454 



FORM AND ORNAMENT IN CERAMIC ART. 



SUGGESTIONS OF NATURAL FEATURES OF OBJECTS. 



The first articles used by men in their simple arts have iu many 

 cases possessed features suggestive of decoration. Shells of mollusks 

 are exquisitely embellished with ribs, spines, nodes, and colors. The 

 same is true to a somewhat limited extent of the shells of the turtle and 

 the armadillo and of the hard cases of fruits. 



These decorative features, though not essential to the utensil, are 

 nevertheless inseparable parts of it, and are cast or unconsciously 

 copied by a very primitive people when similar articles are artificially 

 produced in plastic material. In this way a utensil may acquire orna- 

 mental characters long before the workman has learned to take pleasure 

 in such details or has conceived an idea beyond that of simple utility. 

 This may be called unconscious embellishment. In this fortuitous 

 fashion a ribbed variety of fruit shell would give rise to a ribbed vessel 

 in clay ; one covered with spines would suggest a noded vessel, etc. 

 When taste came to be exercised upon such objects these features 

 would be retained and copied for the pleasure they afforded. 



Passing by the many simple elements of decoration that by this un- 

 conscious process could be derived from such sources, let me give a 

 single example by which it will be seen that not only elementary forms 

 but even so highly constituted an ornament as the scroll may have been 

 brought thus naturally into the realm of decorative art. The sea-shell 

 has always beeu intimately associated with the arts that utilize clay aud 

 abounds in suggestions of embellishment. The Busycon was almost 

 universally employed as a vessel by the tribes of the Atlantic drainage 

 of North America. Usually it was trimmed down and excavated until 



a.— Shell vessel 6.— Copy iu clay 



Fig. 475. — Scroll derived from the spire of a conch shell 



only about three-fourths of the outer wall of the shell remained. At 

 one end was the long spike- like base which served as a handle, and at 

 the other the flat conical apex, with its very pronounced spiral line or 

 ridge expanding from the center to the circumference, as seen in Fig. 

 475 a. This vessel was often copied iu clay, as many good examples 

 now iu our museums testify. The notable feature is that the shell has 



