MALLERY. | SIGNIFICANCE OF COLOR. 619 
applied vermillion and white plaster to their skins, and the German 
tribes when first known in history inscribed their breasts with the fig- 
ures of divers animals, The North British clans were so much ad- 
dicted to paint (or perhaps tattoo) that the epithet Picti was applied 
to them by the Romans. In this respect comparisons may be made 
with the Wichita, who were called by the French Pawnees Piqués, 
commonly rendered in English Pawnee Picts, and Marco de Ni¢a, in Hak- 
luyt, (e) says that Indians in the region of Arizona and New Mexico were 
called Pintados “ because they painted their faces, breasts, and arms.” 
The general belief with regard to the employment of paint in the above 
and similar cases is that the colors had a tribal significance by which 
men became their own flags; the present form of flag not having great 
antiquity, as Clovis was the first among western monarchs to adopt it. 
Then the theory became current that colored devices, such as appeared 
on ensigns and on clothing, e. g., tartans, were imitated from the 
painted marks on the skin of the tribesmen. In this connection remarks 
made supra about tattoo designs are applicable. There is but little 
evidence in favor of the theory, save that fashions in colored decorations 
probably in time became tribal practices and so might have been evolved 
into emblems. But it is proper to regard such colorations as primarily 
ornamental, and toremember that even in England as late as the eighth 
century some bands of men were so proud of their Gecorated bodies 
that they refused to conceal them by clothes. 
This topic may be divided into: 1. Decorative use of color. 2. Idi- 
ocrasy of colors. 3. Color in ceremonies. 4, Color relative to death 
and mourning. 5. Colors for war and peace. 6. Colors designating 
social status. 
DECORATIVE USE OF COLOR, 
The following notes give instances of the use of painting which ap- 
pear to be purely decorative: 
Fernando Alarchon, in Hakluyt, (/) says of the Indians of the Bay 
of California: ‘These Indians came decked after sundry fashions, some 
came with a painting that couered their face all ouer, some had their 
faces halfe couered, but all besmouched with cole and euery one as it 
liked him best.” 
John Hawkins, in Hakluyt, (g) speaking of the Florida Indians, tells 
of “Colours both red, blacke, yellow, and russet, very perfect, wherewith 
they so paint their bodies and Deere skinnes which they weare about 
them, that with water it neither faded away nor altereth in color.” 
Maximilian of Wied (/), reports: 
Even in the midst of winter the Mandans wear nothing on the upper part of the 
body, under their buffalo robe. They paint their bodies of a reddish brown colour, 
on some occasions with white clay, and frequently draw red or black figures on their 
arms. The face is, for the most part, painted all over with vermillion or yellow, in 
which latter case the circumference of the eyes and the chin are red. There are, 
