120 BULLETIN- 15G, UNITED STATES NATIONAIi MUSEUM 



In examples of earthenware from the Floridian northwest coast 

 appear isolated crosses incised on the rim sector or on projecting 

 wen or handle knob. This feature, in decorative embellishment, ap- 

 pears in identical form on handle lug, knobbed excrescence, or rim 

 sector in Santo Domingan vessels from the north coast. 



Alabama River pottery has a decorative design consisting of over 

 and under passes of series of curvilinear lines; punctated designs; 

 urn burial in capped vessels; alternate panels of diagonal incised 

 lines and punctations ; also water bottles with cylindrical neck. Santo 

 Domingo earthenware shares these traits of design and form. 



Along with the several elaborate designs found in the Moundville 

 pottery, such as scrolled figures and incised designs, a conventionally 

 incised serpent form, and incised bird designs, appear effigy vases 

 identical with Porto Rican and Santo Domingan aboriginal forms. 



Owl designs in form of a triangular modeled figure and appear- 

 ing as a handle to a vessel with eye forms represented by two con- 

 centric incised circles appear alike on Floridian northwest coast 

 pottery and on Santo Domingan vessels. 



CHARACTERIZATION OF DIVERGENT POTTERY GROUPS IN THE 



ANTILLES 



Aboriginal pottery of the Bahamas. — In describing Arawak pot- 

 tery from Caicos Island, in the Bahamas, De Boo}'^ ^"^ refers to the 

 over and under trailed decorative patterns in flat relief, resembling a 

 linked cross, or swastika design, a decorative embellishment of rare 

 occurrence in Santo Domingo. A similar pattern appears on a clay 

 stamp from a Franklin Countj'^ (Fla.) mound, also on Alabama River 

 pottery in series of curvilinear over and under passes. The pattern 

 also appears as an element of textile design from South America, and 

 as a painted decorative pattern passing over and under like the links 

 of a chain on earthenware from Curasao. The same linked " swas- 

 tika " design is current in the European Balkans, also on the Nigerian 

 coast of West Africa. This link pattern, however, has not been ob- 

 served in aboriginal forms of the cross incised on aboriginal Santo 

 Domingan pottery, therefore exemplifying one of several distinc- 

 tions that might be drawn between ancient Lucayan or Bahaman 

 decorative designs and those from the island of Santo Domingo. 



The classic example of identity of incised design in the contiguous 

 Bahaman and Floridian areas (pi. 4), first mentioned by Holmes," 

 and generally accepted as evidence of direct culture contact within 

 the two areas, is after all an elementary conventionalization of a life 



*" Booy, Theodoor de, Lucayan Remains on the Caicos Island. 



" Holmes, W. H. Caribbean Influence in the Preliistoric Art of Southern States, Amer. 

 Antlirop, vol. 7, pp. 71-79, January, 1894. 



