TYPE EXAMPLES IN" THE NATIONAL COLLECTION 93 



broken and lost. The Constanza type appears to be the same kind 

 of water bottle as from eastern Santo Domingo, that is, undecorated 

 except for the bilaterally placed figurine heads appearing on bulbous 

 neck sector. Some of these heads are quite elaborate in the con- 

 ventional art displayed, particularly those of the so-called " monkey- 

 face " type, that is, a figurine with projecting snout region and de- 

 pressed middle part of the head. One example of an effigy canteen 

 where the head of the canteen is also the head of the animal figurine 

 and the bulbous neck area has been molded to represent the body is 

 of characteristic monkey-face type with projecting snout region. 

 (PI. 55.) 



Conventionalized art has proceeded to such length in West Indian 

 ceramics that, as stated, it is frequently impossible to determine 

 whether a bird form or an animal form is intended. Diagonal curved 

 lines appearing at the sides might well be interpreted as represent- 

 ing ribs or wing feathers. Raised ribbons of clay at the back might 

 similarly be interpreted as representing either vertebrae of some 

 mammal, such as the monkey, or a color pattern in feathers. All of 

 the decorated water bottle necks are unmistakably Arawakan in that 

 wherever it is conventionally possible the primitive artist has intro- 

 duced etched lines with terminal punctations alternating with raised 

 knobs of clay. 



Paints and slips are fairly common on water bottles. This was 

 first noted in a series recovered from kitchen middens at San Juan 

 on the northern coast of Samana Peninsula in 1928. Along with the 

 application of different colored slips and paints it was noted in 1929 

 at Monte Cristi, during excavations at a site in the Silla de Caballo 

 Mountains, that gray ware was preferred in the making of water 

 bottles. A white slip of kaolin was frequently applied. Clay for 

 making these superior vessels of gray ware must be obtained at a 

 greater depth than that of the ordinary clay which forms the terra 

 cotta or biscuit ware. A characteristic Antillean decoration found 

 rarely on water bottles in Santo Domingo is the realistic figure of a 

 frog occupying the entire neck and head of the bottle. (Pis. 7, 11, 55.) 

 Of all the animal forms attempted by the Arawak artist the frog 

 figure is the most successful, at any rate it is the most realistic. 

 There is never any mistake as to the intent. 



Vases and censers. — A lobate vase with bottle-shaped neck and flat 

 base, U.S.N.M. No. 316445 (pi. 43), from the Cueva de Roma, col- 

 lected by Dr. W. L. Abbott, is 8% inches high, has unusually thick 

 walls of a consistency approaching stoneware, but has typical Tainan 

 decorative designs of concentrically incised circles and central pit in- 

 scribing a panel just above the shoulder ridge and below the con- 

 stricted neck. Bilaterally placed conventionalized figurine heads in 

 54291—31 7 



