TYPE EXAMPLES IN THE NATIONAL COLLECTION 95 



Amazon have earthenware vessels witli perforated bottom. Moore 

 figures two vessels from Louisiana, each provided with free-standing 

 hollow feet which are connected with the body of the vessel by 

 means of " several small holes drilled through the vessel at each 

 of the points of union with the legs to enable the latter to serve as 

 receptacles for liquid, in conjunction with the body of the bottle." 



Stove censers used by the Tule of the San Bias coast of Darien 

 shaped from a dark-brown tenacious clay partly by modeling and 

 partly by coiling have annular feet. Extending upward from the 

 outer circular edge of the foot are several lateral supports separated 

 from each other by seven orifices. This septuple stove base is cov- 

 ered over with a slab which also serves as the bottom piece for the 

 compartment above. Piercing the bottom of the compartment just 

 outside the place of juncture of the seven lateral base supports and 

 placed equidistant are nine draft holes with an average diameter 

 of 1 centimeter. According to Tule informants these perforations 

 are used as draft holes in connection with the burning of the cacao 

 bean incense or when the upper compartment is used as a brazier. 

 In short the perforate bottom device appears to be coextensive with 

 the pottery area on the Western Hemisphere. 



Pottery pestles. — Dr. J. W. Fewkes classifies the stone pestles of 

 the Greater Antilles, according to their component parts, as grind- 

 ing surface, termed "the lens"; the handle; the ferrule; and the 

 head. The stone pestles from Samana have no decorative figurine 

 head, and in other respects resemble the stone pestles of the Caribs 

 of the Lesser Antilles. Two other kinds of pestles were found by 

 the Museum expedition in Samana; one of shell, U.S.N.M. No. 

 341004, the other of earthenware, U.S.N.M. No. 341022. Only the 

 lens and a section of the handle of the latter were recovered. The 

 lens is developed somewhat in the form of a door knob, while the 

 handle shaft is narrow. It is broken off 2.2 inches (5.5 centimeters) 

 above the base. The diameter of the lens at the base is 2.4 inches 

 (6 centimeters). The base is smooth and shows no evidence of use 

 as a triturating or grinding pestle. The paste of which the pestle 

 fragment is shaped has been tempered with bits of shell, stone, and 

 sand. The handle shaft does not project from the exact center 

 of the lens and so betrays a crudity in free-hand molding. Most 

 pestles from Santo Domingo have a well-developed lens, whether 

 the media be stone, shell, or earthenware. The aborigines of Samana 

 probably used the earthenware pestle as a cassava, food, or pigment 

 grinder. Although fashioned of nondurable material, the earthen- 

 ware pestles are much larger than the pestles of carved shell. 

 Several earthenware pestles were collected from Constanza middens 

 in 1930. 



