Making Pottery
All this time Gofa kept turning the pot she was making round and round upon the stone.
“Why do you keep on turning it round and round, mother?” Tig asked.
“So that I can see what I am doing,” said his mother. “The pot would be very ugly if one side bulged out more than the other, wouldn’t it? I turn it round and round so that I can keep it even and right.”
“Who taught you how to make pots, mother?” Tig asked.
“My mother taught me. She was a famous potter. People used to come to watch her when she was at work, but they could not make pots like hers; she had a rare hand in turning. I cannot turn them as she could.”
“I think you turn yours beautifully, mother,” said Tig.
All the pots alike, before they were baked, had to be decorated. This Gofa did with a bone awl, engraving a pattern of lines and cross-lines and dots upon the soft clay. She had also a little stamp of bone with which the dots could be put on in threes.