THE ARMADILLO GROUP. 51 



when the latter is viewed from above (fig. 61). Again, they may end in a blunt 

 point. In some cases the tripod bowl is open and shallow, resembling a halved 

 calabash, in others it is almost spherical. An example of the rarer angular bowl 

 is given in Plate VI (fig. a). Tripods with a single median slit in the leg are 

 even more numerous than those with two lateral slits in each leg. To this type 

 belongs a rare double tripod (fig. b), the bowls being united by a sub-cylindrical 

 tube, slit, and carrying a single ball of clay. The shoulder ornaments probably 

 represent the armadillo. In figure c each leg has four vertical slits, two lateral 

 and two median. This brings us to a rather small but interesting group of tripods 

 with multiple slits in each leg, the slits being usually short and seldom vertical 

 (fig. d). 



The pellets, etc., with which the hollow legs of tripods are supplied, are as a 

 rule little balls of clay, numbering from one to half a dozen or more in each leg. 

 In rare instances, calcareous concretions are used in place of clay balls. Mr. 

 McNiel sent the following note with the collections he sold to Yale University 

 Museum : 



David, Chiriqui, U. S. C. May, 1879. 



Herewith I send samples of what seems a curious formation, found imbedded in soft friable 

 rock which outcrops near steamer's landing, 3 miles from David. I am not certain whether 

 all the pebbles found in the legs, etc. of the pottery from the ancient graves are of this 

 material, but I found, on examining broken specimens, their identity. I believe the rock 

 in which they are found to be tufaceous, being much honey-combed by irregular cells. 



J. A. McNiel. 



As far as the Yale collection is concerned, the use of these concretions as 

 pellets for tripod legs, etc., is very rare indeed, occurring perhaps in a single 

 case only (fig. e). The tripod in question, which is of high artistic merit, is much 

 discolored by grease and smoke. 



The rattles in the legs of some of the tripods are not pellets at all ; but simply 

 little masses of clay, irregular in shape, that were pushed into the hollow of the 

 legs when the latter were slit or punctured. This is particularly true of the group 

 of tripods last referred to, in which each leg bears multiple punctures in the form 

 of short slits, crosses, etc. In these examples, the leg was first attached to the 

 body of the tripod, then punctured. As a rule, the character of the margins of 

 the slits would seem to indicate that the punctures were made after the paste 

 had become dry and hard, perhaps after baking (fig. /). With a mallet and small 

 punch, both of wood, I was able to produce similar punctures on baked specimens 

 without shattering the hollow leg. The slits in figure g could have been made 

 in the same way. They were lengthened by three or four successive light taps, 

 after which the end punctures were made with the same instrument. The foregoing 

 examples are both from Bugavita. Another tripod vase in which the leg rattle 

 is supplied only with irregular fragments of burnt clay is reproduced in figure h. 

 Here some of the punctures take the form of a cross. This piece comes from 

 Escaria. 



It did not require a wide stretch of the imagination to arrive at the zoomorphic 

 possibilities of the plain tripod leg. By the application of nodes and fillets of 

 clay to the hollow tripod supports they immediately assume animal forms, as 



