378 



REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1897. 



Fig. 6. 



ANCIENT rOEBLO POTTERY PIPE. 



Sikyatki, Arizona. 



Cat. No. l.-illLW, U.S.N.M. Collected by Dr. .7. Walter Fewke, 



of reed, wliicli were worn on one arm, while little pieces of deer bone 

 used for scraping ott" the sweat were worn upon the other.' 



Prescott refers to "pipes of tortoise shell and silver, containing 

 tobacco mixed with aromatic substances, which were offered to the 

 company by the Mexicans, whom, he says, compressed the nostrils while 

 they inhaled the smoke," ^ showing that its purjiose was to stupify the 

 smoker. Dr. Fewkes, excavating during the summer of 1895 at the 

 ruins of Sikyatki, in northeastern Arizona, found several tubes or pipes 



much resembling cigarette hold- 

 ers, and as the excavations here 

 showed that only a primitive 

 condition existed at the time of 

 the abandonment of the town or 

 pueblo, the i)resumption is in 

 favor of its antiquity, and may 

 reasonably be considered pre- 

 Columbian. These tnbes, which 

 were straight, though the bowl 

 was much larger than the stem, were made both of stone and of pottery. 

 Fig. G is a pottery specimen, which might well answer the description 

 of one of Montezuma's varnished pipes, referred to by Prescott. It is 

 2h inches long and about three-fourths of an inch wide across the 

 mouthpiece. The clay from which this pipe was made was finely pul 

 verized, and so far as can be seen contains no ground shell or sand, 

 sucli as is usually found in aboriginal pottery, and which was supposed 

 to be intended as a tempering, to 

 prevent cracking in drying or 

 heating. On each of the ends of 

 this specimen, for a distance of 

 one-half an inch, there is a per- 

 fectly smooth and dark brown, 

 almost black, glazed surface. The 

 raised portion of this tube gives 

 the effect of a jacket shrunken 

 on, which is covered by a series 



of closely incised lines, forming a band, as though made by wrapping 

 a thread on the clay while it was in the plastic condition. This pipe 

 might well be taken for varnished wood by anyone not familiar with 

 the material. 



Fig. 7 is also a i^ottery tube from Sikyatki, of ])inkish red color, quite 

 symmetrical in shape, the type of which is not dissimilar to like objects 

 found as far north as the State of Ohio. The type is common throughout 

 the whole pueblo region. The specimen figured has a dull glazed surface, 

 without polish, and similar thread marks to those referred to on fig. 6. 



' Hernando Alarcon, Relation de la Navigation et de la Dcconverte, p. 307, Pari.s,1838. 

 ■^History of the Couciuest of Mexico, I, p. l.")3, Philadelphia, 1860. 



Fig. 7. 



ANCIENT PUEBLO POTTERY PIPE. 



Sikyatki, Arizona. 



Cat. No. IfiSlan, U.S.N.M. Collected by Dr. .). Walti- 



