54 PECKED, GROUND AXD POLISHED STONE. 



gested, on account of their concave side-surfaces, that they were tools em- 

 ployed in pressing ornamental lines on clay vessels while yet in a soft state.. 

 Upon trial, however, it has been found that the imjjressions produced l)y them 

 on wet clay bear little analogy to the ornamentation which characterizes 

 North American vessels, and hence their real purpose remains problematical 

 for the present. 



Among the relics of the former i^opulation are rings of stone and bone of 

 different sizes, but similar in shape, being deeply grooved upon the outer edge, 

 and pierced with eight equidistant small holes radiating from the centre. A 

 east in the collection (Fig. 213) is the fac-simile of such a ring, which was 

 discovered in a mound not far from Chillicothe, Ohio. The cast, however, 

 represents the object as perfect, whereas the original, formerly belonging to 

 Dr. E. H. Davis, constitutes only one-haPf of the ring, which consists of a 

 dark stone of medium hardness. In a former publication^ the writer has 

 suggested that these rings once formed parts of bow-drills by means of which 

 the aborigines produced the perforations in pipes and other objects of stone. 

 A well-made ]iotstone ring of the collection (Fig. 214, Pennsylvania) is 

 grooved around the circumference, but not pierced with lateral holes. The 

 writer's view concerning the mode of application of these rings has been 

 somewhat shaken by the fact that there is in the Smithsonian collection a 

 similarly shaped ornamented ring of burned clay, which, owing to the fragility 

 of its material, hardly could have been utilized in the indicated manner. Yet 

 this clay ring, though resembling the described objects of stone, may have 

 been designed for a totally different piu-pose. 



20, Sculptures. — Though many of the objects treated in the preceding 

 portion of this account may be called sculptures in view of the mode of 

 their production, as for instance, stone pipes and other elaborately wrought 

 articles of the same material, the expression is" here reserved for a special class 

 of aboriginal relics, among which imitations of the human body, or parts of it, 

 are the most conspicuous. 



There are in the collection numerous casts of Mexican stone masks and 

 images, some of which probably have reference to the idol-worship of the 

 Aztecs. The so-called masks are not uncommon in the United States, and 

 casts of several of them may be seen in the collection, which also contains an 

 original of this class from Rhode Island, representing a human face very 

 rudely carved in sandstone. The eyes are represented by oval depressions, 

 and a simple groove constitutes the mouth, while the nose is indicated by 

 an insignificant elevation. The back part shows a rough fracture, a circum- 

 stance which renders it probable at least that the specimen is the detached 

 facial portion of a very roughly worked imitation of the human head. 



One of the most valuable objects in the ^N'ational Museum (Fig. 215) is a 



""Drilliug in Stone without Metal;" Smithsonian Report for 1SG8. 



