442 FEWKES: PREHISTORIC CULTURAL CENTERS 



necting islands they would seem to shed light on the earliest 

 migrations of West Indian aborigines. Unfortunately, however, 

 the objects manufactured by all primitive people in this stage 

 are so crude that they are not distinctive; there is often a paral- 

 lelism in their work. For example, pottery from widely sepa- 

 rated regions often bears identical symbols, even where the 

 people who manufactured it have had no cultural connection. 

 Consequently, although we find certain common features in 

 decorated coastal pottery of Florida and that of Porto Rico, 

 this similarity implies rather than proves cultural contact. 



The highest prehistoric culture attained in the West Indies 

 was an agricultural one. It was based on the cultivation of 

 the yuca {Manihot manihot), a poisonous root out of which 

 was prepared a meal, from which the so-called cassava bread 

 was made. At the time of the discovery the cultivation of this 

 plant had attained its greatest development and so completely 

 had it developed that Porto Rico and Hayti are said to have been 

 practically covered with farms of this plant. In fact, when sorely 

 pressed by the Spaniards to furnish them gold for tribute one of 

 the caciques offered to cultivate, for the conquerors, a yuca farm 

 extending across the island of Hayti. Both Porto Rico and 

 Hayti appear to have been densely populated, and the failure 

 of the population to advance into a higher stage of development 

 was limited by the perishable character of the root or food plant 

 cultivated. Corn and other cereals'' were not extensively used 

 and there was no domesticated animal. It is evident that this 

 culture was built on a root food supply which was clearly a prod- 

 uct of environment, and on account of this dependence merits 

 careful study by the culture historian and anthropo-geographer. 



The development of this culture varies on different islands 

 or groups of islands, forming cultural centers of which the fol- 

 lowing can be recognized by the character of the pottery: (1) 



^ Corn {Zea mays) was introduced into the West Indies as a food plant shortly 

 before the advent of the Spaniards. If sufficient time had elapsed it would 

 have rep'aced this unique form of cultural development based on root agriculture, 

 unless as in the Lesser Antilles it had been destroyed by Caribs who were pressing 

 in upon it with uch force that it could no' survive. 



