seem to have been modelled in bags or nettings of coarse thread or twisted bark. These practices are still retained by some of the remote western tribes. Of this description of pottery many specimens are found with the recent deposits in the mounds. They are identical in every respect with those taken from the known burial-grounds of the Indians; and though generally of rude workmanship, they are not destitute of a certain symmetry of shape and proportion.
Among the mound-builders the art of pottery attained to a considerable degree of perfection. Various though not abundant specimens of their skill have been recovered, which, in elegance of model, delicacy, and finish, as also in fineness of material, come fully up to the best Peruvian specimens, to which they bear, in many respects, a close resemblance. They far exceed anything of which the existing tribes of Indians are known to have been capable. It is to be regretted that none of these remains have been recovered entire in the course of our investigations: they have been found only in the altar or sacrificial mounds, and always in fragments. The largest deposit was found in the long mound, No. 3, “Mound City,” (see page [149],) from which were taken fragments enough to have originally composed a dozen vessels of medium size. By the exercise of great care and patience in collecting and arranging the pieces, a few vessels have been very nearly restored,—so nearly, as not only to show with all desirable accuracy their shape, but also the character of their ornaments. They exhibit a variety of graceful forms.
The material of which they are composed is a fine clay; which, in the more delicate specimens, appears to have been worked nearly pure, possessing a very slight silicious intermixture. Some of the coarser specimens, though much superior in model, have something of the character of the Indian ware already described, pulverized quartz being intermixed with the clay. Others are tempered with a salmon-colored mica in small flakes, which gives them a ruddy and rather brilliant appearance, and was perhaps introduced with some view to ornament as well as p189 utility.[124] None appear to have been glazed; although one or two, either from baking or the subsequent great heat to which they were subjected, exhibit a slightly vitrified surface. Their excellent finish seems to have been the result of the same process with that adopted by the Peruvians in their fictile manufactures.
