Ladd] PARITA AND SANTA MARIA ARCHEOLOGY, PANAMA 53 



in the material from the El Hatillo site, and I know of no examples 

 elsewhere. No whole plates were recovered, and plate sherds are 

 very rare. Large open bowls with either a pear-shaped deep base or 

 a shallower rounder base and sharply incm-ving rims (see fig. 35, c) 

 a fairly common shape in the Parita and Macaracas Polychrome types 

 are also unknown as yet for the El Hatillo type and variety. 



Bases. — Ring bases are by far the most common. Pedestals, ap- 

 parently limited to the bird bowl shape, are very short and collarlike. 



Rims. — On the globular bird bowls the rim and lip are simple, un- 

 modified incurving continuations of the body wall. Only one collar 

 was noted, on the small jar mentioned above, and it was short and 

 curved outward. The plate sherds exhibit either a rounded lip with 

 the rim an unmodified continuation of the body, or else a horizontally 

 flanged rim with rounded lip (fig. 7, q). Spout lips on the bottles are 

 either rounded or flattened horizontally, but never flanged or curled 

 in as is often the case with the Calabaza variety. 



Appendages and construction. — No handles (with the exception of 

 the efiigy vessel mentioned above) or adornos were noted. The only 

 appendages assignable to this type are the wings, tails, and heads on 

 the globular bird bowls. Very little significant information was 

 apparent concerning details of construction, except the characteristic 

 that the heads of the bird bowls clearly assignable to this variety are 

 solid. Heads vary in shape; some are relatively large and flattened, 

 others small and rounded (see fig. 10, f-i). Wings and tails tend to 

 be short and stubby. The method of vessel construction, whether by 

 coiling or paddle and anvil, was not apparent. Holes punched through 

 the bottle necks or shoulders, a common feature of the Calabaza 

 variety, are absent in the El Hatillo variety. 



Surface. — The entire exterior surface is highly polished and the 

 decorated area, although naturally varying with the vessel shape, 

 is ordinarily restricted to the upper two-thirds or half of the vessel. 

 The slip covering the undecorated area is generally a red-brown color. 

 The ground slip of the design area is lighter, usually ranging from 

 orange to a dark orange, although a lighter shade, almost a cream, 

 also occurs. One example of a light-gray slip was found. Occasion- 

 ally the lighter ground color of the design area will be used to cover 

 the entire exterior of the vessel including the base. More often, two 

 broad black bands, barely separated from each other by a very thin 

 line of ground color, will be used to divide the design area from the 

 darker basal portion. 



Colors used in delineation are red and black, the red invariably 

 bordered by a narrow black line. As may be seen, the designs are 

 primarily geometric and angular (fig, 8). When life designs are 



693-817—64 5 



