UNPAINTED WARE. 47 



It would be difficult to devise anything essentially different that would be better 

 than the classification proposed by Holmes ; yet it is by no means perfect. There 

 are more tripods, for example, in his " biscuit group " than in the " tripod group," 

 so-called. And the tripod group has many characters in common with the 

 " handled group." Again, he places the tripod group with the painted ware, but 

 many of them were never painted at all. As a large proportion of the unpainted 

 tripods that come under the head of " painted ware " had been used over the 

 fire, they cannot be looked upon as unfinished specimens. There was evidently 

 no thought of painting the pieces in question. 



Since the " white line " group is such a small one and resembles so closely 

 some of the pottery from Costa Rica, it might have been well to eliminate that 

 group altogether from the discussion of Chiriquian pottery. The same may be 

 said of the " red line " ware, which also resembles a variety of Costa Rican 

 pottery. But specimens of these two groups have undoubtedly been found in 

 Chiriquian graves. Holmes's monograph is not only so well done but also so 

 well known that to make serious changes in his classification would lead to un- 

 necessary confusion. We shall, therefore, retain the white line and the red line 

 groups. 



Quite as distinct as either of these is another small group in the Yale collection, 

 which is not mentioned by Holmes. It consists of a series of chocolate-colored 

 tripods with incised ornamentation ; this will be more fully discussed under the 

 head of the "chocolate" ware. It, also, has marked Costa Rican affinities. 



There is still another series of vessels that does not seem to have been touched 

 upon by Holmes. In form it resembles somewhat the handled group ; and, like 

 the latter, almost all the pieces had served as cooking utensils. None, however, 

 were painted. The paste, too, differs from that of the handled group, being darker 

 in color and averaging somewhat coarser. In some instances there is a distinct 

 salmon-colored slip, reminding one of the slip in one variety of the biscuit group. 

 This series evidently stands between the handled group and the biscuit group. 

 None are mounted on tripods. It may, for convenience, be styled the unpainted 

 variety of the handled group. 



I think that three important changes should be made in the classification of 

 Holmes. On subsequent pages, I shall give my reasons for proposing the name 

 armadillo group in place of " terra cotta " or " biscuit " group ; serpent group instead 

 of " black incised " group, and fish group instead of " tripod " group. 



Unpainted Ware. 



As a matter of convenience Chiriquian pottery may be classified as belonging 

 to two grand divisions depending on the use or non-use of paint. The line of 

 separation, however, is not so distinct as those defining the limits of the groups 

 composing each division. We find, for example, that one variety of handled ware 

 is painted, while another is unpainted. On the other hand, some examples of the 

 tripod or fish ware, one of the groups of painted pottery, do not seem to have 

 ever been painted. With these exceptions, the various groups fall wholly either 

 within the painted class or the unpainted class. Biscuit or armadillo ware, for 



