24 ABORIOINAL IH>TTERY OF EASTERN UNITED STATES [eth. ann.Ju 



articles of pottery to the human remains with which they were asso- 

 ciated in burial seems to have been quite varied. It is probable that 

 the position of the vessel was to a certain extent determined by its 

 oflice; it may have contained food or drink for the dead, personal 

 articles of value, or oti'ering's to deities to be propitiated, and custom 

 or fancy dictated the position it should ttccupy; but it appears that in 

 many cases the articles were cast in without regard to relative position 

 or order. 



CIIKONOLOGY 



Anthropologists are well agreed that pottery making' is not one of 

 the eailiest arts ])racticed by i)rimiti\'e man. Its beginnings probabl}- 

 mark in a general way the step from savagery to the lower stages of 

 barbarism, as defined ))y ^Morgan. If the average aborigines of the 

 eastern half of the United States be regarded as oceupving, at the 

 time of European colonization, the middle status of barbarism, it 

 would seem that tlie practic(^ of the art was not new, having probably 

 extended througii all of the first stage of barbarism. It is not possible, 

 however, to arrive at any idea of the equivalent of this range of prog- 

 ress in years. From thi^ depth of certain accumulations, from the 

 succession of strata, and from the great mass of the structures in 

 which lictile remains are found in some sections, we are led to believe 

 that many centui-ies have jjassed since the discovery or introduction 

 of (he art: but that it was still comparatively 3'oung in some of the 

 eastern and nortlicrn sections of the United States is strongly sug- 

 gested, first, by the scarcity of sherds, and second, by a comparison of 

 its functional scope with that of the ceramic art of the more advanced 

 nations oi ^Mexico anti Central America, among whom it tilled a nuil- 

 titude of important offices. With many of our nomadic and semi- 

 sediMitary tribes it had not passed l)eyond the simplest stage of mere 

 vessel making, the only form employed being a wide-mouthed pot. 

 It may be (juestioned, however, whether degree of simjjlicitv is a 

 valuable index of age. It is possil)le that in a region where condi- 

 tions are unfa\(>rable the art could be practiced a thousand years 

 without material change, while in a more favored environment it 

 might, in tiie same pi'riod and with a people of no greater native abil- 

 ity, rise through a succession of stages to a high degree of perfection. 



FUNCTIONAL CKorPING 



Clas-sificatiox ok Vhk 



The uses to which the earthenware of the aborigines was applied 

 were numerous and important; they may be classed roughly as domes- 

 tic, industrial, saceidot^il, ornamental, and trivial or diversional. To 

 the first class belong vessels for containing, cooking, lioiling (as in 

 sui;ar and salt makino), eating, drinking, etc.; to the second class 



