Antiquities of the Mesa Verde National Park

by Jesse Walter Fewkes

Structure

Classified by structure, the pottery found in the Spruce-tree House ruin falls into two groups, coiled ware and smooth ware, the latter either with or without decoration. The white ware has black decorations.

Fig. 5. Handle of mug.

The bases of the mugs ([pl. 19]) from Spruce-tree House, like those from other Mesa Verde ruins, have a greater diameter than the lips. These mugs are tall and their handles are of generous size. One of the mugs found in this ruin has a T-shaped hole in its handle (fig. 5), recalling in this particular a mug collected in 1895 by the author at Awatobi, a Hopi ruin.

The most beautiful specimen of canteen found at Spruce-tree House is here shown in [plate 20].

The coiled ware of Spruce-tree House, as of all the Mesa Verde ruins, is somewhat finer than the coiled ware of Sikyatki. Although no complete specimen was found, many fragments were collected, some of which are of great size. This kind of ware was apparently the most abundant and also the most fragile. As a rule these vessels show marks of fire, soot, or smoke on the outside, and were evidently used as cooking vessels. On account of their fragile character they could not have been used for carrying water, for, with one or two exceptions, they would not be equal to the strain. In decoration of coiled ware the women of Spruce-tree House resorted to an ingenious modification of the coils, making triangular figures, spirals, or crosses in relief, which were usually affixed to the necks of the vessels.

The symbolism on the pottery of Spruce-tree House is essentially that of a cliff-dwelling culture, being simple in general characters. Although it has many affinities with the archaic symbols of the Pueblos, it has not the same complexity. The reason for this can be readily traced to that same environmental influence which caused the communities to seek the cliffs for protection. The very isolation of the Mesa Verde cliff-dwellings prevented the influx of new ideas and consequently the adoption of new symbols to represent them. Secure in their cliffs, the inhabitants were not subject to the invasion of strange clans nor could new customs be introduced, so that conservatism ruled their art as well as their life in general. Only simple symbols were present because there was no outside stimulus or competition to make them complex.

On classification of Spruce-tree House pottery according to technique, irrespective of its form, two divisions appear: (1) Coiled ware showing the coils externally, and (2) smooth ware with or without decorations. Structurally both divisions are the same, although their outward appearance is different.

The smooth ware may be decorated with incised lines or pits, but is painted often in one color. All the decorated vessels obtained by the author at Spruce-tree House belong to what is called black-and-white ware, by which is meant pottery having a thin white slip covering the whole surface upon which black pictures are painted. Occasionally fragments of a reddish brown cup were found, while red ware bearing white decorative figures was recovered from the Mesa Verde; but none of these are ascribed to Spruce-tree House or were collected by the author. The general geographical distribution of this black-and-white ware, not taking into account sporadic examples, is about the same as that of the circular kivas, but it is also found where circular kivas are unknown, as in the upper part of the valley of the Little Colorado.