A similar reptile is pictured on the food bowl shown in [plate cxxxii], d, in which design, however, there are important modifications, the most striking of which are: (1) The animal ([figure 268]) has both fore and hind legs represented; (2) the head is round; (3) the mouth is provided with teeth; and (4) there are four instead of two feather appendages on the head, two of which are much longer than the others. Were it not that ears are not represented in reptiles, one would be tempted to regard the smaller appendages as representations of these organs. Their similarity to the row of spines on the back and the existence of spines on the head of the "horned toad" suggests this reptile, with which both ancient and modern Hopi are very familiar. On a fragment of a vessel found at Awatobi there is depicted the head of a reptile evidently identical with this, since the drawing is an almost perfect reproduction. There is a like figure, also from Sikyatki, in the collection of pottery made at that ruin by Dr Miller, of Prescott, the year following my work there. The most elaborate of all the pictures of reptiles found on ancient Tusayan pottery is shown in [plate cxxxii], e, in which the symbolism is complicated and the details carefully worked out. A few of these symbols I am able to decipher; others elude present analysis. There is no doubt as to the meaning of the appendage to the head ([figure 269]), for it well portrays an elaborate feathered headdress on which the markings that distinguish tail-feathers, three in number, are prominent. The extension of the snout is without homologue elsewhere in Hopi pictography, and, while decorative in part, is likewise highly conventionalized. On the body semicircular rain cloud symbols and markings similar to those of the bodies of certain birds are distinguishable. The feet likewise are more avian than reptilian, but of a form quite unusual in structure. It is interesting to note the similarity in the carved line with six sets of parallel bars to the band surrounding the figure of the human hand shown in [plate cxxxvii], c. In attempting to identify the pictograph on the bowl reproduced in [plate cxxxiv], a, there is little to guide me, and the nearest I can come to its significance is to ascribe it to a reptile of some kind. Highly symbolic, greatly conventionalized as this figure is, there is practically nothing on which to base the absolute identification of the figure save the serrated appendage to the body and the leg, which resembles that of the lizard as it is sometimes drawn. The two eyes indicate that the enlargement in which these were placed is the head, and the extended curved snout a beak. All else is incomprehensible to me, and my identification is therefore provisional and largely speculative.
Fig. 269—Unknown reptile
I wish, however, in leaving the description of this beautiful bowl, to invite attention to the brilliancy and the characteristics of the coloring, which differ from the majority of the decorated ware from Sikyatki.
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY—— SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. CXXXII
FOOD BOWLS WITH FIGURES OF REPTILES FROM SIKYATKI
