146 



TWO SUMMEKS WORK IN PUEBLO KUINS 



[ETH. ANN. 22 



BIRD FIOURES 



Figures of birds predomiiiiite in tlie pictography of all tho ancient 

 pueblo ruins wliicli have been studied. This is true no less of Four- 

 mile ruin than of those lower down on the Little Colorado river. In 

 their delineations of bird figures, however, the artists took strange 

 liberties with nature, representing birds unknown to students of 

 ornithologj\ One of the most interesting of these from Four-mile 

 ruin was a t(jothed liird drawn on the interior of a food basin. That 



Ptg. fll. Bird design on food bowl from Four-mile ruin (number 177:20:11. 



this picture was intended to represent a bird would seem to l)e shown 

 by the representation of wings and tail, though but for the latter 

 organ it might be suggested with some justice that a bat was intended. 

 In all these representations of mythical animals the imagination had 

 full sway. It was not the bird with which the artist was familiar 

 thi-ough observation, buti a monstrous creation of fancy, distorted 

 by imaginations — real only in legends — that the potter painted on her 

 vessels. Hence, we can not hope to identifj^ them, unless we are 

 familiar with the mythology of the painters, much of which has 



