664 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 
dant, here and there, throughout a large portion of the country drained by the 
central and lower Mississippi and its tributaries. Each little center in this desig- 
nated territory, however, has its local peculiarities; just as we should expect 
would be the case in the work of a widely spread people subdivided into tribes 
and villages, but deriving the knowledge of the art from a common source. 
A thorough acquaintance with this type of pottery, from its comparative 
abundance, wide distribution and peculiar forms, is of great importance in Amer- 
ican archeology; and the Archeological Section of the St. Louis Academy has 
done a good work in placing within reach of all students the present elaborately 
illustrated memoir,* which is the first of a series on the archeology of a region 
that is exceedingly rich in prehistoric and early Indian remains. 
The memoir is divided into two sections. In the first part W. B. Potter 
gives an interesting account of the position and character of the earth-works 
and mounds in the southeastern portion of the State of Missouri, including an 
dmportant geological account of the great “Swamp Region” in which they are 
found. Accompanying this part of the memoir are five maps, showing the loca- 
tion of the old settlements on the ‘‘ridges.’”’ These settlements are surrounded 
‘by embankments and ditches, and include most of the mounds which were ex- 
plored by members of the Academy. 
The pottery obtained from them is described by Dr. Edward Evers in the 
second part of the memoir, accompanied with twenty-four lithographic plates, 
upon which are represented over one hundred and forty vessels of various shapes 
and different styles of ornamentation, which were selected for illustration from 
over four thousand specimens, belonging principally to the collections of the 
Academy, Dr. Engelmann, and Prof. Potter. 
In common with the pottery from many other and widely distant nations 
nd countries, many of the vessels from the Missouri mounds can be classed as 
water-bottles, bowls, dishes, and jars, and pots with or without handles. Occa- 
sionally a vessel is found which has a general resemblance to a form that is com- 
mon to some other locality, and leads one to speculate on the possibility of a 
transmission of the form from a widely separated people, or on the possibility of 
the individual occurence of the same ideas, expressed by the peculiar design, 
among people who were far apart. This thought will probably occur to many on 
glancing over the illustrations in the volume, when the general resemblances _be- 
tween many of the Missouri vessels and those from Central America and Peru, 
and the early Asiatic and Egyptian forms, will be apparent; but when the vessels 
themselves are studied, the method of their manufacture, the peculiarities of their 
ornamentation, and many little technicalities, will show a far greater divergence 
in the art itself than is expressed by the simple occurrence of identity in form 
and the realistic ornamentation common to many nations during corresponding 
periods of development. 
It is hardly necessary to state here that the Missouri pottery was made with- 
*CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ARCHZOLOGY OF MissouRI, by the Archeological Section of the St. Louis 
Academy of Science. Part I. Potvery. 
