230 ISLAND CULTURE AREA OF AMERICA [eth. ANN. 34 



ORNAMENTS 



The aborigines of both the Greater and the Lesser Antilles prized 

 many kinds of ornaments to decorate their heads and bodies. They 

 are described by contemporaries as a cleanly people, bathing often, 

 and are even said to have built their habitations near the water so 

 they coidd take frequent l)aths. They painted, stained, and tattooed 

 their bodies and faces with pigments in elaborate designs and varie- 

 gated colors. These designs were said to represent in some instances 

 zemis. possibly totems. 



The early authors frequently speak also of stone pendants, shell 

 or stone necklaces, gold earrings and gorgets, and other ornaments 

 which they found on their bodies or inserted in nose and ears. Speci- 

 mens of these objects in the Heye collection have a great variety of 

 form. These are generally made of stone, but are probably of the 

 same form as those made of gold. 



Several ornaments here described have a crescentic form that sug- 

 gests the " caracolis " referred to by I.iabat ^^ and others. The ac- 

 count by Labat is instructive, although none of the prehistoric orna- 

 ments wei'e made of other metals than gold. 



" The ornaments most valued by them are caracoli, which are cer- 

 tain plates of metal ))urer than brass and less valuable than silver. 

 It has the property of neither tarnishing nor rusting. This causes the 

 savages to hold it in great estimation. Only the chiefs or their chil- 

 dren wear them. It has been thought that the caracoli came from 

 the island of Hispaniola, otherwise called St. Domingo, but the 

 savages assert to the contrary and say they trade for them with their 

 enemies, who call them alouagues through certain understandings 

 they have among them who make presents to those from whom they 

 receive things. To know whence these Alouagues are obtained is a 

 difficulty. They say the gods whom thej' adore, who make their home 

 in frowning rocks, in inaccessible mountains, give them to them so 

 that they may have greater reverence for this sovereignty. If true 

 I believe, however, that it may be that the devil abuses the feeble 

 minds of these ignorant ones by this artifice. However that may be, 

 these caracoli are very rare amongst them, and are brought from the 

 mainland. 



" They are of different sizes ; the largest are twice as large as a 

 l^iastre. They have the form of a crescent. They wear them at the 

 neck incased in wood. They wear bracelets of white l)eads, not at 

 the wrist, but on the arm near the shoulder. They also wear them 

 on the legs in place of garters. The women dress their hair like the 

 men do but do not ever use feathers stuck in the hair and never 

 wear a crown. They color themselves with arnotto as the men do, 

 also wear bracelets as they do, but at the wrist and not on the upper 



'" Nouveau Voyage aux isles dc I'Amerlque. Paris, 1742. 



