ART. 7 ELDEN PUEBLO POTTERY DESIGNS — HOUGH 7 



Red ware at Elden Pueblo in recovered specimens is scanty. The 

 per cent of red fragments in the debris is not indicated, but it seems 

 probable that the proportion of red ware to the gray is in line with 

 its occurrence in typical gray-ware sites. 



Red ware is primarily a gray-ware body washed with ocher and 

 represents the first application of surface color in the Pueblo 

 region. An inferior paste was used, producing fragile vessels usually 

 faring badly in bvirial offerings or in chance occurrences in debris. 

 The true proportion of red to other wares, therefore, is not found 

 in the recovered ceramics. A rough estimate of the proportion may 

 be arrived at by making a percentage count of shards in the debris, 

 and it is recommended that this method be followed. 



Of the few pieces of red ware from the Elden Pueblo collection, 

 there is selected for description a bowl of Proto-Kayenta type 

 decorated in red stripes outlined in black on a buff base, the designs 

 simple and conforming to the quadrant arrangement. (PL 9, fig. 2.) 

 As only a few examples w^ere found, and as there was an absence 

 of similar shards in the village debris, it appears likely that this 

 pottery came directly from the Kayenta art focus. Another well- 

 preserved bowl of rather thick ware was probably of ceremonial 

 importance. The interior is decorated in black with a band of 

 terraced figures arranged between series of five parallel lines as in 

 the band class. On the exterior are white horizontal lines, and eight 

 representations of human hands in white between two ribbons of 

 white. On the bottom ring of the bowl is a circle of miniature 

 hands, bird tracks, and other figures now obscured by rubbing. (PI. 

 9, fig. 3.) Since occasionally specimens of this description are found 

 in the Little Colorado area, they appear to show southern influence 

 on the San Juan red ware. 



Another variety of red ware has a deep-red interior decorated 

 with black outlined with white. The exterior is dark-yellow ocher 

 with a band of red washed on roughly. The paste is homogeneous 

 and granulated with small quartz pebbles. This class of red ware 

 is widely distributed, occurring in quantity in the Little Colorado 

 region and south of the escarpment on the streams of the Gila- Salt 

 drainage. 



A small, thin wall bowl of dark-red ware with design in narrow 

 lines may be regarded as another variety closer to the southern than 

 to the northern type. The paste of this and of specimens from the 

 Little Colorado Valley, found usually in small house sites, is so 

 perishable that the damp vessels can rarely be removed entire from 

 the ground. 



A second bowl of this character has a gradined background out- 

 lying a swastika figure built on the prolonged sides of a square. 



