FEWKES] SUN SYMBOLS AND GEOMETRIC FIGURES TOL 
It may be added that in this figure we have probably the most aber- 
rant sun-symbol yet recognized, and on that account there is a possi- 
bility that the validity of my identification is more or less doubtful. 
The three designs shown in plate CLVIU, ¢, d, ¢, evidently belong in 
association with sun or star symbols, but it is hardly legitimate to 
definitely declare that such an interpretation can be demonstrated. 
The modern Tusayan Indians declare that the equal-arm cross is a 
symbol of the “Heart of the Sky” god, which, from my studies of the 
effigies of this personage on various altars, I have good reason to 
identify with the lightning. 
GEOMETRIC FIGURES 
INTERPRETATION OF THE FIGURES 
Most of the pottery from Sikyatki is ornamented with geometric 
desigus and linear figures, the import of many of which are unknown. 
Two extreme views are current in regard to the significance of these 
designs. To one school everything is symbolic of something or some 
religious conception; to the other the majority are meaningless save as 
decorations. I find the middle path the more conservative, and while 
regarding many of the designs as highly conventionalized symbols, 
believe that there are also many where the decorator had no thought 
of symbolism. I have ventured an explanation of a few of the former. 
Terraced figures are among the most common rectangular elements in 
Pueblo ceramic decorations. These desigus bear so close a likeness to 
the modern rain-cloud symbol that they probably may all be referred 
to this category. Their arrangement on a bowl or jar is often of such 
a nature as to impart very different patterns. Thus terraced figures 
placed in opposition to each other may leave zigzag spaces suggesting 
lightning, but such forms can hardly be regarded as designed for 
symbols. 
Rectangular patterns (plates CLXII-CLXV) are more ancient in the 
evolution of designs on Tusayan pottery than curved geometric figures, 
and far outnumber them in the most ancient specimens; but there has 
been no epoch in the development reaching to modern times when they 
have been superseded. While there are many specimens of Sikyatki 
pottery of the type decorated with geometric figures, which bear orna- 
mentations of simple and complex terraced forms, the majority placed in 
this type are not reducible to stepped or terraced designs, but are 
moditied straight lines, bars, crosshatching, and the like. In older 
Pueblo pottery the relative proportion of terraced figures is even less, 
which would appear to indicate that basket-ware patterns were 
secondary rather than primary decorative forms. 
By far the largest element in ancient Tusayan pottery decoration 
must be regarded as simple geometric lines, triangles, spirals, curves, 
crosshatching, and the like, some of which are no doubt symbolic, 
