ANCIENT PUEBLOS OF UPPER GILA EEGION. 



31 



A shallow mortar from Blue post office is made from tufa and has 

 convex sides. (Fig. 49.) The specimen is carefully finished both 

 inside and out, and on the exterior are 

 painted bands alternately red, yellow, and 

 black. Cat. No. 245907, U.S.N.M.; diam- 

 eter, 4^ inches; height, 2 inches. 



Another painted mortar (fig. 50) is 

 worked from soft broAvn tufa. The form 

 is angular, the sides forming a terrace de- 

 sign, painted in red. This mortar or dish 

 was found with ceremonial objects in a large room in the Spur Ranch 

 pueblo. (Cat. No. 231901, U.S.N.M. ; dimensions, 4|- inches square, 

 2^ inches high.) A stone tablet (fig. 51) was also found in this room. 



It is painted in alternate bands of red 

 and black, reminding one of the striped 

 bodies of the Hopi tihus. (Cat. No. 

 231900, U.S.N.M. ; size, 4^ inches long, 2 

 inches wide, and five-eighths inch thick.) 



Fig. 49.^Ceremonial painted 

 moetau from blue. 



Fig. 50. — Ceremonial paintkd 

 moktau feom spur ranch. 



PLAQUES. 



The rectangular slabs of fine-gray stone 

 with a shallow excavation on one face, 

 usually bordered with a simple design in parallel or divergent groov- 

 ings are peculiarly characteristic of the archeology of the Gila 

 Valley and are especially abundant in the ruins 

 on the fluAdal plains of the river. South of the 

 Gila, and in northern Mexico, to an extent not 

 yet determined, but probably throughout the 

 ethnic area of the Piman stock, these tablets 

 occur, while north of the Gila they extend spar- 

 ingly to the crest of the great breaks, beyond 

 which they do not pass. Occasionally they take 

 other forms, such as the bird form figured by Dr. 

 J. Walter FeAvkes.^ They are supposed to have 

 been connected with religious rites of the people, 

 and Doctor Fewkes has suggested that they were 

 originally painted with symbolic drawings and 

 that they may be analogous to the tablets of the 

 present Pueblo. Russell calls them magic tablets, 

 and secured two from a medicine man.- 



One of these tablets was found at Spur Ranch, Luna, New Mexico. 

 It is cut from gray fine-grained stone ; the form is that of an oblong 



1 Two Summers' Work in Pueblo Ruins. 22d Ann. Rept. Bur. Amer. Ethnology, pp. 

 185-6. 



2 The Pima Indians. 26th Ann. Rept. Bur, Amer. Ethnology, p. 112. 



Fig. 51. — Painted stone 

 slab from spur ranch. 



