'PIIK PAlNTlN(i OK HITMAN 1U)NF-S AM()N(! TlfK INDIANS. AIT) 



iiiv imcnillu'd ('io;ht to fourlocn days after l)in-ial. The hones are 

 ihorouiilily cU^aiuMl." '' Tlioy Aveiv l)rou^h( and. all [)ai'ts of the 

 skelelon were, before our eyes, ])ainted red. They began with the 

 skull. The whole was appai-eutly a uiode of decoration." 'The 

 painted skull was additionally pasted over with red feathers. All 

 the l)one>. >kull included, wcw placed in a baskt't, which served 

 for the final interment and which also received a coat of red, being 

 hi addition well covered with red feathers. The red pigment was 

 a veactable substance obtained from a cei'tain seed." 



I have thu^ fai" found no historical evidence of bone painting 

 in I*eru. TIkm-c is no exampl(> of it among the over i2()0 Peru.vian 

 skulls in the National Museum. Among more than 500 ancient 

 Peru\ ian craiiia of the Bandelier collection in the American Museum 

 there is but one that shows distinct red stains, bnt these seem to be 

 more accidental than otherwise. I^nt in the more recent Gaffron 

 collection in that nniscMun there is a male adult sknll, from the neigh- 

 !)orho()d (d' Cu/.co (No. '.)i)-;5()82) , which shows ovei- large i)ortions of 

 its surface a lii'm pink incrustation, in all probability the remnant of 

 intentionally apj)lied paint. Acc(n-ding to Vj. Kranse there is in the 

 Keifs-Stiibel collection of crania from Ancon. Peru, one of which the 

 face is covered with '" zinnol)er." " 



The i)ainting of designs on human skulls on this continent requires 

 but few words. I have seen orily live specimens of this sort and 

 found no mention of others. Four of the crania, one from Cali- 

 fornia, two A\'asco from the Columbia Iviver, and one from the Santa 

 Cruz Island, (^difornia, are in the National Museum, and one found 

 l)y Mr. II. I. Smith at Tytton. I'nitish Columbia, is in the American 

 Museum of Natural History. The design on all but the Santa Cruz 

 Island s])ecimen consists of red, or in one of the AVasco skulls red 

 and blue, cross made in very nnich the same manner (see fig. 2, 

 pi. Ji). It is in all probability a i-ecent work of some of the Chris- 

 tianized Indians. The Santa Cruz Island skull shows a partly 

 faded, apparently ancient design, in black, above and under the orbits 

 and on the maxilhe (see fig. '2, \)\. \). A human skull, the vault 

 of which has been cut off, while the renuiinder was painted Avith 

 brown sti'eaks and fitted into a stringed nuisical instrument, is pre- 

 served in the Metropolitan INIuseum of Art, Xew York, and was 

 supposed to l)e of south American origin, but it came in all proba- 

 bility from Africa. 



TIIK SKiNlFTCANCi: OF BONK I'AINTIN*; AMONO INDIANS. 



Bone painting among the American aborigines is most i)robably 

 a development of the custom of painting the corpse, just as the 

 latter is an extension of the custom of painting the living. Paint, 



"Ololms. in Dec. 1901. j). .'^C.l : Verliandl. Berl. .\ntliv. Oes.. :«). 28" 



