FEWKES] REPTILIAN FIGURES ON POTTERY 673 
markings, which are regarded as feather symbols. The position of 
the eyes would seem to indicate that the top of the head is repre- 
sented, but this conelusion is not borne out by comparative studies, 
for it was often the custom of ancient Tusayan potters, like other prim- 
itive artists, to represent both eyes on one side of the head. 
The zigzag line occupying the position of the tongue and terminat- 
ing in a triangle is a lightning symbol, with which the serpent is still 
associated. While striving not to strain tlhe symbolism of this figure, 
it is suggested that the three curved marks on the lower and upper 
jaws represent fangs. It is highly probable that conceptions not 
greatly unlike those which cluster about the Great Plumed Serpent 
were associated with this mythic snake, the figure of which is devoid 
of some of the most essential elements of modern symbolism. 
While from the worn character of the middle of the food bowl illus- 
trated in plate Cxxxu, b, it is not possible to discover whether the 
animal was apodal or not from the crosshatching of the body and the 
resemblance of the appendages of the head to those of the figure last 
considered, it appears probable that this pictograph likewise was 
intended to represent a snake of mystic character. Like the previous 
figure, this also is coiled, with the tail near the head, its body cross- 
hatched, and with two triangular appendages to the head. There is, 
however, but one eye, and the two jaws are elongated and provided 
with teeth,! as in the case of certain reptiles. 
The similarity of the head and its appendages to the snake figure last 
described would lead me to regard the figure shown in plate CXXxJ, ¢, 
as representing a like animal, but the latter picture is more elaborately 
worked out in details, and one of the legs is well represented. I have 
shown in the discussion of a former figure how the decorator, recogniz- 
ing the existence of two eyes, represented them both on one side of the 
head of a profile figure, although only one is visible, and we see in this 
picture (figure 267) a somewhat similar tendency, which is very com- 
mon in modern Tusayan figures of animals. The breath line is drawn 
from the extremity of the snout halfway down the length of the body. 
In modern pictography a representation of the heart is often depicted 
at the blind extremity of this line, as if, in fact, there was a connection 
with this organ and the tubes through which the breath passes. In the 
Sikyatki pottery, however, I find only this one specimen of drawing 
in which an attempt to represent internal organs is made. 
The tail of this singular picture of a reptile is highly convention- 
alized, bearing appendages of unknown import, but recalling feathers, 
while on the back are other appendages which might be compared with 
wings. Both of these we might expect, considering the association of 
bird and serpent in the Hopi conception of the Plumed Snake. 
1This form of mouth I have found in pictures of quadrupeds, birds, and insects, and is believed io 
be conventionalized. Of a somewhat similar structure are the mouths of the Natacka monsters 
which appear in the Walpi Powami ceremony. See the memoir on ‘‘Tusayan Katcinas," in the 
Fifteenth Aunual Report. 
17 ETH, PT 2 14 
