Color.—The prevailing color is a reddish gray, more or less blackened by use. A remarkable variety has a bright red surface, the mass being gray.
Ornamentation.—The ornamentation consists of cord and net impressions, incised lines, stamped figures, indented fillets, and life and fanciful forms modeled in relief.
The study of cord impressions is quite interesting. The cords are twisted and as large as medium twine. These cords appear to have
been disconnected, at least, not woven into a fabric, and the impressions are generally nearly vertical about the upper part of the vessel, but below take all positions, the result being a sort of hatching of the lines. This effect may be the result of placing the vessel upon a coarse fabric while the rim was being finished or the handles added.
It seems possible that a loose net of cords, probably with fine crossthreads, is used to suspend the vessel in during the process of modeling. It appears, however, if this has been the case, that the vessel has been taken out of this net before it was burned. Where handles have been added, it will be found that the cord markings have been destroyed by the touch of the fingers. But the body has impressions of the net made after the addition of the handles and ornaments, as the impressions appear on the outside or lower edges of these additions. The lower part of the body may still have been supported by the net during the process of drying; but as some vessels have no cord markings whatever, it is evident that it was not difficult to complete the vessel without the support of the net.
By making a clay impression of one of the fragments I have been able to determine the character of the fabric used. It was loosely woven and quite flexible, the clay often receiving finger impressions through it. It was probably made of grasses or the fibre of bark.
| Fig. 139. |
Beside the net and cord marks, which may or may not be the result of an attempt at ornament, there are ornaments made of fillets of clay. In a number of cases a comb-like figure made of thin fillets has been added to the shoulder of a vase. In other cases a fillet has been carried around the neck of the vase and indented by the finger or an implement.
The rim of one bowl has been ornamented with three deeply incised or excavated lines, which form a sort of embattled figure about the incurved lip. Another has a series of shallow, vertical, incised lines near the rim, and a circle of annular indentations, three-eighths of an inch in diameter, about one-fourth of an inch from the lip.