90 ABORiaiNAL POTTERY OF EASTERN UNITED STATES Ieth.ann.20 



iigurc seated upon the globular body of the vessel, while c and (/ are 

 average examples of the hunchl)ack figures so eonuuon in the art of this 

 region. It seems probable that jjcrsons suffering from this class of 

 deformity were regaixled as having certain magic powers or attri- 

 butes. A small Idackish bottle, cajiped with a rudely modeled human 

 head, is illustrated in c. The opening in all of these figurines is at the 

 top or back of the head. 



A number of novel forms are given in plate xxa'ii. In ii the heav\' 

 figure of a man extended at full length forms the body of the bottle. 

 The treatment of the figure is much the same in 7>. and other forms are 

 shown in r. tJ. (, and/! A very interesting specimen is shown in plate 



XXVIII. The figure represents a woman potter in the act of modeling 

 a vase. 



In plate xliii we have two examples of the remarkalile head vases, 

 probably mortuary utensils, found in considerable numbers in graves 

 in eastern Arkansas and contiguous sections of other states. The 

 faces have been covered with a whitish wash well rubbed down, the 

 remainder of the surface lieing red. Fuller descriptive details are 

 given in preceding pages and in the Fourth Annual Report of the 

 Bureau of Ethnology. Additional specimens are shown in plates 



XXIX, XXX, XXXI, and xxxii. Specimen a of plate xxix has two owl- 

 like faces modeled in low relief on opposite sides of the body, and i is 

 embellished with a well-suggested human mask painted white and 

 having closed eyes. The striking vessel presented in c and in plate 

 XLiii /' and plate xxx serves well as a type of the mortuary death's- 

 head vases, and the various illustrations will serve to convey a very 

 complete idea of their character. So well is the modeling done and 

 so well is the expression of death on the face suggested that some 

 students have reached the conclusion that this and other specimens of 

 the same class are bona fide death masks, made possibly by coating 

 the dead face with clay and allowing it to harden, then pressing plastic 

 clay into this mold. Mr Dellenbaugh" has urged this view, but it is 

 difficult to discover satisfactory evidence of its correctness. Most of 

 the heads and faces of this group are so diminutive in size and so 

 eccentric in shape that ordinary modeling was necessarily employed, 

 and this implies the skill necessary to model the larger specimens. 

 This head (plate xxx), which is the largest of the group, is only 6 

 inches in height, and if cast from the actual face, woidd thus repre- 

 sent a young person or one of diminutive size. Mj' own feeling is that 

 to people accustomed to model all kinds of forms in clay, as were these 

 pcjtters, the free-hand shaping of such heads would be a less difficult 

 and remarkable undertaking than that of molding and casting the face, 

 these latter branches of the art being apparently unknown to the 

 mound-building tribes. 



"DeUenliaiigh. F. S.. Death mask in ancient American pottery. American Antliropologist, Feb- 

 ruary 1S97. 



