LAUFER, THE DECORATIVE ART OF THE AMUR TRIBES. 65 



designed. Two opposite hearts divide the latter field. In the upper heart are 

 four semicircles used as supports for leaves ; the under heart shows a tree-trunk, 

 the top of which is adorned with an oval leaf ; while semicircles, crescents, and 

 ovals are represented as leaf-bearing boughs. The lateral fields are occupied y 

 fish-cocks with one head at the end of the fish-tail and two heads superposed 

 over the fish-head. In b two branches are carried out as bird-beaks, each holding 

 two leaves. There is a similar motive on the upper, smaller pockets, only there 

 a cruciform leaf-cluster appears between the two deflected beaks. 



On the border extending from the collar to the bottom of the woman s 

 embroidered silk dress seen in Fig. 2, Plate xxvn, the artist has pictured 

 single groups of facing spirals connected with conventionalized fishes, displaying 

 the enormous variations of which these simple forms are capable. Among the 

 twelve consecutive groups a-l, there are only three corresponding pairs ; viz., 

 e and g, i and /(, j and /. 



On the garment in Fig. 3, Plate xxvn, we see combinations of two 

 fish-spirals. One of them contains the same motive as i in Fig. 2 ; that is, 

 spirals with two conventionalized bipartite fishes united into one figure and 

 placed around them. The other motive is a recurved spiral worked out as a 

 fish-body, with tail in the form of a triskeles. On the bottom edge, fish-bodies 

 are gracefully twined close around the spirals, that terminate alternately, below, 

 in cock s heads. 



Fig. 4, Plate xxvn, shows a dress embroidered with white chain-stitching on 

 a black background. The ornaments on the two longitudinal borders might be 

 designated as continuous cock-spirals, for, in spite of their scroll character, the 

 original cock motive is still rather conspicuous. Exactly in the middle we 

 observe what are obviously cocks of Type B, their backs turned toward each 

 other. The beaks are strongly marked. The ovals are under the throats, and 

 the two bodies are connected above by an arc, inside of which two conventional 

 ized fishes are designed. At the beginning no less than at the end of this 

 pattern the beak with the roundish object in front of it is distinctly visible in the 

 fishtail-shaped triskeles; also in the other triskeles next to the central figure the 

 head stands out distinct from the beak of the bird, and this motive occurs 

 also on the collar. On the upper part of the pockets sewed to both sides we 

 note an odd figure not as yet met with. Within two crescents we find two 

 conventionalized fishes, and over their heads the head, eye, and beak of a cock ; 

 while over each fish-tail rises the head of a musk-deer, its two ears erect. Two 

 combatant cocks and two deer, their heads turned so that they are looking at 

 each other, are accordingly united in this one figure. 



In Fig. i, Plate xxvm, is represented a woman s silk-embroidered coat. 

 On it are seen two perching cocks (a) standing opposite each other, and holding 

 fishes in their mouths. Under each of these single cocks is a pair of combatant 

 cocks (ti) showing a much more advanced stage of conventionalization. In the 

 cocks placed sideways (c) the pinions as well as the tail-feathers are expressed 



