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ISLAND CULTURE AREA OF AMERICA 



[ETH. ANN. 34 



position of the perforation by which this amulet was suspended is 

 the same as those of other frontal amulets, which leads the author 

 to include the specimen in this ^roup. It is recorded that an amulet 

 of. a frog was found with a human skeleton on Guadeloupe. 



The museum of Prague, Bohemia, is said to have one of the 

 finest amulets from the "West Indies. The author knows of it from 

 a cast in the Berlin Museum. This specimen (pi. 117, A) is made of 

 a greenstone, probably jadeite, and has the form of a frog, the head 

 and hind legs being cut in low relief. The perforations by which it 

 was susjDended appear in a view from the underside. The smooth 

 surface on this side, comljined with peculiar perforations so like 

 those of other amulets, would indicate that it might have been worn 



on the forehead by warriors 

 when they went into battle, 

 us described by Gomaru and 

 Peter Martyr. 



noXE OBJECTS 



The problematical object, 

 plate 117. E, preserved in the 

 Berlin ISIuseum, is made of 

 bone, one end having a 

 snake's head, the opposite ex- 

 tremity being slightly flat- 

 tened and bifurcated. A 

 IDerforation through the mid- 

 dle of the head would appear 

 to indicate that it was worn 

 on the body, possibly as an 

 ornament suspended about 

 the neck. The side view in- 

 dicates that a section of 

 it is round or oval, and that 

 the flattened spatulate ex- 

 tremity is separated by a shoulder from the body and head. 

 It is not unlikely that this specimen may have been used as a 

 spatula in modeling, the extremity' ornamented with a head being 

 held in the hand for that purjDose, and the flattened end applied to 

 the soft day. 



Plate 117, F, shows an unusual spoon-like object made of bone, a 

 unique form in the Heye collection. One surface is convex, the con- 

 cavity on the opposite side or bowl of the specimen being decorated 

 with incised lines on one end. Further resemblance to a spoon is 

 lost from the absence of a handle, the end near the bowl on which 

 the ornamentation appears being cut off sharply and replaced by a 

 smooth surface. 



r-^ I 



Fig. G1. — Amulet ia Vienna Museum. Shown 

 from front, back, and side. (4.38 inches.) 



