THE ARMADILLO GROUP. 



53 



figures b, c and Ji, with a suggestion of toes in the last two. The supports in figures/ 

 and g are frankly human, the representation of the loin-cloth removing all doubt 

 on this point. The bowl in the former is exquisitely turned, resembling in its 

 outline the Venetian renaissance goblet. 



The identity of the primitive leg form is completely lost in figure 66. Each 

 support is an apelike head with four projecting tongues that fill and even greatly 

 distend the mouth. If the tripod were inverted it would show a drooping left ear 

 on each head. The potter's sense of humor shows to good advantage here as well 

 as in many succeeding illustrations. From the view-point of modeling, this piece 

 has no superior in the whole collection. The diameter of the cup is everywhere 

 equal, as is that of its rim, and the distance separating the grotesque heads is 

 everywhere the same. Other specimens from this locality, eight leagues west- 

 northwest of Bugavita on the Acoo river, are also beautifully modeled. 



Grotesque heads are often attached to the rim of tripods, as illustrated in 

 Plate VIII, figures a and b. These heads occur singly or in twos, one on either 



Fig. 66. — Tripod bowl of superior modeling, sup- 

 ported by three grotesque apelike heads ; from near 

 Bugavita. Armadillo ware. '/> 



Fig. 67. — Tripod representing a primitive zob- 

 morphic type. Armadillo ware. '/» 



side. Sometimes a tail takes the place of one of the heads. In that case there 

 may be four feet with toes pointing in the direction of the head, instead of three, 

 as in figure c. The animal head on the rim in this piece resembles that of the 

 lama, which probably means either Peruvian influence or formerly a wider geo- 

 graphic range north. It will also be seen that the whole body of the animal, 

 instead of the head only, may appear on the rim (figures d, e and / ) ; and that 

 zoomorphic features may be shifted to the equatorial zone, altering somewhat the 

 more or less spherical form of the bowl (figures g and h). 



A further step toward the conversion of the phytomorphic into the animal type 

 is taken in figures 67 and 68. The sculptor's treatment of the eye is an interesting 

 study. It is sometimes a plain node. More often the node is flattened and marked 

 with an annular indentation such as a straw or hollow reed would make. But 

 the most common method of all is to represent the eyelids by an incised line 

 across the center of the flattened node. When the latter is comparatively large 

 and set in a shallow cavity, it may look exactly like the head of a screw. 



There is a curious little group of tripods, showing a pair of prominent screw- 



