Fig. 261.—Painted device.
The handsome shallow bowl presented in Fig. 260 has been badly broken and carefully mended while still in the hands of its aboriginal owners. It is ten and one-half inches in diameter, and only three and three-fourths inches in depth. The surface finish is identical with that of the preceding example. The design, which consists of a single segment of a chain of fret-work, is drawn in broad, steady lines. Fig. 261.
Not unlike the last in its leading features is the vessel illustrated in Fig. 262. The label indicates that it was collected at Kanab, Utah, a Mormon village ninety miles east of Saint George. The design is carried over the whole inner surface, and is somewhat difficult to analyze. There is little doubt, however, that it consists of portions of fretted or meandered patterns arbitrarily selected from basketry or other geometrically embellished articles, and applied to this use. The complete device is shown in Fig. 263.
Fig. 262.—Bowl from Kanab.—1/4.
The following examples are unique in their styles of decoration. The first, Fig. 264, resembles the preceding save in its painted device. Like a few others, it has been badly fractured and carefully mended by its Indian owners. It was obtained also at Kanab, and is nine inches in diameter by four and one-half in height. The design is cruciform in arrangement, the four parts being joined in pairs by connecting lines. It exhibits some very unusual features (Fig. 265), and we are led to suspect that it may in some way have been significant, or at least that it is a copy of some emblematic device.
Fig. 263.—Painted device.
The almost total absence of life forms in the art of the primitive Pueblos has often been remarked. One example only has been discovered in this region. This occurs in a subject painted on the inner surface of a rather rude, oblong, bowl, from the Saint George tumulus, Fig. 266. A checkered belt in black extends longitudinally across the bowl. At the sides of this, near the middle, are two human figures, executed in the most primitive style, as shown in Fig. 267. Their angular forms are indicative of textile influence. The middle part of the bowl is broken out, so that the feet of one figure and the head of the other are lost.