Fig. 223.—Indented pattern.
Fig. 224.—Nail indentions.
These curious decorative effects were still further elaborated by diversifying the character of the indentations of the coil. In Fig. 224 we have a most successful effort in this direction. The fillets are alternately crimped and plain. The thumb, in pressing down the one, has been applied with such force that the nail has cut entirely through it, indenting the plain layer below and causing the two to coalesce. This specimen was obtained from the cañon of the Rio Mancos.
Certain districts are particularly rich in remains of this peculiar ware and furnish many examples of crimped ornament. The remarkable desert-like plateau lying north of the Grand Cañon of the Colorado contains many house and village sites. At intervals along the very brink of the great chasm we come upon heaps of stones and razed walls of houses about which are countless fragments of this ware. These are identical in nearly every character with the pottery of Saint George on the west, of the San Juan on the east, and of the Gila on the south. A few miles south of Kanab stands a little hill—an island in the creek bottom—which is literally covered with the ruins of an ancient village, and the great abundance of pottery fragments indicates that it was, for a long period, the home of cliff-dwelling peoples. In no other case have I found so complete an assortment of all the varieties of coil-ornamentation. All the forms already given are represented and a number of new ones are added.
Fig. 225 .—Wave-like indentions.
Fig. 226 .—Wave-like indentions.